About

Professional

I am currently a Teaching Consultant at Department of Linguistics and Translation at City University of Hong Kong. I earned my Ph.D. of Linguistics from University of Southern California in 2022. I am co-advised by Audrey Li and Andrew Simpson. I received my MA in Linguistics from Kyoto University and my BA in Japanese Studies and Linguistics from The Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Full CV | Google Scholar

I am broadly interested in linguistic theory as a model of human’s knowledge of natural language, and formal approaches to syntactic structures. My research focuses on syntax and its its mapping onto meanings and sounds, with special emphasis on movement theories and linearization of syntactic structures. I seek to further our understanding on these issues through the lens of (Hong Kong) Cantonese, as well as Mandarin, Japanese, Vietnamese, Mongolian, Uyghur, and other East Asian languages. (See Projects for more details.)

More specifically, I work on these issues:

• Surface and deep anaphora;
• The unity of head movement and phrasal movement;
• The dynamic nature of syntactic domains;
• Linearization of syntactic structures;
• Temporality and modality

and these phenomena:

• Sluicing constructions;
• Verbal anaphora;
• VP ellipsis;
• Verb movement;
• Verb doubling;
• Right dislocation;
• Hyperraising (long-distance subject displacement);
• Discontinuous predicates;
• Code-switching speeches in Hong Kong Cantonese;
• Temporal reference (in languages without morphological tense);
• Wh-expressions and epistemic modality (in the nominal domain);
• Strength in modality.

I co-initiated the Forum on Cantonese Linguistics in 2018, and host an annual forum in Cantonese linguistics since then.

I run a reading group with other grad students on Chinese syntax and semantics, discussing recent papers in the area. Let me know if you are interested!

Personal

I am from Hong Kong, a place that means a lot to me.

My Chinese name is pronounced as [lei23] [tsi25] [mɪŋ21] in IPA (or [lei5 zi2 ming4] in Jyutping). I also go by Tommy.

I run a Cantonese podcast channel 《齋・聊》.

I occasionally do some writings here.

When I am doing nothing, I enjoy staring at the sky, the sea, clouds and mountains. I think they connect every place in the world, like languages.