Bert Spector
Biographic Data
| ID | 1173264 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Bert Spector |
| GIVEN NAMES | Bert |
| FAMILY NAME | Spector |
| SIGNATURE | SPECTOR B |
| AFFILIATIONS | Northeastern University |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-0468-5986 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 44 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 119 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 44 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1949 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 8 |
Trivalence and transparency
Exhaustivity and Anti‐Exhaustivity in the RSA Framework
During communication, the interpretation of utterances is sensitive to a listener's probabilistic prior beliefs. In this paper, we focus on the influence of prior beliefs on so-called exhaustivity interpretations, whereby a sentence such as Mary came is understood to mean that only Mary came. Two theoretical origins for exhaustivity effects have been proposed in the previous literature. On the one hand are perspectives that view these inferences …
On the optimality of vagueness
Whose normal is the new normal anyway? A critical leadership appraisal of university administrators in a waning pandemic
Purpose The purpose is to offer a critique of the process of decision-making by top university administrators and to analyze how their decisions imposed their preferences and expanded administrative control. Design/methodology/approach In the fall of 2021, the top administrators at Boston-based Northeastern University required that all members of the university community return to fully on-campus face-to-face work. That decision involved a return…
Volodymyr Zelenskyy, heroic leadership, and the historical gaze
Since the onset of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a great many people have cojoined their admiration for the grit and determination shown by the Ukraine people with their esteem for the nation’s formal leader, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He has been constructed, particularly in the Western press, as kind of larger-than-life hero, displaying physical courage, resilience, and a brilliant use of communication skills to help mobilize world opinion. But the c…
The leader-as-hero-as- leader trope, once again Hearts Touched with Fire
Interpreting plural predication
Plural definite descriptions across many languages display two well-known properties. First, they can give rise to so-called non-maximal readings, in the sense that they ‘allow for exceptions’ ( Mary read the books on the reading list , in some contexts, can be judged true even if Mary didn’t read all the books on the reading list). Second, while they tend to have a quasi-universal quantificational force in affirmative sentences (‘quasi-universal…
Explaining gaps in the logical lexicon of natural languages
Across languages, certain logically natural concepts are not lexicalized, even though they can be expressed by complex expressions. This is for instance the case for the quantifier not all. In this paper, we propose an explanation for this fact based on the following idea: the logical lexicon of languages is partly shaped by a tradeoff between informativity and cost, and the inventory of logical expressions tends to maximize average informativity…
Narrating failure
Leadership as a social problem”
Sociologist Alvin W. Gouldner’s (1950) book of original and previously published chapters collected under the title Studies in Leadership: Leadership and Democratic Action opens with the proclamation: “Leadership as a Social Problem.” Although Gouldner’s work is rarely cited in contemporary critical leadership discourse, he and his coauthors make an important contribution to an analysis of the potentially counter-democratic role of leaders. By us…
Post-truth claims and the wishing away of brute facts
Post-truth claims making has, since 2016, emerged as a defining cultural and political phenomenon. It involves an assertion, made from a position of power, based on an inaccurate description of objective facts. It is a lie, to be sure, but not one intended to be taken literally. Rather, it is meant to be taken as faithful to and reflective of some deeper perceived truth. In this essay, I advance the argument that post-truth claims making is not s…
Norm-based leadership and the challenge of democratically elected authoritarians
Across the post-World War II western liberal order, antidemocratic leaders have ascended to power through the ballot box and then engaged in an assault on prodemocratic norms. Commentators have worried that counter-normative behaviors will bring into existence a “new normal,” constructing an antidemocratic regimen in which future leaders will be freed to operate beyond either long-standing or newly created democratic expectations. In this article…
Even in a global pandemic, there’s no such thing as a crisis
In my 2019 publication, Constructing Crisis: Leaders, Crisis, and Claims of Urgency, I argued that “crisis” is a label, a claim of urgency employed, typically by leaders, to characterize a set of contingencies that are, together, taken to pose a serious and immediate threat. I then proposed a typology for sorting through any such claim in order to reach a judgment concerning the legitimacy of the claim. Classification systems such as typologies a…
Distinctions between primary and secondary scalar implicatures
We made this bed … now look who’s lying in it
In considering the ‘Populist Responses to Austerity and Cultural Change: Brexit, Trumpism and Beyond’, there is a temptation, even a degree of comfort, in depicting 2016 as a kind of deviant moment in which non-elite anger and anxiety fueled an outburst of anti-progressive energy and the electoral victory of demagogues. The proposition put forth in this essay is that leadership scholarship is itself culpable. Transformational leadership, the domi…
Economy and embedded exhaustification
Unexpected Wide‐Scope Phenomena
