From w.croft at manchester.ac.uk Tue Oct 4 08:57:55 2005 From: w.croft at manchester.ac.uk (Bill Croft) Date: Tue, 4 Oct 2005 09:57:55 +0100 Subject: Word token frequency estimates for adult speakers Message-ID: (apologies for cross-posting) Are there any published (or unpublished) estimates of how many words a typical speaker is exposed to (produces and hears), per day, or per year, or even in a lifetime? I am aware of some token frequency estimates of exposure to language use by children acquiring language (though I don't have the references), but not for adults. I will post any references I receive. Thanks, Bill Croft From langconf at bu.edu Tue Oct 4 13:42:16 2005 From: langconf at bu.edu (BUCLD) Date: Tue, 4 Oct 2005 09:42:16 -0400 Subject: Important BUCLD travel info for nationals of countries other than USA, Canada, Mexico, and Bermuda Message-ID: DO YOU HAVE A MACHINE-READABLE PASSPORT OR VISA? The USA has changed its entry procedures as of June 26, 2005 for nationals of 27 countries (see below) who used to be able to enter the USA without a visa under the Visa Waiver Program. As of June 26, nationals from those countries are only able to enter without a visa if they have a machine-readable passport. If they do not have a machine-readable passport, they have to obtain a non-immigrant visa for entry to the USA, from a US consulate or embassy abroad. If you don't have either (1) a machine-readable passport, or (2) a non-machine readable passport and a non-immigrant visa to the USA, it looks like you will not be allowed to board the plane at your point of origin (there's a $3300 per person fine for any airline that allows someone to board that doesn't meet these requirements). The 27 countries are: Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brunei, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom. Note that citizens of Canada, Mexico, and Bermuda are not affected by this regulation - they do not require machine-readable passports to enter the USA. Nothing is mentioned about citizens of other countries than these 30 - please check regulations carefully. Full information on the new regulations is available at: http://www.travel.state.gov/visa/temp/without/without_1990.html#2 From Jordan.Zlatev at ling.lu.se Fri Oct 7 02:00:44 2005 From: Jordan.Zlatev at ling.lu.se (Jordan Zlatev) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 04:00:44 +0200 Subject: First CFP: Language, Culture, Mind - Paris 2006 Message-ID: LANGUAGE CULTURE AND MIND CONFERENCE (LCM 2) PARIS 17-20 JULY 2006 INTEGRATING PERSPECTIVES AND METHODOLOGIES IN THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE The second 'Language Culture and Mind' Conference (LCM 2) will be held in Paris in July 2006, following the successful first LCM conference in Portsmouth in 2004. The goals of LCM conferences are to contribute to situating the study of language in a contemporary interdisciplinary dialogue, and to promote a better integration of cognitive and cultural perspectives in empirical and theoretical studies of language. Human natural languages are biologically based, cognitively motivated, affectively rich, socially shared, grammatically organized symbolic systems. They provide the principal semiotic means for the complexity and diversity of human cultural life. As has long been recognized, no single discipline or methodology is sufficient to capture all the dimensions of this complex and multifaceted phenomenon, which lies at the heart of what it is to be human. In the recent past, perception and cognition have been the basis of general unifying models of language and language activity. However, a genuine integrative perspective should also involve such essential modalities of human action as: empathy, mimesis, intersubjectivity, normativity, agentivity and narrativity. Significant theoretical, methodological and empirical advancements in the relevant disciplines now provide a realistic basis for such a broadened perspective. This conference will articulate and discuss approaches to human natural language and to diverse genres of language activity which aim to integrate its cultural, social, cognitive and bodily foundations. We call for contributions from scholars and scientists in anthropology, biology, linguistics, philosophy, psychology, semiotics, semantics, discourse analysis, cognitive and neuroscience, who wish both to impart their insights and findings, and learn from other disciplines. Preference will be given to submissions which emphasize interdisciplinarity, the interaction between culture, mind and language, and/or multi-methodological approaches in language sciences. *Topics *include but are not limited to the relation between language and: - biological and cultural co-evolution - comparative study of communication systems, whether animal or artificial - cognitive and cultural schematization - emergence in ontogeny and phylogeny - multi-modal communication - normativity - thought, emotion and consciousness - perception and categorization - empathy and intersubjectivity - imitation and mimesis - symbolic activity - discourse genres in language evolution and ontogeny - sign, text and literacy ORGANIZING COMMITTEE Caroline David (Université de Montpellier) Jean-Louis Dessalles (École Nationale Supérieure des Télécommunications, Paris) Jean Lassègue (CNRS, Paris) Victor Rosenthal (Inserm-EHESS, Paris) Chris Sinha (University of Portsmouth) Yves-Marie Visetti (CNRS, Paris) Joerg Zinken (University of Portsmouth) Jordan Zlatev (Lund University) Further information about LCM 2 will be presented at http://www.lcm2006.net SUBMISSIONS Submissions are solicited for oral presentations and poster sessions. Oral presentations should last 20 minutes (plus 10 minutes discussion). All submissions should follow the abstract guidelines below. Submissions should be in English. Abstracts should not exceed 1200 words (about two A4 pages), single-spaced, font size 12 pt or larger, with 2.5 cm margins on all sides. Any diagrams and references must fit on this two page submission. Head material (at the top of the first page): - Title of the paper, - Author name(s), - Author affiliation(s) in brief (1 line), - Email address of principal author - Type of submission (oral presentation, poster) Abstracts should be emailed to submission at lcm2006.net as an ATTACHMENT (i.e. not included in the message) preferably as a MS Word document, but in PDF or postscript format if it is necessary to include a diagram or figure. Please do not send abstracts before December 1st 2005. Abstracts should be submitted by January 8, 2006. Notification of acceptance by March 30, 2006. All abstracts will be reviewed by members of the International Scientific Committee. From language at sprynet.com Fri Oct 7 22:41:36 2005 From: language at sprynet.com (Alexander Gross2) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 18:41:36 -0400 Subject: Six Laws of Language and Linguistics in Draft Form... Message-ID: A few of you wrote me privately back in June asking if I could make my ten-question quiz, distinguishing between practitioners of Evidence Based & Voodoo Linguistics, available before the LACUS event. I didn't feel I could do so at that time, but now I suspect a number of you might find it of interest, along with a fair amount of other material I presented at that conference. For instance, I was particularly encouraged by the positive reception that greeted my "Six Laws of Language and