BIO
James Berry earned his BA in English at the University of Florida, and his MA and PhD in English Linguistics at Arizona State University, where his academic interests included generative syntax, language change, sociolinguistics, pragmatics, and language contact.
Berry’s current research is primarily focused on the rise of sentence adverbs in the history of English (and other languages such as Mandarin Chinese), with a particular concentration on the use of certain sentence adverbs as secondary predicates with pragmatic meaning. Other current research interests include discourse, onomastics, and stylistics.
He said students who take classes in the UWSP English Department are supported in their educational journeys by a wonderful group of kind and brilliant faculty and staff. Students are provided a wide range of experiences, from literary studies to writing and linguistics, and from education to publishing.
RESEARCH INTERESTS
- Historical Morphosyntax
- Generative Grammar
- Sociolinguistics
- Pragmatics and discourse analysis
- Invented languages
- Linguistics pedagogy
PUBLICATIONs
Berry, J. A. (2018). A generative approach to lexicalization: Speech-act ‘frankly’ in the history of English. WORD. 64(3), 135-156. https://doi.org/10.1080/00437956.2018.1490422
QUOTE
“Only connect.” – E.M. Forster
LAST BOOK READ
“Because Internet: Understanding the New Rules of Language” by Gretchen McCulloch
ADVICE
Finished is better than perfect.