Rate My Professor Peter Peterson

Peterson's research focuses on English syntax, with particular emphasis on complex sentence structures such as relative clauses, coordination, apposition, and associated phenomena, analyzed through the Lexical Functional Grammar framework. He established a theoretical account of coordination utilizing non-headed set analysis and alternatives to endocentric configurations. In Second Language Acquisition, his work examines the development of morphological and syntactic structures in learner English, underpinned by a large database of taped conversations with migrants from non-English speaking backgrounds, recognized as the largest such collection in Australia. This resource supports student projects, his research, and teaching. Key publications include contributions to The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language (2002), such as 'Coordination and Supplementation' and 'Relative Constructions and Unbounded Dependencies'; the journal article 'Coordination: Consequences of a Lexical-Functional Account' in Natural Language & Linguistic Theory (2004); 'Commas and Connective Adverbs' (2009); 'Speaker's Choice: Number and Case "Agreement" in Coordination' (2007); and 'Non-Restrictive Relatives and Other Non-Syntagmatic Relations in a Lexical-Functional Framework' (2004). His teaching encompasses linguistics and children's literature.