Research interests
BROAD
Semantics, linguistic typology, psycholinguistics, Cariban languages
NARROW
Countability in the nominal & verbal domains, pluractionality, classifiers, artificial language learning, Macuxi
Publications
Submitted. Antono, Gregory and Suzi Lima. Pluractionality of events in Macuxi: a morpho-syntactic and semantic analysis.
Antono, Gregory. 2022. Meh contributes VERUM: A study of biased questions in colloquial Singapore English. Proceedings of the Linguistic Society of America (PLSA) 7(1). 5238. https://doi.org/10.3765/plsa.v7i1.5238
Guillaume Thomas, Gregory Antono, Angelika Kiss, Laurestine Bradford, Darragh Winkelman. 2021. Switch reference and its role in referential choice in Mbyá narratives. Corpus Linguistics and Linguistic Theory, https://doi.org/10.1515/cllt2020-0028
Antono, Gregory. 2020. Expressing a multiplicity of events in Macuxi. Proceedings of the 2020 annual conference of the Canadian Linguistic Association. Western University. (Link)
Current projects
Project blurbs to come soon!
Space and motion in Macuxi
Generals Paper II (Spring 2022 - Fall 2022):
po, ka, and everything in-between: a study on space in Macuxi
Supervisor: Suzi Lima
Readers: Barend Beekhuizen; Pedro Mateo Pedro
numeral classifiers and artificial language learning
Generals Paper I (Spring 2021 - early 2022):
Toward studying the typology of classifiers: an artificial language learning experiment
Supervisors: Daphna Heller; Craig Chambers
Readers: Suzi Lima; Myrto Grigoroglou
Output:
Linearizing classifiers, numerals, and nouns in the noun phrase. Does artificial language learning reflect cognitive biases? Poster presentation. Architectures and Mechanisms of Language Processing (AMLaP) 2022. University of York, UK. 7-9 September 2022.
Can cognitive biases yield ordering patterns within the noun phrase? Evidence from silent gesture and artificial language learning'. Talk. Cross-linguistic Perspectives on Processing and Learning (X-PPL) Workshop 2022. Department of Comparative Language Science at the University of Zurich. 12-13 September 2022.
Biased questions in colloquial singapore english
This project grew out of a graduate seminar in semantics led by Michela Ippolito, 'Expressing content with attitude', in Winter 2021.
In this project, I analyze the contribution of the meh particle in biased questions in Colloquial Singapore English (CSE). Canonical CSE questions can be formed with inversion, or with declaratives with rising intonation (maintaining neutrality), while non-canonical questions typically require discourse particles. Meh occurs clause-finally (It’s raining meh?) and has been described to mark questions and express skepticism, encoding the opposite of what the speaker thinks to be true. Drawing from Romero and Han (2004), I propose that meh contributes the meta-conversational operator VERUM, which triggers the existence of an epistemic implicature.
Presentations:
Meh contributes VERUM: a study of biased questions in Colloquial Singapore English. Linguistic Society of America 2022 meeting. Washington DC. Poster presentation. Online. January 2022.
Biased questions in Colloquial Singapore English: the case of meh. 13th Montreal-Ottawa-Toronto Semantics Workshop. Poster presentation and lightning talk. 21 May 2021. [Poster and lightning talk slides]
Publication:
Antono, Gregory. 2022. Meh contributes VERUM: A study of biased questions in colloquial Singapore English. Proceedings of the Linguistic Society of America (PLSA) 7(1). 5238. https://doi.org/10.3765/plsa.v7i1.5238
Pluractionality in Macuxi
MA Forum Paper (2019-2020).
For my Master's, I worked on the description and analysis of two constructions: reduplication and the pîtî morpheme in Macuxi (Carib), an indigenous language spoken in Brazil, Guyana and Venezuela, in relation to the multiplicity of events (pluractionality, or verbal plurality). This work is based on the analysis of Macuxi narratives as well as original fieldwork data collected in Boa Vista, Roraima, Brazil in May 2019.
Output:
Semantics of Under-represented Languages of the Americas 11 Virtual conference. 'Poster' Session. Mexico City. 7 August 2020. (Talk can be found here.)
Canadian Linguistic Association 2020 Virtual Conference. Western University. 1 June 2020.
Past projects
Language attitudes of chinese-argentine youth
Undergraduate independent research project, University of Toronto (2018-19)
Based on fieldwork done in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in the summer of 2018, this undergraduate research project examines the factors which influence the linguistic choices that Chinese-Argentine youth in Buenos Aires make, in relation to the formation of their identity. Through questionnaires and semi-structured interviews, I spoke with descendants of first generation immigrants (aged 18-25) in order to learn more about their linguistic choices and attitudes toward their languages: Mandarin or Spanish.
For years, the Asian Argentine voice has been excluded from the national narrative, which focuses on the waves of immigration from Europe encouraged by Argentina’s constitution since 1853. Taiwanese immigrants came in significant numbers in the 1980s and 1990s, while immigrants from Mainland China began to pour in since the 1990s. With the strengthening of Argentina-China commercial ties, even more immigrants have entered Argentina in the past decade. There are about 120, 000 Chinese people living in Argentina, with 80% settled in Buenos Aires province, in the city of Buenos Aires and its surroundings (Samaruga 2014). As Teresa Ko (2016) states in her paper Toward Asian Argentine Studies, there has been little scholarly attention on Asians in Argentina. This study serves to expand on Ho (2011)’s study on Heritage Language Loss in the Chinese Argentine community.
While language shift is indeed occurring, this study has found that participants are optimistic in reclaiming their heritage language. Seeing that the Asian Argentine voice has largely been unheard thus far, this sociolinguistic study can be thought of as a crucial first step to understanding a different facet of the Argentine identity in today’s world.
Presented at:
LSA Linguistic Institute 2019. Sunday Poster Session. University of California (Davis). 14 July 2019. (Poster can be found here.)
9th Great Lakes Expo for Experimental and Formal Undergraduate Linguistics (GLEEFUL). Michigan State University. 13 April 2019.
Boundless Asia Conference. RetCon and Centre for Diaspora and Transnational Studies. University of Toronto. 22 March 2019. Invited talk.
3rd Canadian Linguistics Annual Undergraduate Symposium (CLAUSE). Concordia University and McGill University. 16 March 2019.
Latin American Studies Undergraduate Research Day. University of Toronto. 8 February 2019.
Arts and Science Undergraduate Research Conference. University of Toronto. 25 January 2019.