28.2827, Calls: Pragmatics, Semantics/Germany

[The LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-28-2827. Tue Jun 27 2017. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 28.2827, Calls: Pragmatics, Semantics/Germany

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Date: Tue, 27 Jun 2017 12:34:22
From: Sarah Zobel [sarah.zobel at ds.uni-tuebingen.de]
Subject: Reference determination: literal and non-literal uses

 
Full Title: Reference determination: literal and non-literal uses 
Short Title: RefDet2018 

Date: 07-Mar-2018 - 09-Mar-2018
Location: Stuttgart, Baden-Württemberg, Germany 
Contact Person: Sarah Zobel
Meeting Email: sarah.zobel at ds.uni-tuebingen.de
Web Site: https://refdet.wordpress.com 

Linguistic Field(s): Pragmatics; Semantics 

Call Deadline: 15-Aug-2017 

Meeting Description:

Reference determination: literal and non-literal uses of referring expressions
(AG 15)

Workshop at DGfS 2018, University of Stuttgart, 7-9 March 2018

Natural language provides a wide range of expressions that allow us to refer
to individuals, times, or places, most notably proper names, definite
descriptions, indefinite descriptions, simple and complex demonstratives,
pronouns, and indexical expressions (see e.g., Abbott 2010). In the linguistic
and philosophical literature, different semantic and pragmatic mechanisms were
proposed to describe how reference is determined for these expressions: in
some cases, the linguistic content is sufficient to determine the referent
(like for 'the inventor of the petrol engine'), in others, the linguistic
content is supplemented by additional conventional (non-)cognitive actions
(e.g., simple or complex demonstratives). Most of this research has focused on
the expressions' ''literal use'', for which the referent picked/described by
the linguistic expression (= the semantic referent) matches speaker's intended
referent (= the ''speaker's referent'', Kripke 1977). Many (all?) referring
expressions, however, also allow for ''non-literal uses'', in which the
semantic referent and the speaker's referent do not match: for example,
instances of Donnellan's (1966) referential use of definite descriptions.
Similar cases have been described for proper names, demonstratives, and
pronouns (see recently Aloni 2016, Ebert & Ebert 2014, Rami 2016, and also:
Smith 1989 and Nunberg 1992). What are the semantic/pragmatic consequences of
this mismatch? How do the linguistic content and non-linguistic mechanisms
interact in literal vs. non-literal uses?

Invited Speaker: François Recanati (Institut Jean Nicod, Paris)

Organizers: 
Dolf Rami (University of Göttingen)
T. Ede Zimmermann (University of Frankfurt)
Sarah Zobel (University of Tübingen)


Call for Papers:

We invite submission of proposals dealing with literal and non-literal uses of
referring expressions. We aim at a good balance between linguistically
(semantics, pragmatics) and philosophically (philosophy of language) oriented
talks, approaching the topic from a variety of angles. We also invite
presentations of empirical results on the topic.

Abstracts must be anonymous, in PDF format, at most 2 pages long (including
examples and references), in a font size no less than 12pt, and with margins
of 1 inch/2.5cm. Every author can submit at most one single-authored abstract
and one co-authored abstract.

Abstracts should be submitted via EasyChair no later than August 15, 2017:
https://easychair.org/conferences/?conf=refdet2018

Topics that can be addressed at the workshop include but are not limited to
the following questions:
- When is a non-literal use felicitous for different referring expressions?
- Is the distinction between literal and non-literal uses purely a distinction
between semantic and speakers' reference? What is the role of the speaker's
intention in (non-)literal uses?
- Does reference determination in literal and non-literal uses (necessarily)
involve distinct semantic/pragmatic mechanisms? Or is there a uniform
mechanism operative in all cases, which recombines different ingredients in
literal and non-literal uses?
- How much weight does the linguistic content of a referring expression have
in reference determination?
- Is a sentence containing a non-literal use that states something true about
the speaker's referent true or false? Can such uses only convey true content?




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