Acquisition of Verb Grammar and Verb Arguments

[Natalia Gagarina]

Call for papers

CONFERENCE ON THE ACQUISITION OF VERB GRAMMAR AND VERB
ARGUMENTS

Zentrum für Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft, Universalienforschung und
Typologie (Centre of General Linguistics), Berlin
15-17 November 2001

Organizers:
Dagmar Bittner,
Natalia Gagarina,
Insa Guelzow

It has often been proposed that children begin the process of language
acquisition with a special emphasis on the verb or on verb-like
structures. Whether or not this could be proved cross-linguistically in
detail it could be assumed that the acquisition of the verb and of its
grammar plays a central role in early language acquisition. In this
conference we hope to bring together researchers with an interest in one
of the following aspects which we regard as related to the acquisition
of the grammar of the verb:

- finiteness
- verb inflection
- word order of the verb and verbal arguments
- subjects and objects
- argument structure
- case inflection

Cross-linguistic analysis of these processes will help to draw attention
on the details of the single processes and shed light on their
interrelatedness in early language acquisition. Furthermore they should
provide insight into the impact of particular target languages on these
processes while at the same time leading to a better understanding of
the general cognitive aspects of the acquisition of the basic
grammatical structure of utterances. Papers on any of the topics
mentioned above dealing with first language acquisition in mono- and
bilingual children between 1 to 3 years of age are welcome. Papers
focussing on interrelations among some of these aspects are especially
encouraged.

Abstracts should be up to 500 words in length and should outline the
research question as well as the language(s) and the age range of
children studied.
Three copies of abstracts, two anonymous, should be sent by electronic
or regular mail to Insa Guelzow or Natalia Gagarina by June 30st, 2001.
If you submitting electronically, please include the abstract in the
body of the message (do not send attachments!). You will be informed by
the mid of July of acceptance.
Please send your abstracts to:
Insa Guelzow: guelzow at zas.gwz-berlin.de
Natalia Gagarina: gagarina at zas.gwz-berlin.de

Zentrum für Allgemeine Sprachwissenschaft, Universalienforschung und
Typologie
Jägerstr. 10/11
D-10117 Berlin
Germany

A second circular will be sent out in September with information
concerning travel and accommodation.

Presentations of 40 minutes in length (25 min presentation + 15 min
discussion) will be given at a plenary session. Conference languages are
English and German.

We plan to publish a book of the papers dealing with the impact of verb
acquisition on other acquisitional processes. Texts to be included in
this volume will be reviewed by outside readers.

Scientific Committee:
Jürgen Weissenborn
Klaus-Michael Köpcke
Dagmar Bittner


Coordinators to be consulted on practical and academic matters:

Dagmar Bittner
Universität Potsdam
Institut für Linguistik
Patholinguistik
PO Box 60 15 53
D-14415 Potsdam
Germany
dabitt at zas.gwz-berlin.de

Natalia Gagarina
ZAS,
Jägerstr. 10/11
D-10117 Berlin
Germany
gagarina at zas.gwz-berlin.de