It has long been known that quantificational expressions in natural language do not all have the same scope properties. While the scope of some expressions is closely related to their observable, “surface” position in syntactic structure, other expressions display a remarkable degree of freedom with respect to the relative scope that may obtain between them and other expressions in the structure. In generative syntax, the operation known as “quan…
Priming plural ambiguities
Presupposed ignorance and exhaustification
We investigate the interactions between scalar implicatures and presuppositions in sentences containing both a scalar item and presupposition trigger. We first critically discuss Gajewski and Sharvit’s previous approach. We then closely examine two ways of integrating an exhaustivity-based theory of scalar implicatures with a trivalent approach to presuppositions. The empirical side of our discussion focuses on two novel observations: (i) the int…
Asymmetric inference towards the antonym
In this paper, we investigate the interpretation of negated antonyms. A sentence such as Peter is not tall can be understood as meaning either that Peter is not tall tout court or that Peter is rather short (inference towards the antonym; ITA). We present the results of two experiments, in which we test two theoretical predictions. First, according to Krifka (2007), it is reasonable to expect a stronger ITA effect for positive versus negative adj…
Moral leadership? Be careful what you wish for
Comparing exhaustivity operators
In this paper, I investigate the formal relationships between two types of exhaustivity operators that have been discussed in the literature, one based on minimal worlds/models, noted exh-mw (van Rooij & Schulz 2004, Schulz & van Rooij 2006, Spector 2003, 2006, with roots in Szabolcsi 1983, Groenendijk & Stokhof 1984), and one based on the notion of innocent exclusion, noted exh-ie (Fox 2007). Among others, I prove that whenever the set of altern…
Modified numerals and maximality
Executive incentives as an instrument of leadership – Says who
There is currently wide consensus concerning the notion that corporations can and should call on executive incentives, particularly cash bonuses and stock options, to shape executive behaviors and enhance company performance. To be sure, much controversy surrounds the implementation of such incentives, but the lightning rod is typically the matter of how much, not the use of incentives themselves. Contemporary research, by and large, seeks to fin…
Multivalent Semantics for Vagueness and Presupposition
Even in a global pandemic, there’s no such thing as a crisis
In my 2019 publication, Constructing Crisis: Leaders, Crisis, and Claims of Urgency, I argued that “crisis” is a label, a claim of urgency employed, typically by leaders, to characterize a set of contingencies that are, together, taken to pose a serious and immediate threat. I then proposed a typology for sorting through any such claim in order to reach a judgment concerning the legitimacy of the claim. Classification systems such as typologies a…
The Harvard Business Review goes to war
Ideology can bond a community of individuals around common assumptions and beliefs. Ideology can also distort by leading adherents away from a rational understanding of their world. Studies of the development and history of management theory and practice regularly analyse contextual influences; most typically, economic and technological forces. Prevailing political ideology, and the degree to which that ideology impacts management thought and act…
Carlyle, Freud, and the Great Man Theory more fully considered
Contemporary surveys of leadership scholarship will occasionally mention the Great Man theory before moving on to more rigorous academic categories. Less a theory than a statement of faith, the Great Man theory does not fit into the rigorous scholarly theory and research that makes up the contemporary canon of leadership discourse. My goal in this article is to treat the Great Man theory seriously and to present a fuller notion of the theory. My …
Economy and embedded exhaustification
A uniform semantics for embedded interrogatives
Business Responsibilities in a Divided World”
Both business executives and management scholars have, in recent years, focused a great deal of attention on the theme of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Calls for business leaders to expend resources on behalf of “social good” tend to downplay, if not ignore, what is fundamentally an ideological question: just what is a “good” society and who defines “goodness”? The ideological underpinnings of social responsibility and its relationship t…
Bare Numerals and Scalar Implicatures
Bare numerals present an interesting challenge to formal semantics and pragmatics: they seem to be compatible between various readings ('at least', 'exactly', and 'at most' readings), and the choice of a particular reading seems to depend on complex interactions between contextual factors and linguistic structure. The goal of this article is to present and discuss some of the current approaches to the interpretation of bare numerals in formal sem…
Interpreting numerals and scalar items under memory load
Flawed from the “Get-Go”
Transformational leadership has undergone a critical reassessment. Rather than examining the state of the science or the conceptual confusion and contradictions inherent in the ongoing stream of transformational leadership research, this article adopts an historical perspective, looking back on the founding era of this influential concept. In particular, the article evaluates the use of Lee Iacocca, who became the personification of the transform…
Volodymyr Zelenskyy, heroic leadership, and the historical gaze
Since the onset of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, a great many people have cojoined their admiration for the grit and determination shown by the Ukraine people with their esteem for the nation’s formal leader, Volodymyr Zelenskyy. He has been constructed, particularly in the Western press, as kind of larger-than-life hero, displaying physical courage, resilience, and a brilliant use of communication skills to help mobilize world opinion. But the c…
