ALT News No 24
Johan van der Auwera
auwera at uia.ua.ac.be
Thu Oct 28 21:17:04 UTC 1999
ALT News No. 24
October 1999
1. ALT III
2. The 1999 elections
Appendix 1: Statutes and Interim Arrangements (August 1999)
Appendix 2: Ballot
1. ALT III, Amsterdam (27 - 29 August 1999)
1.1. A word of thanks
One sentence says it all: ALT III was a success. But we need more than
one sentence to explain why. The success was due to the quality of the
presentations, to the work of the program committee (Casper de Groot,
Scott Delancey (chair), Zlatka Guentcheva, Martin Haspelmath, Maria
Polinsky, Masayoshi Shibatani)and to the talents of the local organizer,
Casper de Groot, and his staff. Other colleagues to be thanked are the
members of the Junior Award Jury (Gilbert Lazard, Elena Maslova, Edith
Moravcsik (chair), Frans Plank, and Masayoshi Shibatani) and the readers
that the Jury appealed to. Special thanks are also due to Jacques Arends
for helping to set up the Workshop on Creoles and Typology (August 26),
to David Gil for being the driving force behind the Third Symposium on
Malay / Indonesian Linguistics (August 24-25), and to the officers that
ALT will soon see off.
1.2. The '99 ALT Junior Award
The '99 ALT Junior Award was shared by Konstantin Kazenin and Sergej
Tatevosov, both of Moscow State University. In addition, three
submittors got an honorary mention: Sonia Cristaforo (University of
Pavia), Holger Diessel (State University of New York at Buffalo) and
Ekaterina Ljutikova (Moscow State University).
1.3. Business Meeting on August 28, 1999
Notes taken by Michael Cysouw
a. Membership
-------------
The secretary presents the current figures on membership. ALT has some
365 paying members, and roughly 40 associate members from Moscow. The
total figure on the web is 434 members. This figure includes the 365 +
40 members, and the remaining 40 are members in state of transition
(into or out of membership)
1995 1997 1999
---- --------------- ---------------
tot ord stu tot ord stu tot
Australia 7 1 8 8 4 12
Austria 4 6 6 7 7
Belgium 3 4 4 9 9
Canada 1 3 3 3 2 5
China 2 3 3 2 2
Croatia 1
Czech Republic 1 1 1 1
Denmark 5 6 6 7 1 8
Egypt 1 1
Finland 4 4 6 3 9
France 5 12 12 21 1 22
Germany 25 39 2 41 55 3 58
Great Britain 4 7 1 8 10 2 12
Hungary 1
India 1 1
Ireland 1 1 1 1 1
Israel 1 1
Italy 7 13 13 21 2 23
Jamaica 1 1
Japan 3 7 7 16 16
Mali 2 2
Malta 1 1 1 1
Mexico 2 2
Morocco 1
the Netherlands 7 10 5 14 16 5 21
the Philippines 1 1
New Zealand 2 2 4 4
Norway 1 4 4 4 4
Peru 1 1
Poland 1 1
Russia 3 1 5 5
Singapore 1 1 1
Slovakia 1 1
Slovenia 1 1 1 2 2
Spain 7 12 12 27 5 32
Sweden 3 5 5 7 1 8
Switzerland 3 3 3 4 2 6
Taiwan 1 2 2
Thailand 1 1
Ukraine 2 2 2
USA 21 25 5 30 60 19 79
Yugoslavia 1 1 1 1
Totals 179 14 313 52
113 193 365
There are problems with the payment of the membership fee. It is noted
that there are some people who left ALT because they didn't know how to
pay. Anke Beck from Mouton de Gruyter comments that she will try to
change the text on the bill, but that seems to be rather problematic.
People should simply write their credit card number on the invoice, the
expiry date, identify the card type, sign and send the form back.
b. Finances
-----------
The treasurer presents the current figures on finances. There are no
drastic changes since the last meeting, two years ago. ALT is not poor,
but not rich either.
IN OUT TOTALS
BEF EURO
after ALT III = start of 1998 100.462
News 20 (July 1998) 2.965 97.497
membership dues 1997 (Oct 1998) 84.942 182.439
interest 1999 (Dec 1998) 2.910 185.349
News 21 (Feb 1999) 1.548 183.801
legal advice 1999 2.750 181.051
News 22 (Aug 1999) 1.829 179.222 4.442
membership dues 1998 (Sept 1999)±88.900 ±268.122 ±6.648
Junior Award ALT III (Aug 1999) ?80.000 ?188.122 ±4.664
c. Legal Status
---------------
As put forward already at the last meeting, ALT tries to get the status
of a non-profit organization. The Executive Committee enquired about
getting a legal status in Germany, but this attempt did not succeed.
