The complexity of phonological transformations
How complex are phonological transformations? This question has guided a great deal of work in phonological theory, and my work investigates the complexity of long-distance patterns, usually harmony, using tools from formal language theory to help us understand the limits of natural language phonology.
Meinhardt, Eric; Anna Mai; Eric Baković, and Adam McCollum. in press. Weak determinism and the computational consequences of interaction. Natural Language & Linguistic Theory. [pdf]
Koser, Nate and Adam McCollum. 2021. Computation of unbounded processes with a suprabinary scale requires non-determinism. NELS 52. Rutgers University. October 29-31. [slides]
Yolyan, Tatevik and Adam McCollum. 2021. The expressivity of liquid dissimilation in Yidiny. 28th Manchester Phonology Meeting, University of Manchester. May 26-28 [slides]
Meinhardt, Eric; Anna Mai; Eric Baković, and Adam McCollum. 2020. Questioning to resolve transduction problems. Proceedings of the Society for Computation in Linguistics 3. [pdf]
McCollum, Adam; Eric Baković; Anna Mai, and Eric Meinhardt. 2020. Unbounded circumambient patterns in segmental phonology. Phonology 37.2: 215-255. https://dx.doi.org/10.1017/S095267572000010X [pdf]
McCollum, Adam and James Essegbey. 2018. Unbounded harmony is not always myopic: Evidence from Tutrugbu. Proceedings of WCCFL 35. University of Calgary, pp. 251-258. [pdf]