Main profile

Alexis

Wellwood

Assistant Professor, Philosophy, University of Southern California

Interests: 

Philosophy of Language, Psycholinguistics, Semantics

Projects: 

Graduate-IGERT

Units: 

Linguistics

Degree(s): 

PhD in Linguistics, UMD

Advisor(s): 

Valentine Hacquard

Graduation Year: 

2014

Contact: 

anixopol@gmail.com

Role(s): 

Alumni

Website: 

Alexis's website

About: 

My research examines questions at the interface between natural language semantics and the human conceptual system across development. We conceptualize and cognize about "individuals" and "substances", and ?events? and ?processes? differently, and this has implications for the way we measure or count using language. We often perceive some individuals in the world, e.g. tables, in terms of their objecthood, and count them in terms of cardinality (three wooden tables), but we may also consider them in terms of their matter (some wood), and measure along some other dimension. Events are similarly seen as individuated or continuous, so we may count how many times an action was performed (climb the mountain), or measure the distance of or time spent at an activity (running in the park). It is not well-understood what mediates how/when we will perceive objects/events in these ways. Asking questions about this interface requires understanding not only about the relevant linguistic (linguistics) and conceptual systems (psychology, philosophy), but an understanding of how such capacities develop in children and in how they are deployed by mature adults. I conduct research on these topics combining traditional linguistics methods, with techniques in language acquisition and vision science.

Collaborators: 

Valentine Hacquard
Jeff Lidz
Paul Pietroski
Alexander Williams
Colin Phillips
Ewan Dunbar
Annie Gagliardi