Moral leadership? Be careful what you wish for
An Unnoticed Reading for Wh-Questions
October 01 2008 An Unnoticed Reading for Wh-Questions: Elided Answers and Weak Islands In Special Collection: CogNet Benjamin Spector Benjamin Spector Harvard University Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Scholar Author and Article Information Benjamin Spector Harvard University Online ISSN: 1530-9150 Print ISSN: 0024-3892 © 2008 Massachusetts Institute of Technology2008 Linguistic Inquiry (2008) 39 (4): 677–686. https://d…
Sources of Middle East International Event Data
The analysis of international event data has in the past several years become a major trend in quantitative and non-quantitative international politics. The upsurge of interest in event data parallels the attempt in the late 1960’s to test empirically the international relations theorizing of the 1950’s. Charles McClelland has argued forcefully that systems theory and other theories which focus on the structure, interactions and overt behavior in…
Post-truth claims and the wishing away of brute facts
Post-truth claims making has, since 2016, emerged as a defining cultural and political phenomenon. It involves an assertion, made from a position of power, based on an inaccurate description of objective facts. It is a lie, to be sure, but not one intended to be taken literally. Rather, it is meant to be taken as faithful to and reflective of some deeper perceived truth. In this essay, I advance the argument that post-truth claims making is not s…
Norm-based leadership and the challenge of democratically elected authoritarians
Across the post-World War II western liberal order, antidemocratic leaders have ascended to power through the ballot box and then engaged in an assault on prodemocratic norms. Commentators have worried that counter-normative behaviors will bring into existence a “new normal,” constructing an antidemocratic regimen in which future leaders will be freed to operate beyond either long-standing or newly created democratic expectations. In this article…
The evolution of a private-label brand strategy at J.C. Penney, 1902–33
This article focuses on the historical evolution of private-label brands (PLBs) in the USA. The article focuses on the historical forces extant in nineteenth-century America and, in particular, on the unfolding of a brand strategy at a single company, J.C. Penney, over a period of three decades. Analysis focuses on the evolving use of private labels at J.C. Penney between the company's founding in 1902 and its formalization of a distinct pricing …
A crack the Cold War consensus
Popular culture generally, and motion pictures in particular, help shape the manner in which people view their world. In post-war America, as giant corporations increasingly came to dominate the economic landscape, the public had little first-hand knowledge of the world of corporate executives. A number of corporation films helped fill that void and offered a consistently reassuring image to moviegoers. Corporations were both complex and challeng…
Noah Webster
James Francis Ballard 1878–1955
Journal Article James Francis Ballard 1878–1955 Get access BENJAMIN SPECTOR BENJAMIN SPECTOR Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic PubMed Google Scholar Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences, Volume XI, Issue 3, July 1956, Pages 339–341, https://doi.org/10.1093/jhmas/XI.3.339 Published: 01 July 1956
Sources of Middle East International Event Data
The analysis of international event data has in the past several years become a major trend in quantitative and non-quantitative international politics. The upsurge of interest in event data parallels the attempt in the late 1960’s to test empirically the international relations theorizing of the 1950’s. Charles McClelland has argued forcefully that systems theory and other theories which focus on the structure, interactions and overt behavior in…
The Weavers
Managing Human Assets
The Harvard Business Review goes to war
Ideology can bond a community of individuals around common assumptions and beliefs. Ideology can also distort by leading adherents away from a rational understanding of their world. Studies of the development and history of management theory and practice regularly analyse contextual influences; most typically, economic and technological forces. Prevailing political ideology, and the degree to which that ideology impacts management thought and act…
Business Responsibilities in a Divided World”
Both business executives and management scholars have, in recent years, focused a great deal of attention on the theme of corporate social responsibility (CSR). Calls for business leaders to expend resources on behalf of “social good” tend to downplay, if not ignore, what is fundamentally an ideological question: just what is a “good” society and who defines “goodness”? The ideological underpinnings of social responsibility and its relationship t…
An Unnoticed Reading for Wh-Questions
October 01 2008 An Unnoticed Reading for Wh-Questions: Elided Answers and Weak Islands In Special Collection: CogNet Benjamin Spector Benjamin Spector Harvard University Search for other works by this author on: This Site Google Scholar Author and Article Information Benjamin Spector Harvard University Online ISSN: 1530-9150 Print ISSN: 0024-3892 © 2008 Massachusetts Institute of Technology2008 Linguistic Inquiry (2008) 39 (4): 677–686. https://d…
A crack the Cold War consensus
Popular culture generally, and motion pictures in particular, help shape the manner in which people view their world. In post-war America, as giant corporations increasingly came to dominate the economic landscape, the public had little first-hand knowledge of the world of corporate executives. A number of corporation films helped fill that void and offered a consistently reassuring image to moviegoers. Corporations were both complex and challeng…
