[Lingtyp] CfP WS at SLE2017 'Confronting codeswitching theories with corpus and experimental data'

[Felicity Meakins]

***Apologies for cross-posting***

Confronting codeswitching theories with corpus and experimental data

Convenors: Evangelia Adamou (CNRS, France) & Felicity Meakins (U-Queensland, Australia)

Call deadline: 11 November 2016

Various theoretical frameworks have made a number of generalizations and predictions about the patterns found in intraclausal codeswitching across a variety of bi/multilingual settings. Although many cross-linguistic patterns have been observed and successfully predicted by these theories, increasing amounts of corpus and experimental data are providing challenges to the explanatory power of these theories. The aim of this workshop is to gather specialists of bilingualism and language contact who will bring new corpus and experimental data to competing theories of codeswitching.

Different approaches have been taken to predict potential switch-sites in intraclausal codeswitching. Some utilize existing formal syntactic theories (DiSciullo & Muysken 1986; McSwan 1999), and others base predictions on theory-specific morphological types, most notably the 4-M model of codeswitching (Myers-Scotton 1993, 2002; Myers-Scotton & Jake 2016; Deuchar 2006). Many predictions made by these models, particularly the 4-M model, are also reflected in the borrowing literature (e.g. Weinreich (1974 [1953]; Thomason & Kaufman 1988; Gardani 2008). Where aberrant cases of switches occur, the typological congruence of the languages in contact is often claimed to trump these universal constraints (Muysken 2000; Sebba 1998; Meakins 2014; Meakins & O’Shannessy 2012). These approaches have stressed that switch points are largely determined by absolute typological constraints, as well as by the typological match of the languages in contact. Despite the relative success of these approaches, counter- examples exist in the literature (Adamou & Granqvist 2015; Adamou 2016; Meakins 2011).

More recent formal approaches are attempting to link bilingual data to linguistic theory (Muysken 2012; Benmamoun, Montrul & Polinsky 2013a, 2013b). For example, the Interface Hypothesis (Sorace 2011) predicts that bilingualism is more likely to affect linguistic structures made up of more than one component, namely external interfaces involving syntax and pragmatics. Nonetheless, it appears that the Interface Hypothesis alone cannot account for a variety of datasets, and more criteria need to be (re-)introduced, such as structural complexity and memory capacity (Laleko & Polinsky in press).

In contrast, probabilistic approaches to codeswitching predict that higher levels of abstraction are shaped by language practices. Such studies have a long tradition in the variationist framework (Poplack 1980; Poplack & Dion 2012; Torres Cacoullos & Travis 2015, 2016) and more recently in usage-based approaches (Backus 2015). Finally, Matras (2009) offers an approach that combines language processing requirements, communication goals, and community-level practices.

In particular, we call for papers addressing any of the following questions:

  1.  How can bilingual data inform linguistic theory?
  2.  Code-switched clauses & bilinguals: one grammar or two?
  3.  Are specific linguistic categories more vulnerable to interactional pressure and processing constraints?
  4.  What is the role of typological and structural constraints?
  5.  How does frequency and exposure interact with abstract rules and processing?

Abstracts should be 300 words max excluding references. Relevant Dates
11 November 2016:         Deadline for submission of 300-word abstracts to Evangelia Adamou                                                      evangelia.adamou at cnrs.fr<mailto:evangelia.adamou at cnrs.fr> and Felicity Meakins f.meakins at uq.edu.au<mailto:f.meakins at uq.edu.au>
18 November 2016:         Notification of acceptance by the workshop organizers
25 November 2016:         Submission of the workshop proposals to SLE
25 December 2016:          Notification of acceptance of workshop proposals from SLE
15 January 2017:             Deadline for submission of abstracts to SLE for review
31 March 2017:               Notification of paper acceptance
10–13 September 2017:     SLE conference http://www.societaslinguistica.eu

References


Adamou, E. (2016). A corpus-driven approach to language contact: Endangered languages in a comparative perspective. Boston & Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Adamou, E. & Granqvist, K. (2015). Unevenly mixed Romani languages. International Journal of Bilingualism 19. 525–547.
Backus, A. M. (2015). A usage-based approach to codeswitching: The need for reconciling structure and function. Code-switching Between Structural and Sociolinguistic Perspectives, 19–37. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Benmamoun, S., S. Montrul & M. Polinsky. (2013a). Heritage languages and their speakers: Opportunities and challenges for linguistics. Theoretical Linguistics 39. 129-181.
Benmamoun, S., S. Montrul & M. Polinsky. (2013b). Defining an “ideal” heritage speaker (Reply to peer commentaries in TL). Theoretical Linguistics 39. 259-294.
Deuchar, M. (2006). Welsh-English code-switching and the Matrix Language frame model. Lingua 116. 1986-2011.
Gardani, F. (2008). Borrowing of inflectional morphemes in language contact. Frankfurt: Peter Lang.
Laleko, O. & M. Polinsky. In Press. Between syntax and discourse: Topic and case marking in heritage speakers and L2 learners of Japanese and Korean. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism. Accessed online at http://scholar.harvard.edu/mpolinsky/publications?page=2

Matras, Y. (2009). Language contact. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Meakins, F. (2011). Borrowing contextual inflection: Evidence from northern Australia. Morphology 21(1). 57-87.
Meakins, F. (2014). Nominals as adjuncts or arguments: Further evidence from language mixing. In R. Pensalfini, D. Guilleman, & M. Turpin (Eds.), Language Description Informed by Theory (pp. 283–315). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.
Meakins, F. & C. O’Shannessy. (2012). Typological constraints on verb integration in two Australian mixed languages. Journal of Language Contact 5(2). 216-246.
Muysken, P. (2000). Bilingual speech: A typology of code-mixing. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Muysken, P. (2012). Spanish affixes in the Quechua languages: A multidimensional perspective. Lingua 122. 481-493.
Myers-Scotton, C. (1993). Duelling Languages: Grammatical Structure in Code-switching. Oxford: Clarendon press.
Myers-Scotton, C. (2002). Contact linguistics, bilingual encounters and grammatical outcomes. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Myers-Scotton, C. & J. Jake. (2016). Revisiting the 4-M model: Codeswitching and morpheme election at the abstract level. International Journal of Bilingualism, Published online before print on February 9, 2016, doi:10.1177/1367006915626588.
O’Shannessy, C. (2012). The role of codeswitched input to children in the origin of a new mixed language. Linguistics 50. 305-340.
Poplack, S. (1980). Sometimes I’ll start a sentence in Spanish y termino en espanol. Linguistics 18. 581-618.

Poplack, S. & N. Dion. (2012). Myths and facts about loanword development. Language Variation and Change 24. 279-315.
Sebba, M. (1998). A congruence approach to the syntax of code-switching. International Journal of Bilingualism 2. 1-20.
Sorace, A. (2011). Pinning down the concept of “interface” in bilingualism. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism 1. 1-33.
Thomason, S. G. & T. Kaufman. (1988). Language contact, creolization, and genetic linguistics. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Torres Cacoullos, R. & C. Travis. (2015). Gauging convergence on the ground: Codeswitching in the community. International Journal of Bilingualism 19. 635-386.
Torres Cacoullos, R. & C. Travis. (2016). Two languages, one effect: structural priming in spontaneous code-switching. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 19. 733-753.
Weinreich, U. (1974 [1953]). Languages in contact: Findings and problems. The Hague: Mouton.
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