Currently, attempts are undertaken to get a legal status in Belgium.
There is a suitable format for our association, but we have to wait till
Belgian law on board membership is aligned with European regulations. At
this moment, Belgian law has nationality restrictions on the type of
board ALT would want. As soon as Belgian law is changed - and this is
supposed to happen soon - the legal status for ALT will be arranged.
d. Ballot on Statutes
---------------------
In early July, a change of the statutes was proposed to the membership.
46 members reacted, and all proposals were accepted. The Executive
Committee took some further action to harmonize the Interim Arrangements
and the Statutes. The new Statutes and Interim Arrangements are included
under Appendix 1. Note that the present ballot may again change the
statutes (see below).
e. 1999 elections
-----------------
Because of the ballot on the statutes and its implications for the work
on the Nominating Committee, the latter did not have enough time to come
up with a slate before the ALT conference. For that reason, the slate
will be sent to the members by mail, and voting will be by mail only.
f. Linguistic Typology
----------------------
The Editor-in-chief presents an update on the figures about LT
submissions from his end of '98 report (see ALT News No. 22).
The number of individual subscriptions is good, but there could be more
institutional subscriptions. All members are asked to try and get their
library to take out a subscription of LT.
The average review time is around 3 months. This could be speeded up a
little, and it might be good also for this reason to add two more
members to the Editorial Board to help out with the amount of work.
Enough publications are being received, but good articles are of course
always welcome. The Board also actively encourages people to submit
suitable material.
The Editor-in-chief proposes to add a new section to the journal:
Grammar Notices.
Anke Beck (from Mouton de Gruyter) adds that the introduction of the
journal has gone very smoothly, which is not the norm. She also stresses
the problem of there not being enough institutional subscriptions.
Mouton will take action to present the journal to a wider public in the
near future.
She adds that the discounts offered by Mouton for ALT-members are poorly
used. As a solution, the webmaster offers to add a list of discounted
books with prices to be published on the ALT website.
g. Discounts for ALT members
----------------------------
The Executive Committee has received a request for more attempts to get
discounts for ALT members. This request will be passed on to the new
Executive Committee.
h. Future ALT meetings
----------------------
timing
------
Some members have a problem with the year in which the meeting is held.
In both even and odd years there are of course other conferences. These
include:
in even years: International Pragmatics Conference
International Morphology Meeting
International Conference on Functional Grammar
in odd years: International Cognitive Linguistics Conference
International Conference on Historical
Linguistics
Up to now ALT conferences run in the odd years. It has been suggested to
move them to the even years.
Also, the proposal is put forward to hold a meeting every year. This
would also reduce the amount of rejected papers, and give PhD students
more chances to attend the meetings.
There are also problems with the timing of the conference at the end of
August. At that time, the Fall semester in many US universities has
already started. There are different considerations that should be taken
into account:
- the programs of the countries with the most members should be given a
larger weight for the timing.
- don't forget the calendars of the southern hemisphere
- is it necessary to have the meeting in the summer break?
- the timing will probably change, depending on the place where it is
organized
- the second half of July seems in general to be a good timing for
international conferences.
It seems appropriate to consult the general membership on all of these
issues. (True, we have done this before - October 1995 - but, of course,
the membership has expanded since then and we may have learnt from the
experience of the last 4 years.)
ALT IV
------
There is a proposal to organize ALT IV in conjunction with the LSA
Institute, which will be held in 2001 in Santa Barbara. The linguists of
Santa Barbara, however, will be heavily involved with the Institute.
(Even so, since ALT III, the Executive Committee has received a
realistic proposal from Marianne Mithun.)
ALT V
-----
Two considerations have been put forward. First, the meeting could be
held in Australia, Nick Evans has promised to look into this. Second,
there is an offer from Zlatka Guentcheva to host ALT V in Paris.
i. Seasonal events
------------------
- ALT supports the Second International Winter School in Linguistic
Anthropology and Typology, Moscow, January - February 2000, which will
include a Satellite Seminar 'Japanese and Russian in a Typological
Perspective'. The organizer is Vera Podlesskaya (vera at pdlssk.mccme.ru).
