Ivano Caponigro

About

Ivano Caponigro received his Ph.D. in linguistics from UCLA. His research interests focus on the study of how different languages convey the same meaning by possibly different combinations of words or smaller units into sentences. He is a linguist interested in cross-linguistic formal semantics and its interfaces with formal pragmatics and syntax. He has conducted extensive collaborative work on varieties of wh-constructions and relative clauses in Indo-European languages, Mesoamerican languages, ASL, and Adyghe (Northwest Caucasian). He co-leads Syntax and Semantics Babble, a weekly informal discussion group on theoretical and experimental aspects of syntax and semantics and related areas such as their interfaces with morphology, pragmatics, and philosophy of language.

Research topics

• Computer Science
• Linguistics
• Philosophy
• Natural Language Processing
• Artificial Intelligence
• Combinatorics
• Biology
• Mathematics
• Psychology
• Programming language

Selected publications

• Experimental syntax and the variation of island effects in English and Italian

  Natural Language & Linguistic Theory · 2015-04-09 · 169 citations

  articleOpen access
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Rhetorical questions as questions

  Movebank · 2019-08-07 · 110 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  We argue that rhetorical questions are semantically the same as ordinary questions. New data is presented to show that rhetorical questions allow for answers and the range of their answers is the same as ordinary questions. An analysis is proposed according to which rhetorical and ordinary questions only differ at the pragmatic level: a question is interpreted as a rhetorical question when its answer is known to the Speaker and the Addressee, while it is interpreted as an ordinary question when…

  PublisherDOI

• The puzzling degraded status of <i>who</i> free relative clauses in English

  English Language and Linguistics · 2015-11-17 · 43 citations

  articleSenior author

  There is a puzzling asymmetry in English with respect to free relative clauses introduced by what and who , with the former (e.g. [ What Glenn said ] didn't make much sense ) intuitively being much more acceptable than the latter (e.g. [ Who Glenn married ] didn't make much money ). In this squib, we explore this degraded acceptability of who free relative clauses, and from the results of an experimental study we identify syntactic features of the sentence that influence the level of acceptabili…

  PublisherDOI

• Free choice free relative clauses in Italian and Romanian

  Natural Language & Linguistic Theory · 2017-08-24 · 38 citations

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Introducing Headless Relative Clauses and the Findings from Mesoamerican Languages

  Oxford University Press eBooks · 2021 · 37 citations

  1st authorCorresponding

  This introductory chapter pursues several goals. First, it introduces the characters at the center of the volume: both the main characters, i.e., varieties of headless relative clauses, and the equally important supporting characters, i.e., headed relative clauses and <italic>wh</italic>- interrogative clauses. The next chapters can, therefore, assume that the reader is already familiar with these core constructions and just focus on their manifestations in the specific languages under investiga…

  PublisherDOI

Frequent coauthors

• Carlo Cecchetto

  69 shared

• Kathryn Davidson

  Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research

  69 shared

• Valentina Aristodemo

  University of Trento

  64 shared

• Carlo Geraci

  École Normale Supérieure - PSL

  64 shared

• Caterina Donati

  Laboratoire de Linguistique Formelle

  64 shared

• Labex Efl

  Radboud University Nijmegen

  64 shared

• Onno Crasborn

  Radboud University Nijmegen

  64 shared

• Lisa Pearl

  University of California, Irvine

  24 shared

Similar researchers at University of California, San Diego

• Rachel Mayberryh-41
• Andrew Kehlerh-30
• Robert Kluenderh-24