- PhD, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (2020)
- BA, University of Minnesota (2014)
- Associate Professor, Nord University (2024-)
- Junior Professor, University of Konstanz (2021-2024)
- Postdoctoral Scholar, University of Southern California (2020-2021)
Syntax; morphology; phonology; linguistic fieldwork
Colin Davis is a linguist, researching linguistic theory with an emphasis on syntax (sentence structure), morphology (the parts of words), and the general principles of language that explain their properties. He does this using data from English and many other languages. His work has dealt, for example, with languages such as Albanian, Azerbaijani, Balkar, Buryat, Chichewa, German, Korean, Russian, Spanish, Turkish, and Wolof, among others. Specific information about his projects can be found on his personal website.
Instruction
Nord University
- Syntactic Theory from the Perspective of English and Beyond (ENG2011: Special Topics in English Language and Linguistics)
University of Konstanz
- Core Components of Language B
- Syntax Research Colloquium
- Syntax II
- Field research on the morphosyntax of Brahui
- English Syntax
- Morphology II
- Topics in Morphology and Morpho-Syntax
- Syntactic Theory and Variation from the Perspective of English
University of Southern California
- Introduction to Linguistics (Ling 210)
- Seminar in Syntax (Ling 635)
- Generative Syntax (Ling 530)
Supervision & Advising
University of Konstanz
- 2022-present: Doctoral supervisor (with Miriam Butt and George Walkden), David Diem, Multiple spell-out in syntactic doubling chains
- 2023-2024: Master’s thesis first supervisor (with Tina Bögel), Romi Hill, Syntactic Constraints on the Morphophonology of Reduplication: A Theoretical and Computational Perspective
- 2023: Master’s thesis first supervisor (with George Walkden), Aygül Mehraliyeva, Contrasting the morphology and syntax of embedded clauses in Azerbaijani and English
- 2022-2023: Master’s thesis second supervisor (with George Walkden), Sijing Meng, Comparative study of Chinese and English Word-Formation
- 2022-2023: Master’s thesis second supervisor (with George Walkden), Matías Felipe Hernández Cornejo, Phonetic and phonological nature of the Old English /r/: A systematic literature review
- 2022-2023: Master’s thesis second supervisor (with Tamara Rathcke), Risako Tabata, The influence of audio-visual integration on the phonological perception of English by native speakers of Japanese
- 2022-2023: Bacherlor’s thesis supervisor, Lea-Marie Brenner, The Puzzling Case of Category Changing Prefixation in English
University of Southern California
- 2021: Qualifying paper committee member, Samir Alam, Bangla Quirky Case
- 2021: Qualifying paper committee member, Elango Kumaran, Constraint-driven Agree
- 2021: Dissertation qualifying paper committee member, Tommy Tsz-Ming Lee, Movement of quantificational heads
- 2020: Dissertation qualifying paper committee member, Madhumanti Datta, Selective Islandhood of Nominals in Bangla
Selected Publications:
2023. Concealed pied-piping in Russian: On left-branch extraction, parasitic gaps, and the nature of discontinuous nominal phrases. [With Tatiana Bondarenko.] Syntax 26.
2021. Case-sensitive plural suppletion in Barguzin Buryat: On case containment, suppletion typology, and competition in morphology. Glossa 6.
2021. Possessor Extraction in Colloquial English: Evidence for Successive-Cyclicity and Cyclic Linearization. Linguistic Inquiry 52.
2020. Crossing and Stranding at Edges: On Intermediate Stranding and Phase Theory. Glossa 5.
Research Groups
- Member, Nord University Humanities, Education and Culture Research Group (2024-)
