Call: Approaches to Discourse Particles

[Kerstin Fischer]

CALL FOR PAPERS

This is a call for contributions to the book `Approaches to Discourse
Particles'  edited by K. Fischer for John Benjamins' Pragmatics & Beyond
New Series.

The volume aims at showing which approaches to discourse particles are
on the market and how they address the most pressing problems of their
semantic/pragmatic description. Most importantly, the collection aims
at presenting the approaches in a way so that the different methods,
assumptions, and perspectives of each approach can be compared.

In order to ensure the comparability of the approaches, all articles
will be composed according to a given schema. The schema corresponds
to the main problem areas for which an account of the meanings and
functions of discourse particles has to provide solutions. The four
problem areas are the following:

- Providing a definition of discourse particles by describing the
  characteristics of the word class, and by developing criteria for
  deciding for every given particle instance whether it is a discourse
  particle or not;

- accounting for the different interpretations of the items of the
  class, that is, for the broad functional spectrum of discourse particles;

- accounting for the relationship between the different readings and
  the relationship between the different readings and the particle
  lexeme. Just listing the various interpretations treats the items
  under consideration as homonymous; such an approach does not account
  for our intuition of the relatedness of these meanings, and it
  leaves unexplained how the interpretations observable are learnable
  and how contextual occurrences are interpretable;

- relating the study of discourse particles to other questions of
  general linguistic interest (for instance, research in grammar,
  lexical semantics, or semiotics), such as the semantics/pragmatics
  interface, the nature and levels of discourse, or communicative
  functions. General linguistic distinctions should be mirrored in the
  architecture of the model, so that particles may finally lose their
  exceptional status.

These four problem areas constitute the schema on the basis of
which each individual article will be organized in order to
ensure the comparability of the different approaches for the
prospective reader.

If you are interested in contributing to the volume, send:

- a statement of intent to K. Fischer
  fischer at nats.informatik.uni-hamburg.de as soon as possible

- an abstract of four pages, showing that you have an orginal approach
  to discourse particles and indicating the way by means of which you
  intend to address the four problem areas described above, before
  August 10th, 2001, to K. Fischer fischer at nats.informatik.uni-hamburg.de.

The volume aims at displaying the whole range of currently available
general and comprehensive approaches to all of the four problem areas
outlined. While the current list of contributors promises a very
exciting book already, some research directions are still
underrepresented, and representatives of approaches not covered yet
are especially encouraged to contribute. Each abstract will be
reviewed anonymously, and selections will be made on the basis of the
criteria of the originality and comprehensiveness of the respective
approach.

The list of contributors currently includes:

Jens Allwood
Carla Bazzanella
Gabriele Diewald
Ad Foolen
Bruce Fraser
Maj-Britt Mosegaard Hansen
Francois Nemo
Salvador Pons Borderia
Gisela Redeker
Eddy Roulet
Deborah Schiffrin
Scott Schwenter

The further procedure will be for all authors to write a draft version
of their paper, considering the basic problem areas outlined above,
before October 30th. The draft versions from all authors will then be
made accessible to the other contributors so that everyone can relate
his or her approach to the complete range of approaches
available. Final versions will be due January 4th, 2002.

Important Dates:

Statement of intent to contribute:		as soon as possible
Abstracts:					Aug 10th, 2001
Draft versions of papers:			Oct 30th, 2001
Final versions:					Jan 4th, 2002


------------------------------------------------------------
Dr. Kerstin Fischer

University of Bremen - Fachbereich 10
Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaften
Postfach 330440 - 28334 Bremen
kerstinf at uni-bremen.de - tel: +49-421-218-9735
http://www.fb10.uni-bremen.de/anglistik/homepages/fischer.htm