UC Spark

Dr Katherine Susan Kearns

School of Social and Political Sciences; Linguistics

Fields of Research

  • Semantics, especially verbs and time
  • Syntax, especially verbs and verb phrases
  • Variation in sentential syntax - complementizers

Researcher Summary

Syntax and semantics, particularly verb phrase syntax, the lexical semantics of verbs, aspect and aktionsarten, and the syntax and semantics of events. Recent research also includes syntactic variation in the realization of the English finite complementizer.

Subject Area: Disciplines

Research Groups

Affiliations

Publications

(Selected outputs for 2002-2007)

  • Kearns, K. (2007) That that thing we do: Where to omit 'that' in noun complement clauses. Hamilton, New Zealand: Linguistic Society of New Zealand (LSNZ) 17th Biennial Conference, 19-20 Nov 2007. (Conference Contribution - Full conference paper)
  • Kearns, K. (2006) Lexical Semantics. In B. Aarts and A. McMahon (Ed.), The Handbook of English Linguistics: 557-580. Oxford: Blackwell. (Chapter in Book)
  • Kearns, K. (2005) Composed accomplishment events in English: Syntax and semantics. Wuppertal, Germany: Wuppertaler Linguistisches Forum, 23 Jun 2005. (Oral Presentation)
  • Kearns, K. (2005) I think epistemic phrases could be revisited. Brisbane, Australia: University of Queensland Linguistics Seminar, 28 Oct 2005. (Oral Presentation)
  • Kearns, K. (2005) Telic senses of deadjectival verbs. Konstanz, Germany: Konstanz University Linguistics Colloquium, 16 Jun 2005. (Oral Presentation)
  • Kearns, K. (2005) The Distribution of Null Finite Complementizer in English. Auckland, New Zealand: New Zealand Linguistics Society Conference, 17-18 Nov 2005. (Conference Contribution - Full conference paper)
  • Kearns, K. (2004) Review of S. Rothstein 2004, Structuring Events: A study in the semantics of lexical aspect. Te Reo 46: 118-132. (Journal Article)
  • Kearns, K. (2003) Durative achievements and individual-level predicates on events. Linguistics and Philosophy 26(5): 595-635. (Journal Article)
  • Kearns, K., Lewis, H. and Toivonen, I. (2003) The grammatical function of with-themes in English. Helsinki, Finland: SKY Symposium, Nov 2003. (Conference Contribution - Other)
  • Kearns,K. (2002) Review of Eckardt, 'Adverbs, events and other things'. Word 53: 87--99. (Journal Article)
  • Kearns, Kate. (2002) Review of Regine Eckardt, Adverbs, Events and Other Things: Issues in the Semantics of Manner Adverbs.. Word 53(1): 87-99. (Journal Article)