Linguistics in Draft Form." At that time they also formed a part of my invited presentation "Is Evidence Based Linguistics the Solution? Is Voodoo Linguistics the Problem?" which was supplemented a few days later by a two-hour workshop on Evidence Based Linguistics. I would like to present them here as well, even though reactions are likely to be less positive, since it seems to me important that basic concepts concerning linguistics should be aired as fully as possible. I have made a few changes based on comments from those at the conference, and I would also value comments from FunkNet subscribers as part of a process leading to a more definitive statement of these laws. If they seem a bit disjointed the first time you read them, they are likely to make better sense in the context of my two LACUS presentations, which you can find on my website at: http://languag2.home.sprynet.com/f/evidence.htm and http://languag2.home.sprynet.com/f/evishop.htm They can also both be accessed from the Linguistics menu of my main website at: http://language.home.sprynet.com/ You'll find the 10-question quiz near the beginning of the first URL. However unusual some of these ideas may appear at first reading, I promise that I have done my best to fit them within the framework of current linguistics theories. I look forward to your comments. The text of the "Six Laws" follows: -------------------------------- Six Laws of Language and Linguistics In Draft Form 1. All communication takes place in shared contextual space, subject to a fairly complex process of disambiguation, depending on the conditions inherent in the other five Laws. That space can be more or less roughly measured according to a specialized system of cartography. 2. The Law of Variable Context If two people share sufficient context, almost any words, including sheer nonsense--or no words at all--will suffice for them to communicate with each other. If two people do not share sufficient context, then not all the words in the world may be enough for them to grasp each other's meaning. Where intermediate degrees of partial, fragmented, or otherwise limited or "noise-distorted" context are shared, communication will be proportionately difficult and/or unsuccessful. 3. The Law of Communication Communication never takes place generically between languages and languages, or between dictionaries and dictionaries. All successful communication takes place under specific circumstances between a speaker and a listener, or a writer and a reader, or between a non-verbal communicator and his or her audience. When the communicator changes, and/or the nature of the audience and/or the circumstances change, often the content of the message must also change to some extent, if fully successful communication is to take place. This law holds true both for communication in a single language and for translating and interpreting, since there is essentially no difference between translating a message into another tongue and paraphrasing it within a single tongue. This law also holds true for automatic or electronic communication where the final recipient of information is a human being, and any act of communication appearing to originate from a computer, or to occur between two or more computers, only takes place because a human being has originally programmed it to occur. All the conditions of the first two laws still apply. 4. The Law of Linguistic Entropy A form of entropy, related to Shannon's concept of information entropy or Prigogine's theory of dissipative structures--or of chaos as found in meteorology and other complex systems--also exists for language, and any sentence, concept, or act of communication may fall into such entropy or chaos even after it has been accurately repeated a number of times. Where Shannon's concept applies to letters of the alphabet, this one applies to words, phrases, and/or entire sentences. The number of times the message must be repeated to fall into such entropy or chaos depends on the nature of the message, the number of people attempting to repeat it, and whatever ambient or incidental noise of whatever type may be present either in the system they are using or among those attempting to repeat it. 5. The Law of Recapitulation Just as Haeckel and Von Baer observed and debated the nature of a form of recapitulation in the development of the embryo, so there also exists a process of recapitulation regarding language. During their development from children into adults, all human beings will necessarily pass through a recapitulation of as many of the forms and structures of their language as they possibly can within the limits of utility and the peaceful development of their society. 6. The brain understands the language it hears or reads through a combined comparison of sound, meaning, context, and expected collocations, seeking out a match with other sounds, meanings, contexts, and collocations it has already encountered. Once it has made this match, which may be more or less precise, it assumes it has understood correctly. Grammar plays a relatively small role in this process, sometimes none at all. Said otherwise, the way almost all communication works is by means of a relatively error-prone, quick and dirty matching operation, in some ways comparable to matching operations by computers. We know the brain proceeds in this manner, because it sometimes makes mistakes, permitting us to draw inferences about the way it functions. This process has for its source the humble origins of language through evolution from the chemical signals of early life forms to the scent markings of animals to the sound markings of humans, which we interpret as language, thus providing further proof that Darwin's theory of evolution must be true. -------------------------- Please feel free to post your comments here or to send them to my to my email address: language at sprynet.com Thanks in advance, Alex Gross From lctg at let.rug.nl Mon Oct 10 13:56:46 2005 From: lctg at let.rug.nl (LCTG) Date: Mon, 10 Oct 2005 15:56:46 +0200 Subject: Call for papers: language contact in times of globalization Message-ID: *** APOLOGIES FOR CROSS-POSTINGS *** First International Conference on Language Contact in Times of Globalization University of Groningen, September 28-30, 2006 CALL FOR PAPERS The past decade has witnessed a growing interest in the study of linguistic effects of language contact. Due to rapid globalization and increased migration, people are ever more exposed to other languages, both related and unrelated. The aim of the Groningen conference is to explore the linguistic effects of globalization and migration in societies all over the world. We particularly invite papers adressing the conference theme, but in order to put these issues in a broader historical and theoretical perspective, we also welcome papers on other current issues in the study of language contact and language change. Plenary speakers will be Prof.dr. Pieter Muysken (Radboud University Nijmegen), Dr. Ricardo Otheguy (City University of New York) and Prof.dr. Kurt Braunmüller, (Universität Hamburg). Registration For preliminary registration, send an e-mail message to lctg at let.rug.nl. If you wish to present a paper, please provide us with a provisional title. Once you have registered, you will receive the first circular containing information on conference themes, plenary speakers, submission of abstracts, travel to Groningen and