Acknowledgements

I am grateful to the Columbia University Seminar on Columbia School Linguistics for the many occasions it afforded me to present data and analysis pertaining to this study. I am also grateful for the Columbia School Linguistics Society Graduate Student Fellowship which has been awarded to me for the 2014–15 academic year, during which time most of this manuscript was written. I would like to thank all attendants of the Columbia School Seminar for their contribution to my development of this project; particularly Wallis Reid, Ricardo Otheguy, Alan Huffman, Joseph Davis, Nancy Stern and Radmila Gorup. Our discussions at seminar have always been intellectually stimulating and nurturing, and most invaluable in the development of the hypotheses presented in this manuscript. Of course, acknowledgement in no way implies that the above individuals agree with everything written here; all errors are mine.

I would like to specially thank Wallis Reid, with whom I have engaged in hundreds of email correspondences, ranging from the littlest to the most substantial of questions. Beginning from my first introduction to Columbia School linguistics in 2011, I have insistently raised many challenges to this theoretical framework, and Wallis has consistently taken the time to engage with me, thoroughly educating me in CS linguistics and providing me with the tools necessary to do this research.

Ricardo Otheguy has been the most rigorous reader of my work, always offering much needed encouragement along with incisive criticism and excellent advice, both in terms of content and organization. Our many hours of endless discussions have taught me a great deal about linguistic theory and have had a lasting influence on me as a scholar.

I would finally like to extend my gratitude to Juliette Blevins and Sam Al Khatib. Their questions and criticisms have challenged and pushed me to spell out as clearly and as fully as possible the theoretical assumptions and methodological procedures of CS linguistics, which many linguists are not familiar with.