Charles Reiss

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• PhD
• Professor at Concordia University

Variables, functions, quantifiers, power sets and generalized intersections for linguistic analysis---Why should semanticists have all the fun? This book adopts the pedagogic position that the fundamental logical and mathematical notions that in linguistics curricula are typically taught explicitly only in semantics courses, can be introduced prof...

Our main goal in this paper is to sketch a neurobiologically grounded view of the symbolic primes of phonological representations, features. Before doing so, we discuss the nature of phonological computation and we argue that the innateness of features remains the best hypothesis for their origin in individuals. We offer these concrete arguments ab...

Universal Grammar is usefully viewed as a postulate that allows empirical work to proceed. I describe eleven overlapping Empirical Argumentation Devices that theoretical linguists use, often tacitly.

This note identifies a parallel between syntactic analyses that rely on remnant movement and phonological analyses that rely on bleeding rule ordering. In each case, combination of simple processes yields merely apparent complexity.

This paper is a response to Ambridge & Blything (2024), Piantadosi (2024), and similar recent papers which claim that Large Language Models (LLMs) explain how language works. We provide a series of arguments showing that LLMs are not theories of language at all, and therefore cannot be "better at theoretical linguistics" than theoretical linguistic...

Building on the theory of Substance-free Logical Phonology, which adopts the competence-performance dichotomy, strict internalism and modularity, we argue that phonology (phonological competence) and phonetics (the sensorimotor system in charge of speech production and perception) are distinct and non-overlapping domains in the complex process of t...

This paper is a response to Ambridge & Blything (2024), Piantadosi (2023), and similar claims. We provide a series of arguments showing that Large Language Models are not theories of language at all, and therefore cannot be "better at theoretical linguistics" than theoretical linguistics. What little can be learned from LLMs about the nature of lan...

We suggest thinking about phonological rule environments in terms of a parameterized algorithm-target segments (INR) initiate a SEARCH for segments (TRM) that terminate the SEARCH. If independent conditions (CON) on the terminator are met, a CHANGE in the target potentially occurs. We show how this scoping works, and also show that adjacency is jus...

This paper introduces key concepts of Substance Free Logical Phonology (LP: Bale et al. 2014; Bale and Reiss 2018; Reiss 2021; Dabbous et al. 2025), and applies them to an analysis of the different behaviors of segments that surface as [v] in Hungarian. All data and the idea of relying on an underlying representational distinction between two v’s a...

These are the slides for my GLOWing lecture on Dec 15, 2023. The video is available at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sVpwRvNjloQ I present conventional wisdom on some points of phonology and offer an outlandish and idiosyncratic alternative. For example, I argue that minimal pairs and contrast play no rule in phonological grammars (although these...

Contrary to universally held assumptions, classic OT constraint interaction , without conjoined constraints, distance faithfulness or P-Maps, can generate chain shift and saltation patterns. These new results are derived by constructing OT grammars with the required properties. The key is to derive the relevant alternating segments from under-speci...

We argue that the representational primes of the human phonological faculty, the so-called distinctive features, are innate and substance-free. Our arguments for the innateness of features are built on traditional and novel logical arguments, experimental evidence accumulating over recent decades, and somewhat detailed proposals about their neurobi...

Our approach to phonology shares many traits with Minimalist analysis of FLN. Our goal is to ``abstract from the welter of descriptive complexity certain general principles governing computation that would allow the rules of a particular language to be given in very simple forms'' (Chomsky, 2000). In the spirit of Chomsky (2000zr), we propose that...

It has been universally accepted (e.g., Kager, 1999; Hayes and White, 2015) that “classical OT” (without, e.g., local constraint conjunction) can generate neither chain shift patterns (e.g., /b/ ∼ [B] and /p/ ∼ [b] in the same contexts) nor saltations (/p/ ∼ [B] but /b/ stays [b]). We provide existence proofs for classic OT grammars (inputs and ran...

Science, including linguistic science, is never about the attested data. If chemists had only been interested in attested elements and compounds, we wouldn't have plastics or synthetic elements like copernicium. As soon as one analyzes languages in terms of a base of features, syntactic categories, rule orderings, and so on, simple combinatorics gi...