accommodation. For more information you may also visit our website: http://odur.let.rug.nl/~dejonge/invest/lctg/ Conference registration is 100 Euro until May 1, 2006. Late or on-site registration will be 120 Euro. Early registration for students is 50 euro, late registration 60 euro. Please bring some kind of identification to prove that you are a student. Abstracts Scholars are invited to submit abstracts for 40-minute papers (including 10 minute discussion time). Deadline for abstracts is February 1, 2006. Notification of acceptance will be sent out by March 1. If you require earlier notification, let us know, and we will send you our reply at an earlier date (though not before January 1, 2006). Organizing committee Cornelius Hasselblatt, Bob de Jonge & Muriel Norde, University of Groningen Conference address Organizers of Language contact in times of globalization Scandinavian Languages and Cultures University of Groningen P.O. Box 716 9700 AS Groningen The Netherlands e-mail: lctg at let.rug.nl web: http://odur.let.rug.nl/~dejonge/invest/lctg/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Organizers of LCTG Scandinavian Languages and Cultures University of Groningen P.O. Box 716 9700 AS Groningen The Netherlands http://odur.let.rug.nl/~dejonge/invest/lctg/ From Salinas17 at aol.com Tue Oct 11 05:22:35 2005 From: Salinas17 at aol.com (Salinas17 at aol.com) Date: Tue, 11 Oct 2005 01:22:35 EDT Subject: Six Laws of Language: An Addendum Message-ID: I hope Alex will forgive me for taking a tangent to his post. I find a good deal of his Six Laws very compelling. But I thought I might humbly offer some corollaries that might be worth considering. Alex wrote: << If two people do not share sufficient context, then not all the words in the world may be enough for them to grasp each other's meaning. >> Supplemental Law #1 - "Chocolate! Chocolate!": Understanding and meaning are NOT the objectives of language. - Common understanding and meaning are merely a frequent operational requirement of language, not the ultimate objective. They are equivalent to two football teams agreeing on what is out-of-bounds, where the goal lines are and who gets the ball, often even as the game is being played. But this is not WHY the game is being played. The ancient and reasonable metaphor that makes language a shared "mirror of the world" does not explain the purpose of language, but rather how it operates. Grammar, syntax or any other structural aspect of language makes common understanding manageable. But all these features of language are the means and not the ends. A lot of the mystery of language may come from artificially focusing on the means rather than the ends. Thus the parable: A man is visiting a chocolate factory. He accidentially falls into a vat. About to drown in the melted confection, he yells "Fire! Fire!" When rescued, he is asked why he yelled, "Fire! Fire!" He replies, "Well, do you think if I yelled "Chocolate! Chocolate!" any one would have come?" As Alex implies, the "right word" is sometimes not the grammatically correct word, nor is it even the word as understood by the speaker. I can say the wrong thing, but it can have a happy outcome. The right word is basically the word that will produce a desired change in the listener -- or change how the listener responds. Grammar may aid common understanding. Common understanding may aid the speaker in affecting the listener. But affecting the listener is the objective. Neither grammar nor common understanding are the ultimate objective of the speaker -- except if you are a language teacher. Alex also wrote: <<...often the content of the message must also change to some extent, if fully successful communication is to take place.>> Supplemental Law #2 - "'Heed my words, Pinocchio,!' hiccuped the Cat": A communication is not successful if it doesn't work, understanding not withstanding. - Corollary to Supp Law #1. Language success certainly can't be measured as a meeting of minds. In fact, what the speaker really thinks may be irrelevant to the form and content of a "successful" message. Deceptive language for example may be nearly as old as language itself, so there's no justification for measuring success against what the speaker is really thinking. It is possible, however, that we might measure success by whether the listener understands what the speaker WANTS him to understand -- whether it's accurate or inaccurate, true or false. This is still an incomplete measure. What if the listener understands the message, but does not act accordingly? Should we consider that effective communication? If I say "Stop! a car is coming" and the listener understands me, but goes anyway and gets hit by a car, do I really consider that a successful communication? If all that human language were used for was creating understanding, then I would consider my communication successful whether the listener got run over or not, as long as he got my drift. A lot of mystery about language is created by arbitrarily terminating it at understanding. As if what happened because words worked or didn't work had no connection to the words themselves. As if humans only used language to create an understanding, rather than to benefit themselves in many other ways. That is a very non-Darwinian view of language. It means that that human language could evolve because it created understanding, without regard to whether that understanding was effective or ineffective, accurate or inaccurate. Using words in a way that created understanding in listeners, but was ineffective at helping a human survive, would make language an undesirable trait. Regards, Steve Long From rcameron at uic.edu Tue Oct 11 14:30:10 2005 From: rcameron at uic.edu (Cameron, Richard) Date: Tue, 11 Oct 2005 09:30:10 -0500 Subject: Assistant Prof Position in Spanish Linguistics Message-ID: Assistant Professor of Spanish. Tenure-track with specialization in Spanish Linguistics. The department is seeking a dynamic scholar and teacher to contribute to an established and outstanding program in Hispanic Linguistics. Field of specialization is open but candidates with background in one or more of the following areas will be given preference: semantics, pragmatics, second language acquisition (theoretical and/or instructed). Candidates must demonstrate a commitment to excellence in teaching, evidence of scholarly activity, and potential to make significant contributions to their scholarly fields. Send cv, writing sample, and at least three letters of reference to Prof. Richard Cameron or Prof. Rafael Núñez Cedeño, Dept. of Spanish, French, Italian and Portuguese, University of Illinois at Chicago, M/C 315, 601 Morgan St.,17th Fl., Chicago, IL 60607. Application packages must be postmarked no later than November 21, 2005. The University of Illinois is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer. From asanso at gmail.com Tue Oct 11 18:28:07 2005 From: asanso at gmail.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Andrea_Sans=F2?=) Date: Tue, 11 Oct 2005 20:28:07 +0200 Subject: Generic "man" constructions in Slavonic? