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Apologies for cross-postings<br>
-----------------------------<br>
<br>
Call for papers <br>
<b>Workshop ‘Modality in the Indigenous languages of Australia and
PNG’</b><br>
<br>
To be held at the Australian Linguistic Society conference 2-4
December 2011, Canberra<br>
<br>
<i>Meeting description</i>: <br>
<br>
Modality remains one of the most understudied topics in research on
the majority of Indigenous languages. Two primary reasons for this
situation are that modal categories are notoriously hard to elicit
and that their morphological realisation is often highly
heterogeneous. The fact that modality tends to interact in complex
ways with other grammatical categories such as tense, aspect and
mood further adds to the difficulty of providing a comprehensive
account of modality in newly described languages.<br>
<br>
In recent years, however, modality has received increased interest
from both field researchers and theoretical linguists working on
Indigenous languages, especially for languages in the Americas (see
e.g. Matthewson et al., 2007; Rullmann et al., 2008; Davis et al.,
2009; Faller, forthcoming; and at a recent workshop on this theme
held at Leiden University (March 25-26, 2010)). Indigenous languages
in Australia and Papua New Guinea are also becoming a major focus of
attention, however (see e.g. Rumsey, 2001; Verstraete 2005, 2006;
McGregor & Wagner, 2006; Klamer (to appear); and ongoing work
by members of the TAMEAL project:
(<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://tameal.linguist.univ-paris-diderot.fr">http://tameal.linguist.univ-paris-diderot.fr</a>).<br>
<br>
The workshop aims to bring together researchers working on modality
in Indigenous languages, to build on this emerging research and to
indicate new directions for studying modality in the languages of
Australia and PNG.<br>
<br>
The workshop will specifically address the problems of ‘discovering’
modal categories: How to discuss modality in the field (see e.g.
Matthewson, 2004; San Roque et al., in prep.)? How to elicit
modality in a systematic way? Secondly, the workshop will tackle the
problem of the theoretical/typological identification and study of
modal forms. What are the categories most frequently found in the
languages of Australia and PNG? What are their semantics and
pragmatics? And how do they relate to other grammatical categories?<br>
<br>
Although the focus of the workshop is on languages from Australia
and Papua New Guinea, more typologically and
methodologically/theoretically oriented papers are also invited.<br>
<br>
Topics for presentation may include (but are not restricted to):<br>
<br>
* The functions of irrealis marking in a particular linguistic
area;<br>
* The polysemy of mood and modality markers, and how to treat it
at the semantics/pragmatics interface;<br>
* Interactions between modality and other TAM marking in a
particular language, or in a crosslinguistic perspective;<br>
* Experience with fieldwork tasks for eliciting modality;<br>
* Patterns and frequency of modal marking in spontaneous speech;<br>
* Historical reconstructions of modal paradigms in a particular
linguistic area;<br>
* Typological parallels between individual languages and
cross-linguistic observations outside of Australia/PNG;<br>
* Semantic domains of possibility, necessity, intention, desire
etc. and their encoding.<br>
<br>
<i>Abstracts:</i><br>
<br>
Abstracts should be anonymous, no longer than 200 words + 100 words
for examples and references and should be submitted through the ALS
conference website:
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://langfest.anu.edu.au/index.php/als/ALS2011/schedConf/cfp">http://langfest.anu.edu.au/index.php/als/ALS2011/schedConf/cfp</a>
(please note the submission guidelines there).<br>
<br>
<i>Deadline:</i><br>
<br>
The deadline for abstract submission is <b>31 May</b>.<br>
<br>
Presenters of abstracts accepted for presentation will be asked to
distribute 5-page short versions of their papers among participants
