Implicit indefinite objects at the syntax-semantics-pragmatics interface: a probabilistic model of acceptability judgments

Optionally transitive verbs, whose Patient participant is semantically obligatory but syntactically optional (e.g., to eat, to drink, to write), deviate from the transitive prototype defined by Hopper and Thompson (1980). Following Fillmore (1986), unexpressed objects may be either indefinite (referring to prototypical Patients of a verb, whose actual entity is unknown or irrelevant) or definite (with a referent available in the immediate intra- or extra-linguistic context). This thesis centered on indefinite null objects, which the literature argues to be a gradient, non-categorical phenomenon possible with virtually any transitive verb (in different degrees depending on the verb semantics), favored or hindered by several semantic, aspectual, pragmatic, and discourse factors. In particular, the probabilistic model of the grammaticality of indefinite null objects hereby discussed takes into account a continuous factor (semantic selectivity, as a proxy to object recoverability) and four binary factors (telicity, perfectivity, iterativity, and manner specification). This work was inspired by Medina (2007), who modeled the effect of three predictors (semantic selectivity, telicity, and perfectivity) on the grammaticality of indefinite null objects (as gauged via Likert-scale acceptability judgments elicited from native speakers of English) within the framework of Stochastic Optimality Theory. In her variant of the framework, the constraints get floating rankings based on the input verb’s semantic selectivity, which she modeled via the Selectional Preference Strength measure by Resnik (1993, 1996). I expanded Medina’s model by modeling implicit indefinite objects in two languages (English and Italian), by using three different measures of semantic selectivity (Resnik’s SPS; Behavioral PISA, inspired by Medina’s Object Similarity measure; and Computational PISA, a novel similarity-based measure by Cappelli and Lenci (2020) based on distributional semantics), and by adding iterativity and manner specification as new predictors in the model. Both the English and the Italian five-predictor models based on Behavioral PISA explain almost half of the variance in the data, improving on the Medina-like three-predictor models based on Resnik’s SPS. Moreover, they have a comparable range of predicted object-dropping probabilities (30-100% in English, 30-90% in Italian), and the predictors perform consistently with theoretical literature on object drop. Indeed, in both models, atelic imperfective iterative manner-specified inputs are the most likely to drop their object (between 80% and 90%), while telic perfective non-iterative manner-unspecified inputs are the least likely (between 30% and 40%). The constraint re-ranking probabilities are always directly proportional to semantic selectivity, with the exception of Telic End in Italian. Both models show a main effect of telicity, but the second most relevant factor in the model is perfectivity in English and manner specification in Italian

Interrogating the politics of LGBT celebrity in British reality television

Since the beginning of the twenty-first century, reality television has been one of the most prolific spaces of LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender) visibility in British popular culture. Yet, in almost two decades of scholarship on reality TV, very little academic work has addressed the representation of LGBT identities within this medium, outside of a small set of makeover programmes. Where LGBT visibility in non-makeover reality shows has been analyzed, these representations have been approached as largely indistinguishable from fiction texts, their status as reality TV passing largely unaddressed. This thesis critically interrogates the relationship between reality television as a form, and the representations of LGBT identity found within reality programmes. Focusing on British reality shows broadcast between 2000 and 2014, this study explores how the generic specificities of reality television have shaped the ways in which LGBT identities have become visible within reality formats. This thesis argues that, in the figures of LGBT reality TV participants, tropes of authenticity, self-realization, celebrity and democracy bound to reality television itself have functioned as the discursive frameworks through which a series of normative scripts of LGBT subjectivity and LGBT life have been produced and circulated through British popular culture. This thesis examines the representations of LGBT identity in a range of different reality formats, including Big Brother, The X Factor and The Only Way is Essex, amongst others, alongside the discussions and depictions of LGBT participants in extra-textual media like magazines, newspapers and blogs. Through these materials, this study interrogates how different reality formats enable LGBT subjectivities to become visible in different ways, the divergent ways in which British reality television has represented different kinds of queer identities, and how British reality shows have mobilized the conventions of reality TV to construct and delineate cultural hierarchies of “acceptable” and “unacceptable” formations of queer subjectivity

Mytholudics:understanding games as/through myth

This dissertation outlines a mythological framework for understanding how games produce meaning. I first theorise mythology as it applies to games and play. This is expressed through a cycle showing how mythology is embedded in the production of games and how it impacts the interpretation of games. This is then operationalised as a method for the analysis of games. I call my theorisation and analytical approach mytholudics. I then apply mytholudics in ten analyses of individual games or game series, split into two lenses: heroism and monstrosity. Finally, I reflect on these analyses and on mytholudics as an approach.Mythology here is understood through two perspectives: Roland Barthes’ theory outlined in Mythologies (1972/2009) and Frog’s (2015, 2021a) understanding of mythology in cultural practice and discourse from a folklore studies perspective. The Barthesian approach establishes myth as a mode of expression rather than as an object. This has naturalisation as a key feature. Otherwise-arbitrary relations between things are made to seem natural. Frog’s mythic discourse approach understands mythology as “constituted of signs that are emotionally invested by people within a society as models for knowing the world” (2021a, p. 161). Mythic discourse analysis focuses on the comparison of mythic discourses over time and across cultures.Barthes and Frog broadly share an understanding of mythology as a particular way of communicating an understanding of the world through discourse. Mythology is then not limited to any genre, medium or cultural context. It can include phenomena as diverse as systems, rules, customs, rituals, stories, characters, events, social roles and so on. What is important is how these elements relate to one another. Games consist of the same diverse elements arranged in comparable configurations, and so this perspective highlights the otherwise hidden parallels between mythology and games.I argue for analysing games as and through myth. Games as myth means viewing the game as an organising structure that works analogously to mythology. Elements are constructed and put into relation with one another within a gameworld, which the player then plays in and interprets. Games through myth means seeing games as embedded within cultural contexts. The cultural context of development affects the mythologies that can be seen to influence the construction of the game, while the cultural context of the player affects how they relate to the game and the mythologies channelled through it.A mytholudic approach helps us to understand how games make meaning because it focuses on the naturalised and hidden premises that go into the construction of games as organising structures. By analysing the underpinnings of those organising structures, we can outline the model for understanding the world that is virtually instantiated and how they are influenced by, influence and relate to models for understanding the world—mythologies—in the real world