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Dear list members, I'm conducting a study on impersonal "man" constructions, i.e. constructions in which nouns originally meaning "man" or "people" have become generic human subjects, such as "on" in French and "man" and related items in many Germanic languages. My question is very specific. I came across a quotation of a paper by Andre' Mazon in Melanges Mikola (Helsinki 1931), which unfortunately I didn't find in any library within reach. The title of the paper, however, leaves no doubts about its content: it is "L'emploi indefini du nom de l'homme en slave". Now, since to the best of my knowledge I didn't find any "presence" of man-constructions in any grammar of any Slavonic language, I was wondering whether such constructions really exist in some Slavonic language. It could be the case that they have escaped the attention of linguists because they are typical of the spoken register, or whatever. Perhaps they have simply escaped my attention! I will appeciate any useful suggestions both by experts of Slavonic languages and by native speakers. Please reply to me directly. Of course, I will post a summary if significant results emerge. Thanks in advance, Andrea Sanso' Dipartimento di Linguistica Teorica e Applicata Universita' di Pavia, Italy > > From katten at rice.edu Thu Oct 13 19:10:07 2005 From: katten at rice.edu (David Katten) Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 14:10:07 -0500 Subject: CFP: Complex Predicates and Related Constructions - March 2006 Message-ID: Apologies for cross-postings CALL FOR PAPERS The Rice Linguistics Society will host a poster session to accompany the 11th Biennial Rice Symposium on Linguistics, to be held March 16-18th in Houston, Texas. * * * * Topic * * * * The theme for the poster session is “Complex Predicates and Similar Constructions”. We invite papers from all areas and orientations of linguistics that touch upon the structure, meaning, usage, or development of complex constructions. These posters should complement the symposium topic of “Intertheoretical approaches to complex verb constructions”. For more information, consult www.rice.edu/lingsymp * * * * Submission Guidelines * * * * The deadline for submissions is January 20, 2006, 5 p.m. central time zone. Please submit a 300 word abstract in PDF format to rls at rice.edu. The filename should be AUTHORSNAME.pdf. Please include “poster session” in the subject. The email body should include: Name of author(s) Paper title Institution(s) of author(s) Email address(es) of author(s) Postal address(es) of author(s) Phone number for primary author Postal submissions will not be accepted. * * * * Poster Presentation * * * * Participants will be given a space approximately 6’ by 4’ to display their work. * * * * Registration * * * * Registration will be handled through the symposium. Poster presenters are invited to attend all symposium events. For more information, contact rls at rice.edu or visit the symposium website at www.rice.edu/ lingsymp. From apawley at coombs.anu.edu.au Wed Oct 19 02:37:17 2005 From: apawley at coombs.anu.edu.au (Andrew Pawley) Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2005 12:37:17 +1000 Subject: Position in Papuan Linguistics Message-ID: Greetings from the Antipodes. The Dept. of Linguistics, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University, invites applications for a three year research fellowship in Papuan linguistics, to begin 1 July 2006. Details of the position are given below. Best wishes Andrew Pawley Australian National University Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies Division of Society and Environment Department of Linguistics Research Fellow/Fellow Academic Level B or C Fixed term: 3 years Salary Range: $A 59,420-82,931 plus 17% super Reference: PA 3076 The Department of Linguistics seeks to appoint a scholar to carry out research on Papuan languages (the indigenous non-Austronesian languages of New Guinea, Island Melanesia and East Nusantara) and to contribute to the supervision and training of the Department's graduate students. Candidates will be expected to outline the research project or projects that they wish to pursue during the period of the appointment. The successful candidate will also be expected to serve on the editorial board of the publication series, Pacific Linguistics. Preference will be given to a candidate with an established record of research and publication on the Papuan languages and whose research proposal is most compatible with the Department's research focus. The position is available from 1 July 2006. Selection Criteria: http://info.anu.edu.au/hr/jobs/ or from Gabrielle Cameron, T: 6125 4444, E: hr.rspas at anu.edu.au Enquiries: Professor Andrew Pawley, T: 6125 0028, E: Andrew.Pawley at anu.edu.au Closing Date: Friday 18 November 2005 Information for applicants: http://info.anu.edu.au/hr/Jobs/How_to_Apply/index.asp Job Application Cover sheet: http://info.anu.edu.au/policies/Forms/Human_Resources/Recruitment/HR86.asp. From reng at ruf.rice.edu Sun Oct 30 18:21:09 2005 From: reng at ruf.rice.edu (Robert Englebretson) Date: Sun, 30 Oct 2005 12:21:09 -0600 Subject: Revised Braille IPA Message-ID: Dear Linguists, Based on the number of queries I have received over the years regarding braille versions of the International Phonetic Alphabet, I thought the following link would be useful. http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~reng/BrlIPA.html This page is devoted to the Unified IPA Braille project, which I am currently working on in conjunction with the International council on English Braille. We are drafting an updated and revised version of braille IPA, which we hope can finally become an international standardized code. The page contains current versions of the code draft for download (PDF and formatted braille versions), presents some background and history of braille IPA codes, and seeks input from braille-reading linguists and others who use the IPA. Because the system is designed around the Unicode IPA codepoints, makers of automated braille translation software will be able to support IPA characters in their products, which will hopefully lead to a greater supply of braille materials utilizing the IPA, and will improve access for blind professionals and students to the literature. We would value all comments and suggestions, in order to make this code as robust and useful as possible. I would especially welcome comments from braille readers living in countries which do not use English Braille, as we would like to make the braille IPA code a truly international system. Please pass this link along to anyone who may be interested. http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~reng/BrlIPA.html In order to work out some of the details of automated Unicode to IPA braille translation, we are also seeking sample texts which have been transcribed into IPA using Unicode. If you have any fully-Unicode compliant materials that you would be willing to share with the committee, please e-mail them to me at reng at rice.edu preferably as a Word, RTF, or UTF-8 encoded file. Older "symbol fonts" won't work--these must be fully Unicode. In addition to information on braille IPA, the page also contains a list of links related to blind accessibility in linguistics, including my instructions and character maps for reading Unicode IPA with the Jaws For Windows screen reader. All input is welcome, and I hope this will be a useful resource. --Robert Englebretson ****************************************************************** Dr. Robert Englebretson Dept. of Linguistics, MS23 Rice University 6100 Main St. Houston, TX 77005-1892 Phone: 713 348-4776 E-mail: reng at rice.edu http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~reng