of the workshop one week before the conference and the conveners
intend the contributions to the workshop to be included in a
publication on the workshop’s theme. <br>
<br>
<i>Scientific committee:</i><br>
<br>
Prof. Dr. Johan van der Auwera (University of Antwerp)<br>
Dr. Patrick Caudal (C.N.R.S./Université Paris Diderot-Paris 7/U.W.A)<br>
Prof. Dr. Alan Dench (University of Western Australia)<br>
Prof. Dr. Nicholas Evans (Australian National University)<br>
Dr. Martina Faller (University of Manchester)<br>
Prof. Dr. William Foley (University of Sydney)<br>
Prof. Dr. William McGregor (Aarhus University)<br>
Dr. Lila San Roque (Max Planck Institute for Psycholinguistics)<br>
Prof. Dr. Alan Rumsey (Australian National University)<br>
Dr. Jean-Christophe Verstraete (Katholieke Universiteit Leuven)<br>
<br>
<i>Conveners:</i><br>
<br>
Patrick Caudal (C.N.R.S./Université Paris Diderot-Paris 7)
pcaudal_at_linguist.jussieu.fr <br>
Tom Honeyman (ANU) tom.honeyman_at_anu.edu.au<br>
Stef Spronck (ANU) stephan.spronck_at_anu.edu.au<br>
<br>
<i>Further information:</i><br>
<br>
Please contact one of the convenors or visit the ALS 2011 modality
workshop website (available soon):<br>
<br>
<a class="moz-txt-link-freetext" href="http://www.als2011-modality.linguist.univ-paris-diderot.fr">http://www.als2011-modality.linguist.univ-paris-diderot.fr</a><br>
<br>
<i>References</i> <br>
Davis, Henry; Lisa Matthewson; Hotze Rullmann (2009). "‘Out Of
Control’ Marking as Circumstantial Modality in St’át’imcets". In:
Hogeweg, Lotte; Helen de Hoop; Andrej Malchukov (eds.),
Cross-linguistic Semantics of Tense, Aspect, and Modality, 205-244.
Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins.<br>
Faller, Martina (forthcoming). "A possible worlds semantics for
Cuzco Quechua evidentials". In: Li, Nan; David Lutz (eds.),
Proceedings of SALT 20, University of British Columbia / Simon
Fraser University, Vancouver, British Columbia (April 29 - May 1,
2010). Ithaca: CLC Publications, Cornell University.<br>
Klamer, Marian (to appear). 'Reality status in Teiwa (Papuan)". To
appear in Language Sciences, Special issue on "What do languages
code when they code reality status?", guest-editors Caterina Mauri
& Andrea Sansò.<br>
Matthewson, Lisa (2004). "On the Methodology of Semantic Fieldwork".
International Journal of American Linguistics 70(4):369-415.<br>
Matthewson, Lisa; Henry Davis and Hotze Rullmann (2007).
"Evidentials as Epistemic Modals: Evidence from St’át’imcets". In
Van Craenenbroeck, Jeroen (ed.), Linguistic Variation Yearbook 7,
201-254. Amsterdam: John Benjamins.<br>
McGregor, William and Tamsin Wagner (2006). "The Semantics and
Pragmatics of Irrealis Mood in Nyulnyulan Languages". Oceanic
Linguistics 45(2):339-379<br>
Rullmann, Hotze, Lisa Matthewson, and Henry Davis (2008). "Modals as
Distributive Indefinites". Natural Language Semantics 16(4):317–357.<br>
Rumsey, Alan (2001). "On the syntax and semantics of trying" In:
Jane Simpson, Nash, David, Laughren, Mary, Austin, Peter and Alpher,
Peter (eds.), Forty years on: Ken Hale and Australian languages,
353-363.Canberra: Pacific Linguistics},<br>
San Roque, Lila, Lauren Gawne, Darja Hoenigman, Julia Miller, Stef
Spronck and Nicholas Evans (in prep.) "Getting the story straight:
Language fieldwork using a narrative problem-solving task".<br>
Verstraete, Jean-Christophe (2006). "The Nature of Irreality in the
Past Domain: Evidence from Past Intentional Constructions in
Australian Languages". Australian Journal of Linguistics
26(1):59-79.<br>
Verstraete, Jean-Christophe (2005). "The semantics and pragmatics of
composite mood marking: The non-Pama-Nyungan languages of northern
Australia". Linguistic Typology 9(2):223-268.<br>
<div class="moz-signature">-- <br>
Stef Spronck - PhD Candidate
<br>
Linguistics, CHL,
College of Asia and the Pacific (Coombs Building #9), The
Australian National University,
Canberra, ACT 0200 Australia
<br>
t: + 61 2 6125 3288
f: + 61 2 6125 1463
w: <a href="http://people.anu.edu.au/stef.spronck/">
http://people.anu.edu.au/stef.spronck/ </a></div>
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