The River Liffy, Dublin

I am a second-year grad student working on my PhD in Linguistics at Rutgers. I'm primarily interested in phonology (and its interfaces with phonetics and morphology), signed languages, and Optimality Theory. I have also done some work on a null nominal construction in Spanish.

If you want to know more about me, my CV [pdf] might be of interest.

Current Work

Some of my current and recent projects are listed below. For other selected work, see the research page.

Undergrad course: Linguistics of signed languages
Over the summer of 2008 I designed a course on the linguistics of signed languages, focusing on phonology, syntax, and semantics, as well as Deaf arts and culture. The course uses data from several signed languages, especially ASL and Auslan, to combat many of the false assumptions about signed languages.

What leaves the phonological module?
Does the output of phonology contain morphological structure? Information about the phonological input? I am investigating these question with phonetic analysis as well as theoretical evidence.

Phonetics/phonology interface in signed languages
Recently, much attention has been paid to the phonetics/phonology interface. This attention, however, has centered on spoken languages. Signed languages clearly have different articulatory mechanisms than spoken ones, and I am interested in what these differences suggest for the interface.

Phonologically conditioned suppletion
Allomorphy sometimes occurs in regular phonological contexts, but without plausible phonological explanatons for the forms of each allomorph. I am examining ways of modeling this form of suppletion in OT.

Contact Information

Email: < abraver /æt/ rutgers.edu >
Mail: Aaron Braver
Linguistics Department
Rutgers University
18 Seminary Place
New Brunswick, NJ 08901
IM: AIM/Skype/Google: AaronBraver

Personal Interests

I like computers. There, I said it. Stop laughing - computers are cool now. I also enjoy SciFi, especially Battlestar Galactica, Doctor Who, and Torchwood.