PIONIER workshop on Case, Valency and Transitivity in Nijmegen (J une 2003) : call for papers : extended dead-line

[Kulikov, L.]

	Case, Valency and Transitivity 
	First CALL FOR PAPERS
	PIONIER-Workshop
	
	Dates: second half of June 2003
	Location: Nijmegen
	Organizers: Leonid Kulikov, Andrej Malchukov, Peter de Swart
	
	Case, valency and transitivity belong to the most discussed topics
of the modern linguistics. Case is a grammatical category determined by the
syntactic or semantic function of a noun or pronoun. Valency is a verbal
feature which characterizes the capacity of a verb to take a specific number
and type of arguments and thus, in the languages with case-marking,
crucially depends on the case-marking of the arguments. Transitivity is a
more abstract feature of both verbs and syntactic patterns, determined by
the ability of a given verb (verbal form) to take a (direct) object. 
	
	Thus, the three concepts listed in the title of the workshop are
intimately related to each other and build up the foundations of the
syntactic skeleton of a clause. In fact, however, all the three concepts
reach far beyond the pure syntax. On the one hand, they are crucially
connected with such morphological aspects of the clause as case marking and
person agreement (which both can be understood as case in a broad sense of
the concept), valency marking on verbs (voice and diathesis) and various
morphological devices for marking transitivity. On the other hand, they
inevitably involve several semantic issues, such as meaning of case,
semantico-syntactic verbal classes, semantic correlates of transitivity (in
the vein of Hopper & Thompson's (1980) approach to transitivity as a bunch
of features) and some others. 
	
	All these issues belong to the scope of the research activity of the
PIONIER-Project "Case cross-linguistically", started at University of
Nijmegen in 2002 under the guidance of Dr. H. deHoop. 
	
	Among the questions which we would like to see addressed are the
following:
	
	· Case systems across languages 
	· Case semantics
	· Valency, transitivity and verbal classes
	· Valency change and case-marking
	· Core valency and oblique arguments
	· Case-marking of subject and object: nominative, accusative,
ergative, absolutive
	· Nominative-accusative and ergative-absolutive patterns in
synchronic and diachronic perspective
	· Evolution of case systems
	· Person agreement as case-marking on verbs
	· Passive, antipassive and other transitivity alternations
	· Case-marking in causative constructions
	· Marking of transitivity and labile verbs
	· Transitivity and object marking
	
	The idea is to organize two- or three-day meeting on Case, Valency
and Transitivity in the second half of June 2003. 
	We hope also to be able to arrange partial reimbursement of travel
and accommodation costs for some participants if necessary.
	
	We invite those interested in these topics to a discussion, with
reference to specific case histories or more general issues in the study of
Case, Valency and Transitivity. 
	Each presentation will be allotted 30 minutes including time for
discussion. 
	
	Abstracts should not exceed one page and can be sent electronically
or in paper format. Electronic submission should be pdf-files or Word
documents. 
	Please include your name, affiliation, and contact information in
the email message to which the abstract is attached. If sending as paper
copy, please include your name, affiliation, and contact information on a
separate sheet. Please specify in the subject line or on the envelope:
Abstract for "Case, Valency and Transitivity".
	
	Deadline for abstract submission: March 1st, 2003
	Notification of acceptance: March 31th, 2003
	
	The organizers of the workshop will be the members of the
PIONIER-Project "Case cross-linguistically" Leonid Kulikov, Andrej Malchukov
and Peter de Swart.
	
	
	Please send your submissions to:
	
	Peter de Swart 
	P.deSwart at let.kun.nl <mailto:P.deSwart at let.kun.nl>
	University of Nijmegen
	Faculty of Arts, Dept. of Linguistics
	PO Box 9103, 6500 HD Nijmegen
	The Netherlands
	Fax: 024-3611070