Elaine J. Francis
Purdue University
Elaine J. Francis is a professor in the Department of English at Purdue University. In her research, she uses experimental methods to investigate the syntactic, semantic, discourse-pragmatic, and cognitive factors that underlie the grammar and usage of complex sentence structures. Her work also explores the relationship between data from experimental tasks and theoretical interpretation. For example, her recent book, Gradient Acceptability and Linguistic Theory (Oxford University Press, 2022), examines the complex problem of interpreting data from acceptability judgment tasks in relation to theoretical questions in syntax.