- ALT can (help) organize summer schools or LSA workshops or any other
events on typology. At this moment the association does not plan any
immediate action and awaits the initiative of its members to come up
with proposals.
j. Any other business
----------------------
- the present organizer notes that there have been 120 people attending
ALT III, coming from 14 different countries. The attendance fee for the
conference is low, as 65 % of the budget comes from different subsidies.
It was rather problematic to find a room for Sunday, as the university
is closed. This is probably a typically Dutch problem.
- the Program Committee reports that the amount of papers proposed for
the ALT meetings is rising. Due to this, the acceptance rate has gone
down from 65% to 50%. Maybe, the meeting should be longer, or there
should be more parallel sessions, or maybe more meetings. It is
commented that there should be more regional meetings for people to
present their results.
- the call for syllabi of typology courses (to be published on the ALT
website) is renewed.
2. The 1999 elections
The Nominating Committee, consisting of Joan Bybee, Victor Friedman,
Masa Koptjevskaja-Tamm, and Pier Marco Bertinetto (chair), has
unanimously proposed a slate, and the nominees have accepted.
President: Marianne Mithun
Secretary-Treasurer: Johan van der Auwera
Editor-in-chief: Frans Plank
Executive Committee:
President
Secretary-Treasurer
Editor-in-Chief
+ Matthew Dryer (1999-2001)
Gilbert Lazard (1999-2001)
Paolo Ramat (1999-2001)
+ Bernard Comrie (1999-2003)
Scott Delancey (1999-2003)
Maria Polinsky (1999-2003)
Editorial Board:
The Nominating Committee wants to submit two proposals to the
membership. Proposal A, which if accepted entails a change in the
Statutes, guarantees a judiciously gradual replacement of the members.
Proposal B, in conformity with the Statutes, has the drawback of forcing
a more abrupt alteration, something the Nominating Committee does not
recommend.
Proposal A
Editor-in-chief
+
Marianne Mithun (1999-2000)
Anna Siewierska (1999-2000)
+ Nicholas Evans (1999-2001)
Aleksandr Kibrik (1999-2001)
+ Edith Moravcsik (1999-2002)
Leon Stassen (1999-2002)
+ Larry Hyman (1999-2003)
Matt Shibatani (1999-2003)
+ Carmen Pensado (2000-2004)
Dan Slobin (2000-2004)
In 2001 the Nominating Committee will propose 2 names for the period
2001-2005 and 2 names for the period 2002-2006, and so forth for the
years to follow, so that there will be a replacement of two names every
year.
Proposal B
Editor-in-chief
+
Nicholas Evans (1999-2001)
Aleksandr Kibrik (1999-2001)
Edith Moravcsik (1999-2001)
Leon Stassen (1999-2001)
+ Larry Hyman (1999-2003)
Carmen Pensado (1999-2003)
Matt Masayoshi (1999-2003)
Dan Slobin (1999-2003)
In 2001 the Nominating Committee will propose 4 names for the period
2001-2005, and so forth for the years to follow, so that there will be a
replacement of 4 names every second year.
A ballot on these slates and on some of the issues that came up at the
ALT III business meeting can be found in Appendix 2.
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
Bernard Comrie [President]
Director, Department of Linguistics
Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology
Inselstrasse 22 tel +49 341 99 52 301
D-04103 Leipzig tel secretary +49 341 99 52 300
Germany fax +49 341 99 52 119
E-mail: comrie at eva.mpg.de
Secretary's e-mail (Ms. Julia Cissewski): cissewsk at eva.mpg.de
Frans Plank [Editor-in-chief, Linguistic Typology]
Sprachwissenschaft
Universitaet Konstanz
D-78457 Konstanz tel + 49 7531 88 26 56
Germany fax + 49 7531 88 27 41
E-mail: frans.plank at uni-konstanz.de
Johan van der Auwera [Secretary-Treasurer]
Linguistiek (GER)
Universiteit Antwerpen (UIA)
B-2610 Antwerpen tel + 32 3 820 27 76
Belgium fax fax + 32 3 820 27 62
E-mail: auwera at uia.ua.ac.be
ALT on the WEB: http://www.ling.lancs.ac.uk/alt
Webmaster : Peter Kahrel p.kahrel at lancaster.ac.uk
-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
APPENDIX 1: Statutes and Interim Arrangements (August 1999)
STATUTES
Article I. Name and Object
1. This Association shall be known as the ASSOCIATION FOR LINGUISTIC
TYPOLOGY.
