CALL FOR PAPERS: BUCLD 33

Sun Feb 24 22:11:33 UTC 2008

CALL FOR PAPERS

THE 33rd ANNUAL BOSTON UNIVERSITY CONFERENCE ON LANGUAGE DEVELOPMENT
OCTOBER 31 - NOVEMBER 2, 2008

Keynote Speaker:
Barbara Landau, Johns Hopkins University

"Spatial Language and Spatial Cognition: Origins, Development, and Interaction"

Plenary Speaker:
Tom Roeper, University of Massachusetts - Amherst

"From Input to Mind: How Acquisition work captures the heart of linguistic theory and the soul of practical application"

Lunch Symposium:

"Brain mechanisms of language development: The promise and pitfalls of neuroimaging"

Dick Aslin, University of Rochester

Debra Mills, Emory University

Colin Phillips, University of Maryland 
Helen Tager-Flusberg, Boston University

Submissions which present research on any topic in the fields of first and second language acquisition from any theoretical perspectives will be fully considered, including:

* Bilingualism
* Cognition & Language
* Creoles & Pidgins
* Dialects
* Discourse and Narrative 
* Gesture
* Hearing Impairment and Deafness
* Input & Interaction
* Language Disorders (Autism, Down Syndrome, SLI, Williams Syndrome, etc.)
* Linguistic Theory (Syntax, Semantics, Phonology, Morphology, Lexicon) 
* Neurolinguistics
* Pragmatics
* Pre-linguistic Development

* Reading and Literacy
* Signed Languages
* Sociolinguistics
* Speech Perception & Production

Presentations will be 20 minutes long followed by a 10-minute question period. Posters 
will be on display for a full day with two attended sessions during the day.

ABSTRACT FORMAT AND CONTENT

* Abstracts submitted must represent original, unpublished research.

* Abstracts should be anonymous, clearly titled and no more than 500 words in length. Text of abstract should fit on one page, with a second page for examples, figures, or references. Abstracts longer than 500 words will be rejected without being evaluated. 

* Please note the word count at the bottom of the abstract. Note that word counts should not include the abstract title, figure or table titles, examples, or the list of references.

* A suggested format and style for abstracts is available at:
http://www.bu.edu/linguistics/APPLIED/BUCLD/template.html

* Three examples of how to formulate the content of the abstract can be found at:
http://www.lsadc.org/info/dec02bulletin/model.html

http://www.linguistics.ucsb.edu/faculty/bucholtz/sociocultural/abstracttips.html

http://www.ulcl.leidenuniv.nl/index.php3?m=5&c=124

* The criteria used by the reviewers to evaluate abstracts can be found at:
http://www.bu.edu/linguistics/APPLIED/BUCLD/reviewprocess.html#rate

* All abstracts must be submitted as PDF documents. Specific instructions for how to create PDF documents are available at:
http://www.bu.edu/linguistics/APPLIED/BUCLD/pdfinfo.html.
If you encounter a problem creating a PDF file, please contact us for further assistance.
Please use the first author's last name as the file name (eg. Smith.pdf). No author 
information should appear anywhere in the contents of the PDF file itself.

SUBMISSION INSTRUCTIONS

* Electronic submission: To facilitate the abstract submission process, abstracts will be 
submitted using the form available at the conference website at 
http://www.bu.edu/linguistics/APPLIED/BUCLD/abstract.htm.

* Specific instructions for abstract submission are available on this website.

* Abstracts will be accepted between April 1 and May 15.

* Contact information for each author must be submitted via webform. No author information should appear anywhere in the abstract PDF.

* At the time of submission you will be asked whether you would like your abstract to be 
considered for a poster, a paper, or both. Note that this preference is not revealed to the reviewers, and thus is not considered in the review process. 

* Although each author may submit as many abstracts as desired, we will accept for 
presentation by each author: (a) a maximum of 1 first authored paper/poster, and (b) a 
maximum of 2 papers/posters in any authorship status. Note that no changes in authorship (including deleting an author or changing author order) will be possible after the review process is completed or for publication in the conference proceedings.

DEADLINE

* All submissions must be received by 8:00 PM EST, May 15, 2008.

* Late abstracts will not be considered, whatever the reason for the delay.

* We regret that we cannot accept abstract submissions by fax or email.

* Submissions via surface mail will only be accepted in special circumstances, on a case-by-case basis. Please contact us well in advance of the submission deadline (May 15, 2008) to make these arrangements.

ABSTRACT SELECTION

* Each abstract is blind reviewed by 5 reviewers from a panel of approximately 180 
international scholars. Further information about the review process is available at 
http://www.bu.edu/linguistics/APPLIED/BUCLD/reviewprocess.html.

* Acknowledgment of receipt of the abstract will be sent by email as soon as possible after receipt. Notice of acceptance or rejection will be sent to first authors only, in early 
August, by email. Pre-registration materials and preliminary schedule will be available 
in late August 2008.

* If your abstract is accepted, you will need to submit a 150-word abstract including 
title, author(s) and affiliation(s) for inclusion in the conference handbook. Guidelines 
will be provided along with notification of acceptance.

* Abstracts accepted as papers will be invited for publication in the BUCLD Proceedings.

* Abstracts accepted as posters will be invited for publication online only, but not in the 
printed version.

* All conference papers will be selected on the basis of abstracts submitted. Although each abstract will be evaluated individually, we will attempt to honor requests to schedule accepted papers together in group sessions. 

* No schedule changes will be possible once the schedule is set. Scheduling requests for religious reasons only must be made before the review process is complete (i.e. at the time of submission). A space is provided on the abstract submission webform to specify such requests.

FURTHER INFORMATION

General conference information is available at:
http://www.bu.edu/linguistics/APPLIED/BUCLD/

Boston University Conference on Language Development
96 Cummington Street, Room 244
Boston, MA 02215
U.S.A.
Telephone: (617) 353-3085

Questions about abstracts should be sent to abstract at bu.edu