This volume celebrates the work of the American linguist Mark R. Hale with contributions from general and historical linguistics, especially comparative Indo-European linguistics, phonological and syntactic theory, and language change.

We propose a model of phonological computation based on rules characterized by a small set of parameters. We focus on rules affecting segmental features. One parameter is the characterization of a class of initiator, INR, segments from which a linear Search is initiated. The TRM parameter specifies the class of segments that successfully terminate...

Saltations can be generated in a classical OT grammar by using underspecified inputs and MAX and DEP faithfulness constraints.

The well-known computational problem of generating chain shifts in a classic Opti-mality Theory grammar has a simple representational solution. Chain shift patterns can be generated by using underspecified inputs and MAX and DEP faithfulness constraints .

All changes to the internal structure of phonological segments arise from combinations of rules based on two set-theoretic operations: feature deletion by set subtraction and feature insertion by unification. Apparent cases of rules targeting underspecified segments reflect two kinds of vacuous rule application, one due to unification failure and t...

Phonology is the study of abstract sound patterns in human language, as opposed to phonetics, which studies all aspects of speech, including articulation and acoustics. The phonology of each language consists of various computations. In Sound Pattern of English (SPE) the computations are called rules, and the phonology of a language is a complex fu...

See published version in Glossa

We discuss a set-theoretic treatment of segments as sets of valued features and of natural classes as intensionally defined sets of sets of valued features. In this system, the empty set { } corresponds to a completely underspecified segment, and the natural class [ ] corresponds to the set of all segments, making a feature ±SEGMENT unnecessary. We...

http://loquens.revistas.csic.es/index.php/loquens/article/view/70/207 The papers collected here adopt a range of theoretical frameworks and address various phenomena drawn from many languages. Despite this diversity, they are united by a focus on the formal properties of phonological computation, or rather by the position that in a useful sense ph...

The chapters in this book represent the theme of “bridges” – bridging research approaches and directions across languages, methodologies and disciplines. Alongside descriptive and theoretical studies, the contributions present experimental studies addressing issues in syntax, phonetics-phonology and sociolinguistics. And alongside investigations of...

Phonological rules built from a single operation, priority union, can model both feature-filling and feature-changing processes. The distinction is handled by specifying which argument of priority union is defeasible. Priority union should be considered as a candidate for inclusion in phonological Universal Grammar.

Rules built from a single operation, priority union, can model both feature-filling and feature-changing processes. The distinction is handled by specifying which argument of priority union is defeasible. Priority union should be considered as a candidate for inclusion in phonological Universal Grammar.

Three leading ideas of Chomsky's linguistics, naturalism, internalism and nativism, all of which figure prominently in SPE, are ignored or even explicitly rejected in much post-SPE phonological work.

We develop an analysis of Back vowel harmony for the Finno-Ugric language Votic. Consistent with the tenets of Substance Free Phonology (Hale & Reiss 2008), our analysis makes no reference to markedness considerations related to ease of articulation, ease of perception, typological patterning or the notion of contrast. Our computational and represe...

This paper outlines a program for the study of phonology as a branch of cognitive science. Building on the legacy of classical generative phonology and biolinguistics, it provides a theoretical framework that strictly differentiates phonological competence from aspects of articulation, acoustics and perception. We argue that phonological competence...

We propose a derivational model that rejects the idea that reduplicated forms show multiple copies of phonological material, one of which has priority as a ‘base’, with the others as ‘copies’ or ‘reduplicants’. In such a system, it is meaningless to ask if a totally reduplicated form like Warlpiri kurdukurdu involves prefixation or suffixation. Our...

A theory based on features demands that rules apply to natural classes, defined intensionally. However , because of rule-ordering, actual surface distributions may not reflect natural classes. Since learners posit natural-class based rules despite the evidence, we conclude that the Argument from the Poverty of the Stimulus applies to phonology, con...

