Hi. My name is Yuhong Zhu (朱 宇宏; IPA: [y:.hoŋ ʈʂʷu:]). I’m a sixth-year PhD candidate in the Linguistics department at OSU.
(Me, circa 2018)
Research Interests
My primary interest is phonology, especially the interaction between metrical theory and tonal systems. I mainly work with Professor Björn Köhnlein, Professor Brian Joseph, Professor Marjorie Chan, Professor Becca Morley and Professor Cynthia Clopper. Some questions I would want to answer through my work are: What role can phonological stress/prominence play in a system where there is no phonetic correlate of stress? What makes lexical tone systems different from pitch accent systems, or are they different in the first place? What roles do intonational tones play in a densely-toned language?
Besides phonological theory, I also work on phonetics and historical linguistics. I study how sound change progresses across generations, and how loanwords participate in sound change after their first introduction into the language.
My dissertation is on the tonal grammar (of both lexical and intonational tones) of Suzhou Chinese, a variety of Northern Wu.
Random facts
My favorite English word is “glimpsed”: it is one of the few CCVCCCC words English has.
My second favorite English word is “pentasyllabic”, as it is pentasyllabic.