From w.croft at manchester.ac.uk Tue Oct 4 08:57:55 2005 From: w.croft at manchester.ac.uk (Bill Croft) Date: Tue, 4 Oct 2005 09:57:55 +0100 Subject: Word token frequency estimates for adult speakers Message-ID: (apologies for cross-posting) Are there any published (or unpublished) estimates of how many words a typical speaker is exposed to (produces and hears), per day, or per year, or even in a lifetime? I am aware of some token frequency estimates of exposure to language use by children acquiring language (though I don't have the references), but not for adults. I will post any references I receive. Thanks, Bill Croft From langconf at bu.edu Tue Oct 4 13:42:16 2005 From: langconf at bu.edu (BUCLD) Date: Tue, 4 Oct 2005 09:42:16 -0400 Subject: Important BUCLD travel info for nationals of countries other than USA, Canada, Mexico, and Bermuda Message-ID: DO YOU HAVE A MACHINE-READABLE PASSPORT OR VISA? The USA has changed its entry procedures as of June 26, 2005 for nationals of 27 countries (see below) who used to be able to enter the USA without a visa under the Visa Waiver Program. As of June 26, nationals from those countries are only able to enter without a visa if they have a machine-readable passport. If they do not have a machine-readable passport, they have to obtain a non-immigrant visa for entry to the USA, from a US consulate or embassy abroad. If you don't have either (1) a machine-readable passport, or (2) a non-machine readable passport and a non-immigrant visa to the USA, it looks like you will not be allowed to board the plane at your point of origin (there's a $3300 per person fine for any airline that allows someone to board that doesn't meet these requirements). The 27 countries are: Andorra, Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brunei, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Monaco, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, San Marino, Singapore, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, United Kingdom. Note that citizens of Canada, Mexico, and Bermuda are not affected by this regulation - they do not require machine-readable passports to enter the USA. Nothing is mentioned about citizens of other countries than these 30 - please check regulations carefully. Full information on the new regulations is available at: http://www.travel.state.gov/visa/temp/without/without_1990.html#2 From Jordan.Zlatev at ling.lu.se Fri Oct 7 02:00:44 2005 From: Jordan.Zlatev at ling.lu.se (Jordan Zlatev) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 04:00:44 +0200 Subject: First CFP: Language, Culture, Mind - Paris 2006 Message-ID: LANGUAGE CULTURE AND MIND CONFERENCE (LCM 2) PARIS 17-20 JULY 2006 INTEGRATING PERSPECTIVES AND METHODOLOGIES IN THE STUDY OF LANGUAGE The second 'Language Culture and Mind' Conference (LCM 2) will be held in Paris in July 2006, following the successful first LCM conference in Portsmouth in 2004. The goals of LCM conferences are to contribute to situating the study of language in a contemporary interdisciplinary dialogue, and to promote a better integration of cognitive and cultural perspectives in empirical and theoretical studies of language. Human natural languages are biologically based, cognitively motivated, affectively rich, socially shared, grammatically organized symbolic systems. They provide the principal semiotic means for the complexity and diversity of human cultural life. As has long been recognized, no single discipline or methodology is sufficient to capture all the dimensions of this complex and multifaceted phenomenon, which lies at the heart of what it is to be human. In the recent past, perception and cognition have been the basis of general unifying models of language and language activity. However, a genuine integrative perspective should also involve such essential modalities of human action as: empathy, mimesis, intersubjectivity, normativity, agentivity and narrativity. Significant theoretical, methodological and empirical advancements in the relevant disciplines now provide a realistic basis for such a broadened perspective. This conference will articulate and discuss approaches to human natural language and to diverse genres of language activity which aim to integrate its cultural, social, cognitive and bodily foundations. We call for contributions from scholars and scientists in anthropology, biology, linguistics, philosophy, psychology, semiotics, semantics, discourse analysis, cognitive and neuroscience, who wish both to impart their insights and findings, and learn from other disciplines. Preference will be given to submissions which emphasize interdisciplinarity, the interaction between culture, mind and language, and/or multi-methodological approaches in language sciences. *Topics *include but are not limited to the relation between language and: - biological and cultural co-evolution - comparative study of communication systems, whether animal or artificial - cognitive and cultural schematization - emergence in ontogeny and phylogeny - multi-modal communication - normativity - thought, emotion and consciousness - perception and categorization - empathy and intersubjectivity - imitation and mimesis - symbolic activity - discourse genres in language evolution and ontogeny - sign, text and literacy ORGANIZING COMMITTEE Caroline David (Universit? de Montpellier) Jean-Louis Dessalles (?cole Nationale Sup?rieure des T?l?communications, Paris) Jean Lass?gue (CNRS, Paris) Victor Rosenthal (Inserm-EHESS, Paris) Chris Sinha (University of Portsmouth) Yves-Marie Visetti (CNRS, Paris) Joerg Zinken (University of Portsmouth) Jordan Zlatev (Lund University) Further information about LCM 2 will be presented at http://www.lcm2006.net SUBMISSIONS Submissions are solicited for oral presentations and poster sessions. Oral presentations should last 20 minutes (plus 10 minutes discussion). All submissions should follow the abstract guidelines below. Submissions should be in English. Abstracts should not exceed 1200 words (about two A4 pages), single-spaced, font size 12 pt or larger, with 2.5 cm margins on all sides. Any diagrams and references must fit on this two page submission. Head material (at the top of the first page): - Title of the paper, - Author name(s), - Author affiliation(s) in brief (1 line), - Email address of principal author - Type of submission (oral presentation, poster) Abstracts should be emailed to submission at lcm2006.net as an ATTACHMENT (i.e. not included in the message) preferably as a MS Word document, but in PDF or postscript format if it is necessary to include a diagram or figure. Please do not send abstracts before December 1st 2005. Abstracts should be submitted by January 8, 2006. Notification of acceptance by March 30, 2006. All abstracts will be reviewed by members of the International Scientific Committee. From language at sprynet.com Fri Oct 7 22:41:36 2005 From: language at sprynet.com (Alexander Gross2) Date: Fri, 7 Oct 2005 18:41:36 -0400 Subject: Six Laws of Language and Linguistics in Draft Form... Message-ID: A few of you wrote me privately back in June asking if I could make my ten-question quiz, distinguishing between practitioners of Evidence Based & Voodoo Linguistics, available before the LACUS event. I didn't feel I could do so at that time, but now I suspect a number of you might find it of interest, along with a fair amount of other material I presented at that