Experimental Evidence for Embedded Scalar Implicatures
Scalar implicatures are traditionally viewed as pragmatic inferences that result from a reasoning about speakers' communicative intentions (Grice 1989). This view has been challenged in recent years by theories that propose that scalar implicatures are a grammatical phenomenon. Such theories claim that scalar implicatures can be computed in embedded positions and enter into the recursive computation of meaning—something that is not expected under…
A Semantics for Degree Questions Based on Intervals
According to the standard analysis of degree questions (see, among others, Rullmann 1995; Beck & Rullmann 1996), the logical form of a degree question contains a variable that ranges over individual degrees and is bound by the degree question operator how. In contrast with this, we claim that the variable bound by the degree question operator how does not range over individual degrees but over intervals of degrees, by analogy with Schwarzschild a…
The evolution of a private-label brand strategy at J.C. Penney, 1902–33
This article focuses on the historical evolution of private-label brands (PLBs) in the USA. The article focuses on the historical forces extant in nineteenth-century America and, in particular, on the unfolding of a brand strategy at a single company, J.C. Penney, over a period of three decades. Analysis focuses on the evolving use of private labels at J.C. Penney between the company's founding in 1902 and its formalization of a distinct pricing …
Flawed from the “Get-Go”
Transformational leadership has undergone a critical reassessment. Rather than examining the state of the science or the conceptual confusion and contradictions inherent in the ongoing stream of transformational leadership research, this article adopts an historical perspective, looking back on the founding era of this influential concept. In particular, the article evaluates the use of Lee Iacocca, who became the personification of the transform…
Bare Numerals and Scalar Implicatures
Bare numerals present an interesting challenge to formal semantics and pragmatics: they seem to be compatible between various readings ('at least', 'exactly', and 'at most' readings), and the choice of a particular reading seems to depend on complex interactions between contextual factors and linguistic structure. The goal of this article is to present and discuss some of the current approaches to the interpretation of bare numerals in formal sem…
Interpreting numerals and scalar items under memory load
Global positive polarity items and obligatory exhaustivity
I argue for a distinction between two types of positive polarity items (PPIs) which has not been recognized so far. While for some PPIs, anti-licensing is a strictly local phenomenon, for other PPIs anti-licensing should be stated as a global condition. I aim to contribute to a principled explanation for the distribution of a significant subset of global PPIs, by relating it to specific semantic properties of the relevant items. More specifically…
Using History Ahistorically
Much attention in this journal has been paid to the ahistorical nature of management and organizational studies. Drawing from academic, practitioner and consultant literature, I look at examples where history itself is called upon – absent any of the theoretical and methodological discipline that should accompany history – to augment an authors' analysis and conclusion. In particular, I focus on presentism and the tranquility fallacy; the terms I…
Multivalent Semantics for Vagueness and Presupposition
Carlyle, Freud, and the Great Man Theory more fully considered
Contemporary surveys of leadership scholarship will occasionally mention the Great Man theory before moving on to more rigorous academic categories. Less a theory than a statement of faith, the Great Man theory does not fit into the rigorous scholarly theory and research that makes up the contemporary canon of leadership discourse. My goal in this article is to treat the Great Man theory seriously and to present a fuller notion of the theory. My …
A uniform semantics for embedded interrogatives
Comparing exhaustivity operators
In this paper, I investigate the formal relationships between two types of exhaustivity operators that have been discussed in the literature, one based on minimal worlds/models, noted exh-mw (van Rooij & Schulz 2004, Schulz & van Rooij 2006, Spector 2003, 2006, with roots in Szabolcsi 1983, Groenendijk & Stokhof 1984), and one based on the notion of innocent exclusion, noted exh-ie (Fox 2007). Among others, I prove that whenever the set of altern…
Modified numerals and maximality
Executive incentives as an instrument of leadership – Says who
There is currently wide consensus concerning the notion that corporations can and should call on executive incentives, particularly cash bonuses and stock options, to shape executive behaviors and enhance company performance. To be sure, much controversy surrounds the implementation of such incentives, but the lightning rod is typically the matter of how much, not the use of incentives themselves. Contemporary research, by and large, seeks to fin…
Unexpected Wide‐Scope Phenomena
It has long been known that quantificational expressions in natural language do not all have the same scope properties. While the scope of some expressions is closely related to their observable, “surface” position in syntactic structure, other expressions display a remarkable degree of freedom with respect to the relative scope that may obtain between them and other expressions in the structure. In generative syntax, the operation known as “quan…
Priming plural ambiguities
Philosophy (26 works) · Computer Science (25 works) · Epistemology (19 works) · Linguistics (18 works) · Sociology (18 works) · Political science (15 works) · Artificial Intelligence (14 works) · Psychology (13 works) · Law (12 works) · Law (12 works)