Aron Finholt

I am a postdoctoral researcher in the Syntax, Morphology, and Variability research group and the Morpho-Syntax Lab in the Linguistics Department at the University of Potsdam. My research focuses on the interfaces between syntax, semantics, and morphology. I explore these domains through a combination of fieldwork and corpus methods, working primarily with understudied languages of the Bantu language family of Central and East Africa.

One topic of considerable interest to me currently is the morphosyntactic expression and semantic interpretation of non-verbal predication. My dissertation, Non-verbal predication and copular variation in Eastern Bantu, explores this topic through a typological investigation of non-verbal predication in a small cluster of Great Lakes Bantu languages that have been shown to exhibit significant and highly complex patterns of copular allomorphy. Some of the broad questions I aim to address include: What are the factors that condition the morphosyntactic realization of non-verbal predication in Bantu languages and beyond? What patterns do we observe among Bantu languages in terms of the form(s) used to realize different types of non-verbal predication relations? How are different non-verbal predications – and the forms used to help realize them (e.g., forms of the copula) –semantically interpreted? How does non-verbal predication relate to other types of predication, e.g., possessive predication? How do these typological observations comment on our structural and semantic models of (non-verbal) predication?

My interest in non-verbal predication and copular allomorphy extends to a range of other related phenomena as well, including the derivation/compositional status of possessive HAVE-verbs, the distribution and semantic function of complementizers, and focus constructions. I am also interested and actively involved in research related to the syntax-phonology interface, specifically as it pertains to verbal tone assignment in Eastern Bantu languages.

In addition to my role as a researcher, I am also an instructor in the Linguistics M.Sc. program at the University of Potsdam. Recent courses I have taught include an empirical methods course on field research and a syntax/morphology seminar course on non-verbal predication.

TALKS/POSTERS
2025 "Locative inversion strategies in Mashi", at 56th Annual Conference on African Linguistics, University of Minnesota. (handout)

2024 "Interpretive effects of the copula -ri in Kinyarwanda and Kinyamulenge", at 55th Annual Conference on African Linguistics, McGill University. (handout)

2023 "Locatives in Mashi", at 54th Annual Conference on African Linguistics, University of Connecticut (slides)

2023 "Interpretive contrasts in the Kifuliiru copular system", at 41st West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics, University of California Santa Cruz. (handout)

2023 "Three-way Copular Contrast in Kifuliiru", at 97th Annual Meeting of the Linguistics Society of America, Denver, CO. (handout)

2022 (alternate; with John Gluckman) "Evidentiality and Modality in the Mashi complementizer system", at TripleAFLA 2022, University of Manchester

2022 "On the Semantic Contribution of Complementizers: Data from Mashi", at 53rd Annual Conference on African Linguistics, University of California San Diego

2022 (with John Gluckman, Stephanie Born, Jack Foster and Lucy Whittington) "Non-verbal Predication in Kihavu", at 53rd Annual Conference on African Linguistics, University of California San Diego

2022 "To (use) be or not to (use) be: Non-Verbal Predication Strategies in Eastern Bantu" at Western Speaks Talk Series, Western Washington University

2022 "On Complementizer Choice in Swahili", at 44th Annual Conference of the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Sprachwissenschaft (DGfS), University of Tübingen (handout)

2022 "States and Possession in Mashi: Novel Evidence for Decomposing HAVE", at 96th Annual Meeting of the Linguistics Society of America, Washington D.C.

2022 (with John Gluckman) "Complementizer Choice and Relative Belief: On Swahili Complementizer Variation", at 96th Annual Meeting of the Linguistics Society of America, Washington D.C (poster)

2021 "A Parallelism between be and have: Evidence from Mashi for the decomposition of have", Monday Linguistics Colloquia Series, University of Florida

2021 "Decomposing HAVE: Evidence from Possessive Predication in Mashi", at 52nd meeting of the North East Linguistic Society, Rutgers University

2021 "Evidence and Relative Belief: Swahili Complementizer Variation", at New Ways of Analyzing Variation 49, University of Texas

2021 (with John Gluckman) "Reason and Result in Kinyamulenge" at TripleA 8, National University of Singapore (recording) and (handout)

2021 "A New Perspective on Swahili's Dual-Complementizer System", at 37th Annual Northwest Linguistics Conference, University of British Columbia

2021 (with John Gluckman) "A Corpus Study of Swahili's Dual-Complementizer System", at 51st & 52nd Annual Conference on African Linguistics (ACAL), University of Florida (handout)

2019 "The Scope of Negation In Romance", at WWU Scholars Week, Western Washington University

2019 (with Grace deMeurisse) "Western Talks", at WWU Scholars Week, Western Washington University

PAPERS
In revision (with John Gluckman) "A preliminary typology of causal clauses in Bantu languages"

2024 "Copulas, Possession, and the Temporary-Permanent Distinction in Mashi: Evidence for decompositional HAVE". Glossa: a journal of general linguistics (DOI: 10.16995/glossa.9977)

2023 (with John Gluckman) "A corpus analysis of Swahili's dual complementizer system" Journal of African Languages and Linguistics (DOI: 10.1515/jall-2023-2005)

PROCEEDINGS
Under review "Interpretive effects of the copula -ri in Kinyarwanda and Kinyamulenge", Proceedings of ACAL 55

To appear "Interpretive contrasts in the Kifuliiru copular system", Proceedings of WCCFL 41

To appear (with John Gluckman) "A New Perspective on Swahili's Dual-Complementizer System", Proceedings of ACAL 51/52

2022 "Decomposing HAVE: Evidence from Possessive Predication in Mashi", Proceedings of the Fifty-Second Annual Meeting of the North East Linguistic Society, Volume One

2022 (with John Gluckman) "Reason and purpose in Kinyamulenge", Proceedings of TripleA 8 (accessible at https://scholarbank.nus.edu.sg/handle/10635/231238)

PH.D. DISSERTATION
2024 "Non-verbal predication and copular variation in Eastern Bantu", University of Kansas

M.A. THESIS
2021 "Attitude Reports and Relative Belief: A New Perspective on the Swahili Dual-Complementizer System", University of Kansas