conference. For instance, I was particularly encouraged by the positive reception that greeted my "Six Laws of Language and Linguistics in Draft Form." At that time they also formed a part of my invited presentation "Is Evidence Based Linguistics the Solution? Is Voodoo Linguistics the Problem?" which was supplemented a few days later by a two-hour workshop on Evidence Based Linguistics. I would like to present them here as well, even though reactions are likely to be less positive, since it seems to me important that basic concepts concerning linguistics should be aired as fully as possible. I have made a few changes based on comments from those at the conference, and I would also value comments from FunkNet subscribers as part of a process leading to a more definitive statement of these laws. If they seem a bit disjointed the first time you read them, they are likely to make better sense in the context of my two LACUS presentations, which you can find on my website at: http://languag2.home.sprynet.com/f/evidence.htm and http://languag2.home.sprynet.com/f/evishop.htm They can also both be accessed from the Linguistics menu of my main website at: http://language.home.sprynet.com/ You'll find the 10-question quiz near the beginning of the first URL. However unusual some of these ideas may appear at first reading, I promise that I have done my best to fit them within the framework of current linguistics theories. I look forward to your comments. The text of the "Six Laws" follows: -------------------------------- Six Laws of Language and Linguistics In Draft Form 1. All communication takes place in shared contextual space, subject to a fairly complex process of disambiguation, depending on the conditions inherent in the other five Laws. That space can be more or less roughly measured according to a specialized system of cartography. 2. The Law of Variable Context If two people share sufficient context, almost any words, including sheer nonsense--or no words at all--will suffice for them to communicate with each other. If two people do not share sufficient context, then not all the words in the world may be enough for them to grasp each other's meaning. Where intermediate degrees of partial, fragmented, or otherwise limited or "noise-distorted" context are shared, communication will be proportionately difficult and/or unsuccessful. 3. The Law of Communication Communication never takes place generically between languages and languages, or between dictionaries and dictionaries. All successful communication takes place under specific circumstances between a speaker and a listener, or a writer and a reader, or between a non-verbal communicator and his or her audience. When the communicator changes, and/or the nature of the audience and/or the circumstances change, often the content of the message must also change to some extent, if fully successful communication is to take place. This law holds true both for communication in a single language and for translating and interpreting, since there is essentially no difference between translating a message into another tongue and paraphrasing it within a single tongue. This law also holds true for automatic or electronic communication where the final recipient of information is a human being, and any act of communication appearing to originate from a computer, or to occur between two or more computers, only takes place because a human being has originally programmed it to occur. All the conditions of the first two laws still apply. 4. The Law of Linguistic Entropy A form of entropy, related to Shannon's concept of information entropy or Prigogine's theory of dissipative structures--or of chaos as found in meteorology and other complex systems--also exists for language, and any sentence, concept, or act of communication may fall into such entropy or chaos even after it has been accurately repeated a number of times. Where Shannon's concept applies to letters of the alphabet, this one applies to words, phrases, and/or entire sentences. The number of times the message must be repeated to fall into such entropy or chaos depends on the nature of the message, the number of people attempting to repeat it, and whatever ambient or incidental noise of whatever type may be present either in the system they are using or among those attempting to repeat it. 5. The Law of Recapitulation Just as Haeckel and Von Baer observed and debated the nature of a form of recapitulation in the development of the embryo, so there also exists a process of recapitulation regarding language. During their development from children into adults, all human beings will necessarily pass through a recapitulation of as many of the forms and structures of their language as they possibly can within the limits of utility and the peaceful development of their society. 6. The brain understands the language it hears or reads through a combined comparison of sound, meaning, context, and expected collocations, seeking out a match with other sounds, meanings, contexts, and collocations it has already encountered. Once it has made this match, which may be more or less precise, it assumes it has understood correctly. Grammar plays a relatively small role in this process, sometimes none at all. Said otherwise, the way almost all communication works is by means of a relatively error-prone, quick and dirty matching operation, in some ways comparable to matching operations by computers. We know the brain proceeds in this manner, because it sometimes makes mistakes, permitting us to draw inferences about the way it functions. This process has for its source the humble origins of language through evolution from the chemical signals of early life forms to the scent markings of animals to the sound markings of humans, which we interpret as language, thus providing further proof that Darwin's theory of evolution must be true. -------------------------- Please feel free to post your comments here or to send them to my to my email address: language at sprynet.com Thanks in advance, Alex Gross From lctg at let.rug.nl Mon Oct 10 13:56:46 2005 From: lctg at let.rug.nl (LCTG) Date: Mon, 10 Oct 2005 15:56:46 +0200 Subject: Call for papers: language contact in times of globalization Message-ID: *** APOLOGIES FOR CROSS-POSTINGS *** First International Conference on Language Contact in Times of Globalization University of Groningen, September 28-30, 2006 CALL FOR PAPERS The past decade has witnessed a growing interest in the study of linguistic effects of language contact. Due to rapid globalization and increased migration, people are ever more exposed to other languages, both related and unrelated. The aim of the Groningen conference is to explore the linguistic effects of globalization and migration in societies all over the world. We particularly invite papers adressing the conference theme, but in order to put these issues in a broader historical and theoretical perspective, we also welcome papers on other current issues in the study of language contact and language change. Plenary speakers will be Prof.dr. Pieter Muysken (Radboud University Nijmegen), Dr. Ricardo Otheguy (City University of New York) and Prof.dr. Kurt Braunm?ller, (Universit?t Hamburg). Registration For preliminary registration, send an e-mail message to lctg at let.rug.nl. If you wish to present a paper, please provide us with a provisional title. Once you have registered, you will receive the first