We propose a derivational model that rejects the idea that reduplicated forms show multiple copies of phonological material, one of which has priority as a 'base', with the others as 'copies' or 'reduplicants'. In such a system, it is meaningless to ask if a totally reduplicated form like Warlpiri kurdukurdu involves prefixation or suffixation. Our...

This presentation at University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez argues that the Argument from the Poverty of the Stimulus is just as valid in phonology as in syntax. It addresses the common denial of the relevance of PoS found in recent literature and provides a simple example based on English plurals. An analogy to masking in perception is made.

Overview of Logical Phonology presented at University of Puerto Rico Mayaguez (following a review of basic set theory). This presentation was meant to prepare the audience for the next set of slides on the Argument from the Poverty of the Stimulus.

This study addresses a puzzle in Croatian regarding the fate of the underlying palatal glide in intervocalic position. Approaching the puzzle from the perspective of Cognitive Phonetics (CP), we advance two claims: First, output phonological representations consisting of features are not directly interpretable by the articulatory system; rather, th...

This study addresses a puzzle in Croatian regarding the fate of the underlying palatal glide in intervocalic position. Approaching the puzzle from the perspective of Cognitive Phonetics (CP), we advance two claims: First, output phonological representations consisting of features are not directly interpretable by the articulatory system; rather, th...

We propose that the interface between phonology and phonetics is mediated by a transduction process that converts elementary units of phonological computation, features, into temporally coordinated neuromuscular patterns, called 'True Phonetic Representations', which are directly interpretable by the motor system of speech production. Our view of t...

Laxing and harmony in Quebec French (QF) high vowels shows dialec-tal, register and perhaps even lexical variation. A recent proposal to handle some of the data (Poliquin, 2006) contains a radical innovation to phonological theory concerning long-distance segment interactions. We question the necessity of such an account by pointing out that recogn...

In recent years, an increasing number of linguists have re-examined the question of whether markedness has explanatory power, or whether it is a phenomenon that begs explanation itself. This volume brings together a collection of articles with a broad range of critical viewpoints on the notion of markedness in phonological theory. The contributions...

Halle’s (1959) argument against a distinction between morphophonemic and phonemic rules can be understood as an argument against the relevance of contrast to phonology. After adducing further arguments against a role for contrast, the paper provides a simple contrast-free analysis of the classic problem of the voicing behavior of Russian /v/. This...

The papers assembled in this volume aim to contribute to our understanding of the human capacity for language: the generative procedure that relates sounds and meanings via syntax. Different hypotheses about the properties of this generative procedure are under discussion, and their connection with biology is open to important cross-disciplinary wo...

Imagine a theory of phonology that makes no reference to well-formedness, repair, contrast, typology, variation, language change, markedness, `child phonology', faithfulness, constraints, phonotactics, articulatory or acoustic phonetics, or speech perception. What remains in such a phonological theory constitutes the components of the Substance Fre...

We present phonological parallels to Gallistel & King's (2009) discussion of symbols, variables and function in animal cognition in order to take up Poeppel's (2012) challenge to cognitive scientists to formulate their models in general computational terms that can potentially be translated into the kind of representational and computational behavi...

This paper is complementary both to work like that of Hornstein and Pietroski [4], who explicitly exclude phonology in their discussion of a possible set of ‘basic operations’ for language; and to work like that of Mesgarani et al. [5] who report finding evidence for phonetic/phonological feature encoding in the brain. We are interested in the comb...

In this paper, we discuss how the difference between feature-changing and feature-filling processes has not been adequately addressed in rule-based, derivational phonology. We explore two different theories of these processes. One theory analyzes feature-changing in two steps—set subtraction and then set unification. Another analyzes feature-changi...

Proceedings of the Twenty-Ninth Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society: General Session and Parasession on Phonetic Sources of Phonological Patterns: Synchronic and Diachronic Explanations (2003)

Extract from Isac & Reiss 2012 that critiques Nature paper Lieberman, E., Michel, JB., Jackson, J. et al. Quantifying the evolutionary dynamics of language. Nature 449, 713–716 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature06137 and more generally talks about I-language perspective in diachronic linguistics

The theoretical proposals brought forward in this book as well as the results from the reported experimental studies present genuine contributions to the biolinguistic program. The papers contribute to our understanding of the properties of the computations and the representations derived by the language faculty, viewed as an organism of human biol...

