Research

My research interests and experience vary widely. I originally worked on a project investigating the acquisition of phonology by children learning English as their first language. The project used experimental methods to test theoretical models of phonology. My doctoral research focused on the syntax of appositive constructions within the model of generative grammar. My thesis provides a description of appositives within a formal model of grammar.

O’Connor, K. M. 1999. On the role of segmental contrasts in the acquisition of clusters. In K. Baertsch & D. A. Dinnsen (eds.), Indiana University working papers in linguistics 1: Optimal green ideas in phonology. Bloomington, IN: IULC. 109-126.

Dinnsen, D. A., McGarrity, L. W., O’Connor, K. M. & Swanson, K. A. B. 2000. On the role of sympathy in acquisition. Language Acquisition 8, 321-361.

Dinnsen, D. A. & O’Connor, K. M. 2001. Implicationally-related error patterns and the selection of treatment targets. Language, Speech and Hearing Services in Schools 32, 257-270.

Dinnsen, D. A. & O’Connor, K. M. 2001. Typological predictions in developmental phonology. Journal of Child Language 28, 597-618.

Dinnsen, D. A., O’Connor, K. M. & Gierut, J. A. 2001. The puzzle-puddle-pickle problem and the Duke-of-York gambit in acquisition. Journal of Linguistics 37, 503-525.

O’Connor, K. M. 2001. When is a cluster not a cluster? Clinical Linguistics & Phonetics 15, 53-56.

Gierut, J. A. & O’Connor, K. M. 2002. Precursors to onset cluster acquisition. Journal of Child Language 29, 495-517.

Langford, C. & O’Connor, K. M. 2005. Pre-posed color adjectives in French: A diachronic corpus study in micro-change. In J. Kabatekl, C. Pusch & W. Raible (eds.), Romanistische Korpuslinguistik II: Korpora und diachrone Sprachwissenschaft. Tübingen: Narr. 483-494.

O’Connor, K. M. 2008. Adverbs as evidence for functional structure in appositives. Proceedings of Language at the University of Essex 2007.

O’Connor, K. M. 2008. Aspects de la syntaxe et de l’interprétation de l’apposition à antécédent nominal. Thèse de doctorat, Université de Lille 3.

O’Connor, K. M. 2012. On the positions of subjects and floating quantifiers in appositives. In J. Błaszczak, B. Rozwadowska & W. Witkowski (eds.), Current issues in generative linguistics: Syntax, semantics and phonology. Wroclaw: Center for General and Comparative Linguistics at the University of Wroclaw. 76-89. http://www.ifa.uni.wroc.pl/linguistics/gliw.html

Loock, R. & O’Connor K. M. 2013. The discourse functions of non-verbal appositives. Journal of English Linguistics 41, 332-358.

O’Connor, K. M. & Patin, C. 2015. The syntax and prosody of apposition in Shingazidja. Phonology 32, 111-145.

Dawson, A., Auran, C., Bouzon, C., Delrue, L., Loock, R., O’Connor, K. M. & Patin, C.. To appear. French in Nord-Pas de Calais: Two speakers from La Madeleine. In S. Detey, J. Durand, B. Laks & C. Lyche (eds.), Varieties of spoken French: A source book.  Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Haegeman, L. & O’Connor, K. M. To appear. Contre l’analyse racine des propositions relatives non introduites en anglais.

Presentations

O’Connor, K. M. 1999. When is a cluster not a cluster? Paper presented at the annual conference of the International Clinical Phonetics & Linguistics Association, Montreal, Canada.

O’Connor, K. M. 1999. Prerequisites to cluster acquisition. Paper presented at the annual conference of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association, San Francisco, California.

Dinnsen, D. A., O’Connor, K. M. & Gierut, J. A. 2001. An optimality theoretic solution to the puzzle-puddle-pickle problem. Paper presented at the annual conference of the Linguistic Society of America, Washington, DC.

O’Connor, K. M. 2001. Parametric change and the development of SVO interrogatives in the history of French. Paper presented at the Linguistic Symposium on Romance Languages XXXI, University of Illinois, Chicago.

O’Connor, K. M. 2002. Hidden rankings in optimality theory: Evidence from second language acquisition. Paper presented at Generative Linguistics in the Old World: Workshop on Phonological Acquisition, University of Utrecht, Netherlands.

Langford, C. & O’Connor, K. M. 2002. Empirical evidence for a diachronic perspective of pre-posed color adjectives in French and Italian. Paper presented at the annual conference of the Modern Language Association: Panel on Comparative Romance Linguistics, New York, New York.

Langford, C. et O’Connor, K. M. 2003. Micro-change in the French noun phrase: The case of pre-posed color adjectives. Paper presented at la Deuxième rencontre fribourgeoise de la linguistique sur corpus appliquée aux langues romanes, Freiburg, Germany.

O’Connor, K. M. 2004. A clausal analysis of appositives in English. Paper presented at the annual conference of the Linguistics Association of Great Britain, University of Surrey, Roehampton.

O’Connor, K. M. 2007. An analysis of adverbs in appositives. Paper presented at Language at the University of Essex Postgraduate Conference, Colchester, Great Britain.

O’Connor, K. M. 2009. Adverbs as evidence for higher syntactic structure in appositives. Paper presented at the International Conference on the Linguistics of Contemporary English, University of London, Great Britain.

Corteel, C. & O'Connor, K. M. 2010. Autre - différent vs. other - different: A contrastive approach. Paper presented at Re-Thinking Synonymy, University of Helsinki, Finland.

Loock, R. & O'Connor K. M. 2011. The discourse functions of non-finite appositives. Paper presented at the 12th International Pragmatics Conference, University de Manchester, Great Britain.

O’Connor, K. M. 2011. Subjects and floating quantifiers in non-restrictive non-finite modification. Paper presented at Generative Linguistics in Poland 7, Wroclaw, Poland.

Patin, C. & O’Connor, K. M. 2012. The syntax and prosody of apposition in Shingazidja. Paper presented at Syntax-Phonology Interface from a Cross-Linguistic Perspective, Berlin, Germany.

O’Connor, K. M. & Patin, C. 2013. Nominal apposition in Shingazidja. Paper presented at the Fifth International Conference on Bantu Languages, Institut des langues et civilisations orientales, Paris, France.

O’Connor, K. M. 2013. A semantic analysis of non-restrictive NP modifiers. Paper presented at the International Conference on the Linguistics of Contemporary English, University of Texas, Austin.

Bouzon, C. & O’Connor, K. M. 2015. The interaction of aspiration and syllabification in the English of French speakers. Paper presented at the annual conference La phonologie de l’anglais contemporain, Toulouse, France.

Invited presentations

O’Connor, K. M. 2000. Current issues in phonological acquisition. Presentation for the Multidisciplinary seminar in language acquisition, Indiana University, Bloomington.

O’Connor, K. M. & Swanson, K. A. B. 2000. Current issues in L2 phonological acquisition. Presentation for the Multidisciplinary seminar in language acquisition, Indiana University, Bloomington.

O’Connor, K. M. 2012. Some thoughts on non-nominal appositional modifiers. Presentation for (Ap)positive thinking in linguistics, University of Groningen, Netherlands.