circular containing information on conference themes, plenary speakers, submission of abstracts, travel to Groningen and accommodation. For more information you may also visit our website: http://odur.let.rug.nl/~dejonge/invest/lctg/ Conference registration is 100 Euro until May 1, 2006. Late or on-site registration will be 120 Euro. Early registration for students is 50 euro, late registration 60 euro. Please bring some kind of identification to prove that you are a student. Abstracts Scholars are invited to submit abstracts for 40-minute papers (including 10 minute discussion time). Deadline for abstracts is February 1, 2006. Notification of acceptance will be sent out by March 1. If you require earlier notification, let us know, and we will send you our reply at an earlier date (though not before January 1, 2006). Organizing committee Cornelius Hasselblatt, Bob de Jonge & Muriel Norde, University of Groningen Conference address Organizers of Language contact in times of globalization Scandinavian Languages and Cultures University of Groningen P.O. Box 716 9700 AS Groningen The Netherlands e-mail: lctg at let.rug.nl web: http://odur.let.rug.nl/~dejonge/invest/lctg/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Organizers of LCTG Scandinavian Languages and Cultures University of Groningen P.O. Box 716 9700 AS Groningen The Netherlands http://odur.let.rug.nl/~dejonge/invest/lctg/ From Salinas17 at aol.com Tue Oct 11 05:22:35 2005 From: Salinas17 at aol.com (Salinas17 at aol.com) Date: Tue, 11 Oct 2005 01:22:35 EDT Subject: Six Laws of Language: An Addendum Message-ID: I hope Alex will forgive me for taking a tangent to his post. I find a good deal of his Six Laws very compelling. But I thought I might humbly offer some corollaries that might be worth considering. Alex wrote: << If two people do not share sufficient context, then not all the words in the world may be enough for them to grasp each other's meaning. >> Supplemental Law #1 - "Chocolate! Chocolate!": Understanding and meaning are NOT the objectives of language. - Common understanding and meaning are merely a frequent operational requirement of language, not the ultimate objective. They are equivalent to two football teams agreeing on what is out-of-bounds, where the goal lines are and who gets the ball, often even as the game is being played. But this is not WHY the game is being played. The ancient and reasonable metaphor that makes language a shared "mirror of the world" does not explain the purpose of language, but rather how it operates. Grammar, syntax or any other structural aspect of language makes common understanding manageable. But all these features of language are the means and not the ends. A lot of the mystery of language may come from artificially focusing on the means rather than the ends. Thus the parable: A man is visiting a chocolate factory. He accidentially falls into a vat. About to drown in the melted confection, he yells "Fire! Fire!" When rescued, he is asked why he yelled, "Fire! Fire!" He replies, "Well, do you think if I yelled "Chocolate! Chocolate!" any one would have come?" As Alex implies, the "right word" is sometimes not the grammatically correct word, nor is it even the word as understood by the speaker. I can say the wrong thing, but it can have a happy outcome. The right word is basically the word that will produce a desired change in the listener -- or change how the listener responds. Grammar may aid common understanding. Common understanding may aid the speaker in affecting the listener. But affecting the listener is the objective. Neither grammar nor common understanding are the ultimate objective of the speaker -- except if you are a language teacher. Alex also wrote: <<...often the content of the message must also change to some extent, if fully successful communication is to take place.>> Supplemental Law #2 - "'Heed my words, Pinocchio,!' hiccuped the Cat": A communication is not successful if it doesn't work, understanding not withstanding. - Corollary to Supp Law #1. Language success certainly can't be measured as a meeting of minds. In fact, what the speaker really thinks may be irrelevant to the form and content of a "successful" message. Deceptive language for example may be nearly as old as language itself, so there's no justification for measuring success against what the speaker is really thinking. It is possible, however, that we might measure success by whether the listener understands what the speaker WANTS him to understand -- whether it's accurate or inaccurate, true or false. This is still an incomplete measure. What if the listener understands the message, but does not act accordingly? Should we consider that effective communication? If I say "Stop! a car is coming" and the listener understands me, but goes anyway and gets hit by a car, do I really consider that a successful communication? If all that human language were used for was creating understanding, then I would consider my communication successful whether the listener got run over or not, as long as he got my drift. A lot of mystery about language is created by arbitrarily terminating it at understanding. As if what happened because words worked or didn't work had no connection to the words themselves. As if humans only used language to create an understanding, rather than to benefit themselves in many other ways. That is a very non-Darwinian view of language. It means that that human language could evolve because it created understanding, without regard to whether that understanding was effective or ineffective, accurate or inaccurate. Using words in a way that created understanding in listeners, but was ineffective at helping a human survive, would make language an undesirable trait. Regards, Steve Long From rcameron at uic.edu Tue Oct 11 14:30:10 2005 From: rcameron at uic.edu (Cameron, Richard) Date: Tue, 11 Oct 2005 09:30:10 -0500 Subject: Assistant Prof Position in Spanish Linguistics Message-ID: Assistant Professor of Spanish. Tenure-track with specialization in Spanish Linguistics. The department is seeking a dynamic scholar and teacher to contribute to an established and outstanding program in Hispanic Linguistics. Field of specialization is open but candidates with background in one or more of the following areas will be given preference: semantics, pragmatics, second language acquisition (theoretical and/or instructed). Candidates must demonstrate a commitment to excellence in teaching, evidence of scholarly activity, and potential to make significant contributions to their scholarly fields. Send cv, writing sample, and at least three letters of reference to Prof. Richard Cameron or Prof. Rafael N??ez Cede?o, Dept. of Spanish, French, Italian and Portuguese, University of Illinois at Chicago, M/C 315, 601 Morgan St.,17th Fl., Chicago, IL 60607. Application packages must be postmarked no later than November 21, 2005. The University of Illinois is an Affirmative Action/Equal Opportunity Employer. From asanso at gmail.com Tue Oct 11 18:28:07 2005 From: asanso at gmail.com (=?ISO-8859-1?Q?Andrea_Sans=F2?