2. Its objects are set out in the Charter, which is hereby deemed to
form part of these Statutes.
Article II. Membership
1. There shall be the following classes of membership: regular members,
student members, group members, and associate members.
2. Any individual may become a regular member by payment of dues. The
Secretary-Treasurer may, in consultation with the Executive Committee,
and on an equitable basis, waive a portion or all of the dues for
scholars actively working in the area of linguistic typology who are
unable to pay the regular dues.
3. Any bona fide student may become a student member on payment of dues.
Student membership in the Society requires that the individual submit a
verification of student status.
4. Any group of individuals, incorporated or not, may apply for group
membership to the Secretary-Treasurer; on acceptance, such a group shall
pay dues at the rate for a regular member. The individuals constituting
a group member shall be associate members.
5. Each regular, student, and group member shall pay an annual fee as
dues, in amount fixed by vote of the Executive Committee. If the annual
dues are not received within a time to be prescribed, the member shall
forfeit the rights of membership (as hereafter specified) until payment
is received; these rights shall be restored upon payment of all arrears.
6. Only regular members, student members, and group members may vote and
hold office in the Association; to be eligible to vote and hold office,
group members must appoint one of their constituent associate members as
the representative of the group for the purpose of voting and holding
office. All regular, student, and group members shall receive certain
publications of the Association, including the journal 'Linguistic
Typology'. Anyone may submit articles and reviews to the Editor to be
considered as possible contributions to the journal. Only regular,
student, and associate members may offer to the Program Committee papers
for oral presentation at the meetings of the Association.
Article III. Officers and Committees
1. The elected officers shall be a President, a Secretary-Treasurer, and
the Editor-in-Chief of the journal 'Linguistic Typology'.
2. The President shall serve for four years, and shall not be eligible
for re-election. The President shall preside at the meetings of the
Association and the Executive Committee and shall, with the approval of
the Executive Committee, appoint the Nominating and the Program
Committees and such other non-elective officers and committees as may be
required.
3. The Secretary-Treasurer shall serve for four years, with the
possibility of re-election. The responsibilities of the
Secretary-Treasurer shall include keeping the records of the
deliberations of the Association and the Executive Committee, presenting
an annual report to the Association, supervising publications of the
Association which are not the responsibility of the Editor, and such
functions as may be assigned by the President and the Executive
Committee. The Secretary-Treasurer shall be the chief fiscal officer.
4. The Editor-in-Chief shall be elected for four years, with the
possibility of re-election, and shall be responsible for the publication
of the journal.
5. Eight other members of the Editorial Board shall be elected for four
years, with the possibility of re-election, with four members retiring
and four members being elected every other year.
6. There shall be an Executive Committee, composed of the President; the
Secretary-Treasurer; the Editor-in-Chief; and six other members, three
of the six being elected every other year to serve for four years each.
The six extra members shall not be eligible for immediate re-election.
The Executive Committee shall have the power to take, by a majority vote
of those voting, any action that the Association itself could take, but
all its acts must be reported in timely manner to the Association. The
Executive Committee may conduct part or all of its business by mail,
including electronic mail.
7. There shall be a Nominating Committee consisting of four members, two
of them being appointed by the President with the approval of the
Executive Committee every other year, to serve for four years, without
eligibility for immediate re-election. The President shall designate one
of the senior members as chair of the committee.
8. The Nominating Committee shall nominate one person for the position
of President, one for the position of Secretary-Treasurer, one for the
position of Editor-in-Chief, and one for each vacant position on the
Executive Committee and on the Editorial Committee. A report from the
Nominating Committee and the slate of nominees shall be mailed to the
members at the meeting of the Association. The elections shall start
during the meeting of the Association. In order to allow members not
attending the meeting to vote, the polls shall remain open for six weeks
after the meeting. During this period members may vote by mail. For each
vacant position, the candidate receiving the largest number of votes
shall be deemed elected.
9. There shall be a Program Committee consisting of six members
appointed by the President with the approval of the Executive Committee,
three persons being appointed every second year to serve for a period of
four years. For each meeting of the Association, the President shall
appoint one member as Chair. The Program Committee shall have
responsibility for the scholarly content of the Association's meetings
and for recommending general policies on the form of the meetings to the
Executive Committee for action.
Article IV. Fiscal Policy
The Secretary-Treasurer will provide the membership with an annual
report of the Association's finances.
Article V. Meetings
1. There shall be a meeting of the Association at least once every two
years, at such time and place as shall be determined by the Executive
Committee.
