Ali Aenehzodaee has successfully defended his dissertation, "On Fictional Names, Linguistic Pretense, and Imaginative Resistance." His Advisor was Stewart Shapiro. 

Ali’s dissertation addresses three central puzzling issues broached by our fictional talk and thought: the semantics of fictional names, the nature of the speech acts deployed in storytelling, and the so-called puzzle of imaginative resistance. It defends three claims: that fictional names have the underlying semantics of predicates; that fictional utterances can constitute genuine assertions; and that readers confront imaginative resistance when they find the offending fictional assertions inexplicable. 

If the fall, Ali will begin a tenure track position at Harper College. 

Congratulations Ali!