=) Date: Tue, 11 Oct 2005 20:28:07 +0200 Subject: Generic "man" constructions in Slavonic? In-Reply-To: Message-ID: Dear list members, I'm conducting a study on impersonal "man" constructions, i.e. constructions in which nouns originally meaning "man" or "people" have become generic human subjects, such as "on" in French and "man" and related items in many Germanic languages. My question is very specific. I came across a quotation of a paper by Andre' Mazon in Melanges Mikola (Helsinki 1931), which unfortunately I didn't find in any library within reach. The title of the paper, however, leaves no doubts about its content: it is "L'emploi indefini du nom de l'homme en slave". Now, since to the best of my knowledge I didn't find any "presence" of man-constructions in any grammar of any Slavonic language, I was wondering whether such constructions really exist in some Slavonic language. It could be the case that they have escaped the attention of linguists because they are typical of the spoken register, or whatever. Perhaps they have simply escaped my attention! I will appeciate any useful suggestions both by experts of Slavonic languages and by native speakers. Please reply to me directly. Of course, I will post a summary if significant results emerge. Thanks in advance, Andrea Sanso' Dipartimento di Linguistica Teorica e Applicata Universita' di Pavia, Italy > > From katten at rice.edu Thu Oct 13 19:10:07 2005 From: katten at rice.edu (David Katten) Date: Thu, 13 Oct 2005 14:10:07 -0500 Subject: CFP: Complex Predicates and Related Constructions - March 2006 Message-ID: Apologies for cross-postings CALL FOR PAPERS The Rice Linguistics Society will host a poster session to accompany the 11th Biennial Rice Symposium on Linguistics, to be held March 16-18th in Houston, Texas. * * * * Topic * * * * The theme for the poster session is ?Complex Predicates and Similar Constructions?. We invite papers from all areas and orientations of linguistics that touch upon the structure, meaning, usage, or development of complex constructions. These posters should complement the symposium topic of ?Intertheoretical approaches to complex verb constructions?. For more information, consult www.rice.edu/lingsymp * * * * Submission Guidelines * * * * The deadline for submissions is January 20, 2006, 5 p.m. central time zone. Please submit a 300 word abstract in PDF format to rls at rice.edu. The filename should be AUTHORSNAME.pdf. Please include ?poster session? in the subject. The email body should include: Name of author(s) Paper title Institution(s) of author(s) Email address(es) of author(s) Postal address(es) of author(s) Phone number for primary author Postal submissions will not be accepted. * * * * Poster Presentation * * * * Participants will be given a space approximately 6? by 4? to display their work. * * * * Registration * * * * Registration will be handled through the symposium. Poster presenters are invited to attend all symposium events. For more information, contact rls at rice.edu or visit the symposium website at www.rice.edu/ lingsymp. From apawley at coombs.anu.edu.au Wed Oct 19 02:37:17 2005 From: apawley at coombs.anu.edu.au (Andrew Pawley) Date: Wed, 19 Oct 2005 12:37:17 +1000 Subject: Position in Papuan Linguistics Message-ID: Greetings from the Antipodes. The Dept. of Linguistics, Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies, Australian National University, invites applications for a three year research fellowship in Papuan linguistics, to begin 1 July 2006. Details of the position are given below. Best wishes Andrew Pawley Australian National University Research School of Pacific and Asian Studies Division of Society and Environment Department of Linguistics Research Fellow/Fellow Academic Level B or C Fixed term: 3 years Salary Range: $A 59,420-82,931 plus 17% super Reference: PA 3076 The Department of Linguistics seeks to appoint a scholar to carry out research on Papuan languages (the indigenous non-Austronesian languages of New Guinea, Island Melanesia and East Nusantara) and to contribute to the supervision and training of the Department's graduate students. Candidates will be expected to outline the research project or projects that they wish to pursue during the period of the appointment. The successful candidate will also be expected to serve on the editorial board of the publication series, Pacific Linguistics. Preference will be given to a candidate with an established record of research and publication on the Papuan languages and whose research proposal is most compatible with the Department's research focus. The position is available from 1 July 2006. Selection Criteria: http://info.anu.edu.au/hr/jobs/ or from Gabrielle Cameron, T: 6125 4444, E: hr.rspas at anu.edu.au Enquiries: Professor Andrew Pawley, T: 6125 0028, E: Andrew.Pawley at anu.edu.au Closing Date: Friday 18 November 2005 Information for applicants: http://info.anu.edu.au/hr/Jobs/How_to_Apply/index.asp Job Application Cover sheet: http://info.anu.edu.au/policies/Forms/Human_Resources/Recruitment/HR86.asp. From reng at ruf.rice.edu Sun Oct 30 18:21:09 2005 From: reng at ruf.rice.edu (Robert Englebretson) Date: Sun, 30 Oct 2005 12:21:09 -0600 Subject: Revised Braille IPA Message-ID: Dear Linguists, Based on the number of queries I have received over the years regarding braille versions of the International Phonetic Alphabet, I thought the following link would be useful. http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~reng/BrlIPA.html This page is devoted to the Unified IPA Braille project, which I am currently working on in conjunction with the International council on English Braille. We are drafting an updated and revised version of braille IPA, which we hope can finally become an international standardized code. The page contains current versions of the code draft for download (PDF and formatted braille versions), presents some background and history of braille IPA codes, and seeks input from braille-reading linguists and others who use the IPA. Because the system is designed around the Unicode IPA codepoints, makers of automated braille translation software will be able to support IPA characters in their products, which will hopefully lead to a greater supply of braille materials utilizing the IPA, and will improve access for blind professionals and students to the literature. We would value all comments and suggestions, in order to make this code as robust and useful as possible. I would especially welcome comments from braille readers living in countries which do not use English Braille, as we would like to make the braille IPA code a truly international system. Please pass this link along to anyone who may be interested. http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~reng/BrlIPA.html In order to work out some of the details of automated Unicode to IPA braille translation, we are also seeking sample texts which have been transcribed into IPA using Unicode. If you have any fully-Unicode compliant materials that you would be willing to share with the committee, please e-mail them to me at reng at rice.edu preferably as a Word, RTF, or UTF-8 encoded file. Older "symbol fonts" won't work--these must be fully Unicode. In addition to information on braille IPA, the page also contains a list of links related to blind accessibility in linguistics, including my instructions and character maps for reading Unicode IPA with the Jaws For Windows screen reader. All input is welcome, and I hope this will be a useful resource. --Robert Englebretson ****************************************************************** Dr. Robert Englebretson Dept. of Linguistics, MS23 Rice University 6100 Main St. Houston, TX 77005-1892 Phone: 713 348-4776 E-mail: reng at rice.edu http://www.ruf.rice.edu/~reng