2. Titles and descriptions of papers to be read before the Association
must be submitted to the Program Committee beforehand, and its
disposition of such papers, including a possible limitation of the time
to be devoted to them, shall be final.
Article VI. Publication
1. On behalf of the Association, Mouton de Gruyter shall publish a
journal, to be called 'Linguistic Typology'.
2. Approval of expenditures in connection with the publication of the
journal is the responsibility of the Secretary-Treasurer in consultation
with the Executive Committee.
3. Other publications of the Association are the responsibility of the
Secretary-Treasurer in consultation with the Executive Committee.
Article VII. Amendments
Any proposed amendments to this constitution must be submitted to the
Secretary-Treasurer in writing, signed by at least five members of the
Association. Such proposals will be submitted to the membership for
ballot. An amendment must have the approval of two-thirds of the members
voting.
Interim Arrangements
1. The next elections will be held in 1999.
2. Until the office-holders elected in 1999 take office, all current
office-holders, who were elected under an interim procedure at ALT-I in
1995, will remain in office.
3. Eight members-at-large of the Editorial Board shall be elected at the
1999 elections; four for a four year position, and four for a two year
position.
4. Six members-at-large of the Executive Committee shall be elected at
the 1999 elections; three for a four year position, and three for a two
year position.
5. Four members of the Nominating Committee shall be appointed by the
President with the approval of the Executive Committee prior to the 1999
elections, two to a term of four years, and two to a term of two years.
6. Six members of the Program Committee shall be appointed by the
President with the approval of the Executive Committee prior to the 1999
Annual Meeting, three to a term of two years, and three to a term of
four years.
o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-
APPENDIX 2: The 1999 Elections
I APPROVE of the entire slate of ALT officers nominated, as listed in
ALT News No. 24, and with respect to the Editorial Board I choose
Proposal A. I further accept that the Statutes be changed accordingly.
OR
I APPROVE of the entire slate of ALT officers nominated, as listed in
ALT News No. 24, and with respect to the Editorial Board I choose
Proposal B.
OR
I APPROVE of only part of the slates, as listed in ALT News No. 24.
President: Marianne Mithun YES/NO
Secretary-Treasurer: Johan van der Auwera YES/NO
Editor-in-chief: Frans Plank YES/NO
Executive Committee:
(President, Secretary-Treasurer, Editor-in-Chief)
+ Matthew Dryer (1999-2001) YES/NO
Gilbert Lazard (1999-2001) YES/NO
Paolo Ramat (1999-2001) YES/NO
+ Bernard Comrie (1999-2003) YES/NO
Scott Delancey (1999-2003) YES/NO
Maria Polinsky (1999-2003) YES/NO
Editorial Board:
Proposal A (irrespective of names) YES/NO
(Editor-in-Chief+
+ Marianne Mithun (1999-2000) YES/NO
Anna Siewierska (1999-2000) YES/NO
Nicholas Evans (1999-2001) YES/NO
Aleksandr Kibrik (1999-2001) YES/NO
Edith Moravcsik (1999-2002) YES/NO
Leon Stassen (1999-2002) YES/NO
Larry Hyman (1999-2003) YES/NO
Matt Shibatani (1999-2003) YES/NO
Carmen Pensado (2000-2004) YES/NO
Dan Slobin (2000-2004) YES/NO
OR
Proposal B (the system irrespective of names) YES/NO
(Editor-in-Chief)
+ Nicholas Evans (1999-2001) YES/NO
Aleksandr Kibrik (1999-2001) YES/NO
Edith Moravcsik (1999-2001) YES/NO
Leon Stassen (1999-2001) YES/NO
Larry Hyman (1999-2003) YES/NO
Carmen Pensado (1999-2003) YES/NO
Masayoshi Shibatani (1999-2003) YES/NO
Dan Slobin (1999-2003) YES/NO
-o-o-o-o
To assist the Executive Committee, you are asked to express your own
preferences with respect to the ALT conferences.
I am in favor of holding ALT conferences
a. Annually
Biennially
Whenever
b. In even years
In odd years
Whenever
For me
c. early June is good / bad / neither
late June is good / bad / neither
early July is good / bad / neither
late July is good / bad / neither
early August is good / bad / neither
late August is good / bad / neither
early September is good / bad / neither
late September is good / bad / neither
Cross out what is inappropriate and return the Appendix by December 12
1999 to Johan van der Auwera.
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