A collection of cutting-edge work on cognition and a celebration of a foundational figure in the field. Classical cognitive science has found itself in something of a pickle; a pickle that's so deep (if I may mix a metaphor) that most of its practitioners haven't so much as noticed that they are in it. What's so good about Pylyshyn—in particular wh...

The model of stress computation proposed by Morris Halle and William J. Idsardi explicitly aims to reduce to a bare minimum the set of primitives the approach requires. In this approach, the foot types (iambs, trochees, etc.) that constitute the primitives of other models are epiphenomena arising from the foot construction algorithms. This chapter...

Leading phonologists discuss contemporary work on the topics of metrical theory, feature theory, syllable theory, and the relation among grammatical modules. The essays in this volume address foundational questions in phonology that cut across different schools of thought within the discipline. The theme of modularity runs through them all, however...

This chapter argue that wellformedness constraints are inappropriate computational devices for modeling grammar. It develops a purely derivational theory with minimal theoretical apparatus and no filters or wellformedness constraints. The conceptual arguments will be bolstered by reference to recent work developing alternative approaches to phonolo...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This book scrutinizes recent work in phonological theory from the perspective of Chomskyan generative linguistics and argues that progress in the field depends on taking seriously the idea that phonology is best studied as a mental computational system derived from an innate base, phonological Universal Grammar. Two simple problems of phonological...

This article develops an explicit procedural model of vowel harmony, and takes steps toward finding a lower bound on the computational power of phonological rules. The focus on formalization and procedural computation allows for simplification in models of representation and the discovery of interesting interactions involving the conditions in rule...

We demonstrate the logical necessity of assuming innate knowledge for language acquisition using toy grammars. The implications are applied to reconceptualizing the Subset Principle in terms of features, rather than, say, segments. Both syntactic and phonological issues are discussed, but the focus is on the acquisition of phonological inventories....

Accounting for the tremendous diversity of acoustic realizations of what linguists label as the ‘same’ sounds (featurally and/or implicitly through use of IPA symbols) cross-linguistically is a challenging task. Since a certain amount of this diversity is directly reflected in the input data presented to acquirers, and since determining its source...

The Oxford Handbook of Linguistic Interfaces explores how the core components of the language faculty interact. It examines how these interactions are reflected in linguistic and cognitive theory, considers what they reveal about the operations of language within the mind, and looks at their reflections in expression and communication. Internationa...

This article defines a number of modules composing what are typically referred to as phonetics and phonology. It describes the fact that Universal Grammar actually requires the consideration of the nature of the performance systems. The distinction between transduction and computation is introduced. The chapter then outlines Albert Bregman's audito...

In Brown, K., 2005. Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics, 14-Volume Set. Elsevier Science. Vowel harmony is the name applied to a range of assimilatory phenomena involving vowel features, typically in contiguous strings of syllables. The term is not a primitive element of phonological theory, but instead serves as a pretheoretical classificatio...

Through an examination of vowel harmony and similar phenomena, we attempt to define a lower boundary on the computational power of phonological rules. We formalize locality and discover that the conditions in rules interact in interesting ways. We also provide a unified analysis for neutral vowels in harmony processes. The focus on computation allo...

This is a never-published proceedings article from 2004 that contains some of the material that ultimately appeared as F. Mailhot and C. Reiss. Computing long-distance dependencies in vowel harmony. Biolinguistics, 1(1):28–48, 2007.

Isac, Daniela, and Charles Reiss. "Romance and ‘something else’." Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory 2002: Selected Papers from" Going Romance," Groningen, 28-30 November 2002 256 (2004): 141.

The article explores an alternative to the interpretive procedure adopted in SPE and proposes a unified interpretive procedure for all languages. The proposal solves long-standing problems by making it unnecessary to refer to a third value of binary features [θF], to introduce negation into lexical representations (e.g., [NOT + rd]), or to introduc...

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