27.4235, Calls: Gen Ling, Historical Ling, Ling Theories, Syntax/Switzerland

Thu Oct 20 19:31:55 UTC 2016

LINGUIST List: Vol-27-4235. Thu Oct 20 2016. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 27.4235, Calls: Gen Ling, Historical Ling, Ling Theories, Syntax/Switzerland

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Date: Thu, 20 Oct 2016 15:31:33
From: Elena Smirnova [elena.smirnova at unine.ch]
Subject: Advances in Diachronic Construction Grammar

Full Title: Advances in Diachronic Construction Grammar 

Date: 10-Sep-2017 - 13-Sep-2017
Location: Zurich, Switzerland 
Contact Person: Elena Smirnova
Meeting Email: elena.smirnova at unine.ch

Linguistic Field(s): General Linguistics; Historical Linguistics; Linguistic Theories; Syntax 

Call Deadline: 01-Nov-2016 

Meeting Description:

During the last decade, the constructionist approach has definitely been the
fastest growing linguistic and interdisciplinary cognitive-functional approach
to language (cf. Goldberg 2013: 30). Many historical linguists ''see an
excellent fit between the mechanisms of syntactic change and the basic
principles of Construction Grammar'' (Bartðdal & Gildea 2015: 9). 
Construction grammar is considered a useful descriptive tool for diachronic
analysis because its architecture invites us to think ''about change in form
and meaning equally, as well as the creation of and changes to links between
constructions in a network'' (Traugott & Trousdale 2013: 231). As DCxG is
still a very young endeavor, many theoretical questions have only been touched
upon inconsistently so far. One of these fundamental questions is whether
diachronic construction grammar can be a fruitful endeavor without placing
cognition and psychological reality/ plausibility at the center of discussion
(cf. Hilpert: forthc.)? On the one hand, DCxG's aim has been defined as the
''historical study of constructions'' (Barðdal & Gildea 2015: back cover)
looking for their occurrence ''in specific types of usage events'' (Fried
2015: 140) with a rather descriptive focus. On the other hand, DCxG with a
cognitive outlook focuses on psychological underpinnings and aims to ''make
statements about the [internal] linguistic knowledge of earlier generations of
speakers'' (Hilpert, forthc.). 

Next to this question, many model-internal concepts have not been discussed
explicitly enough or are simply understood differently by different
researchers. Additionally, one can observe a lack of consistent terminology
and annotation. However, we believe that only by hands on application, the
strengths and weaknesses of a constructionalist model can be made visible for
our field.

This is why the intended workshop invites speakers to collectively discuss the
theoretical foundations of diachronic construction grammar by suggestions and
refinements on open questions.

References:

Barðdal, Jóhanna & Spike Gildea. 2015. Diachronic Construction Grammar:
Epistemological context, basic assumptions and historical implications. In
Barðdal, J., Smirnova, E., Sommerer, L. & S. Gildea (eds). Diachronic
Construction Grammar. Amsterdam: Benjamins, 1-50. 
Goldberg, Adele. 1995. Constructions: A construction grammar approach to
argument structure. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 
Hilpert, Martin. forthc. Three open questions in Diachronic Construction
Grammar.
Smirnova, Elena. 2015. Constructionalization and constructional change: The
role of context in the development of constructions. In Barðdal et al. (eds),
81-106.
Traugott, Elizabeth C. Forthc. Modeling language change with constructional
networks. 
Traugott, Elizabeth C. & Graeme Trousdale. 2013. Constructionalization and
constructional changes. Oxford: OUP.
Van de Velde, Freek. 2014. Degeneracy: The maintenance of constructional
networks. In Boogaart, R., T. Colleman & G. Rutten (eds). Extending the scope
of Construction Grammar. De Gruyter, 141-180.

Call for Papers:

We welcome papers which explicitly relate their presented empirical data and
line of argumentation to one or more of the following theoretical
aspects/questions:

Constructions are organized in networks. Lower level constructions inherit
features from higher level constructions. Additionally, horizontal links
between constructions on the same level of abstraction enrich any inheritance
model (van de Velde 2014, Traugott forthc.). They should be taken to be the
only basic elements of a network. 

- When is it feasible to postulate a separate node in the network? 
- Which options exist to capture horizontal relations between constructions
within a network?
- Should sketches of constructional families be based on form, on function or
on both?
- Which inheritance model should be favoured? 
- What is the theoretical status of constructs and allostructions especially
in a diachronic perspective?

A distinction has been made between constructionalization and constructional
changes (see Traugott & Trousdale 2013, Smirnova 2015). 

- The question remains whether it is necessary to postulate such a difference
after all. Are there alternatives to differentiating between types of change
(node changes vs. connectivity changes (cf. Hilpert: forthc.)? 
- What is the role of analogization, frequency effects and neo-analysis?
- How can such phenomena as constructional competition and changes in
constructional productivity be implemented within a network model?
- With respect to diachronic data and to changes within and between
constructions, how relevant is the issue of (non-) compositionality and
chunking? 
- Related to that is the question of mismatch and coercion effects, which is
particularly important in diachronic studies, especially if one thinks about
analogy and neo-analysis as the major mechanisms of constructional change.

Current studies use a variety of notational styles and often do not adhere to
any constructionist formalism at all. Still, that does not mean that DCxG
should not at least aim to develop a 'useful' notational formalism (compare
the Leipzig Glossing Rules).

- Can DCxG do without any notational formalism?
- If not, how should/could a (language-specific) annotation look like? How
much formalism should we aim for in diachronic work?

This workshop is intended to form a part of the 50th Annual Meeting of the
Societas Linguistica Europea (SLE), which will be held at the University of
Zurich, 10-13 September 2017. The workshop will be concluded with a final
discussion. For our workshop proposal, we are soliciting abstracts of 300
words (excluding references). Abstracts should be emailed to both of the
workshop organizers (elena.smirnova at unine.ch and lotte.sommerer at univie.ac.at).
Notification of acceptance/rejection of the workshop proposal by the SLE will
be given by 25 December 2016. If our workshop proposal has been accepted, we
will invite all preliminary workshop participants to submit their full
abstracts of 500 words (excluding references) by 15 January 2017 to the
general call for papers for review.

Important Dates: 

1 November 2016: Deadline for submission of 300-word abstracts to the workshop
organizers
15 November 2016: Notification of acceptance by the workshop organizers
25 November 2016: Submission of the workshop proposals to SLE 
25 December 2016: Notification of acceptance from SLE
15 January 2017: Deadline for submission of abstracts to SLE for review
31 March 2017: Notification of paper acceptance

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