36.2547, Calls: Panel at LIV Simposio de la Sociedad Española de Lingüística: The Morphosyntax of Proper Names (Spain)

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LINGUIST List: Vol-36-2547. Thu Aug 28 2025. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 36.2547, Calls: Panel at LIV Simposio de la Sociedad Española de Lingüística: The Morphosyntax of Proper Names (Spain)

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Date: 27-Aug-2025
From: Javier Caro-Reina [javier.caroreina at uni-koeln.de]
Subject: Panel at LIV Simposio de la Sociedad Española de Lingüística: The Morphosyntax of Proper Names


Full Title: Panel at LIV Simposio de la Sociedad Española de
Lingüística: The Morphosyntax of Proper Names
Short Title: LIV Simposio SEL

Date: 26-Jan-2026 - 29-Jan-2026
Location: Madrid, Spain
Contact Person: Javier Caro-Reina
Meeting Email: javier.caroreina at uni-koeln.de
Web Site: https://www.sel.edu.es/liv-simposio-madrid-2026/

Linguistic Field(s): Historical Linguistics; Morphology;
Sociolinguistics; Syntax; Typology

Call Deadline: 30-Sep-2025

Description:
During the last years there has been a growing interest in the study
of the morphosyntactic behaviour of proper names (Ackermann &
Schlücker 2017; Dammel & Handschuh 2019; Caro Reina & Helmbrecht 2022;
Stolz & Nintemann 2024). From a typological perspective, it has been
shown that proper names can, to varying degrees, morphosyntactically
differ from common nouns. As a consequence, some scholars speak of a
special onymic grammar (Nübling et al. 2015) while others propose a
special anthroponymic grammar and a special toponymic grammar (Stolz &
Levkovych 2022). This is due to the fact that place names can
morphosyntactically pattern with either personal names or common nouns
or even morphosyntactically deviate from both.
The morphosyntactic behaviour of proper names has been described for
several languages (see Fernández Leborans 1999 and Bajo Pérez 2002 for
Spanish). However, proper names do not constitute a homogeneous class.
Therefore, it is necessary to distinguish not only between proper name
classes (such as personal names, place names, etc.), but also between
proper name subclasses (such as names of cities, countries, regions,
etc. in the case of place names) to carry out a systematic study of
their grammatical behaviour. Moreover, language varieties may differ
with respect to the morphosyntax of proper names. Such is the case
with the use of the definite article with personal names and the
gender assignment rules of city names in Spanish.
Thus, the morphosyntax of proper names has opened up new lines of
research, which include linguistic typology, historical linguistics,
and language variation.
Goals:
The aim of this panel is to examine the special morphosyntax of proper
names (as well as proper name classes such place names and proper name
subclasses such as city names) from a synchronic, diachronic,
contrastive, and typological perspective. Examples of the most
productive lines of research in this area are the following:
1) Definite article: The use of the definite article with personal
names and place names has been the subject of numerous studies. While
the occurrence of the definite article with place names seems to be
the result of a grammaticalization process that diachronically goes
from less prototypical place names (such as river names) to more
prototypical place names (such as country names), the occurrence of
the definite article with personal names seems to be the result of a
complex pragmaticalization process whereby the role of
semantic-pragmatic, lexical, morphosyntactic, and sociolinguistic
factors changes depending on the variety (see Caro Reina 2022 for
Romance languages).
2) Gender: The gender of common nouns is mainly determined by
phonological, semantic, and lexical rules. In contrast, gender may be
assigned to proper names according to semantic and referential rules.
In Spanish, for example, semantic gender assignment applies to
personal names (Pedro, María) and animal names (Pluto, Lassie) while
referential gender applies to other (less prototypical) proper name
classes such as object names and proper name subclasses such as river
names. More specifically, river names are masculine regardless of
their ending (el Ebro, el Guadiana, el Guadalquivir) since gender
assignment is based on the basic level noun –that is, the hyperonym
río ‘river’, which is masculine. However, gender assignment rules may
overlap, giving rise to variation. This is the case with city names in
Spanish, where they can be either masculine or feminine (Madrid es
bonito vs. Madrid es bonita ‘Madrid is beautiful’).
3) Differential Object Marking (DOM): DOM is a morphosyntactic
phenomenon whereby some direct objects are marked while other are not
depending on factors such as the referentiality of the direct object
(animacy and definiteness/specificity), verbal semantics (telicity,
affectedness, and agentivity), and information structure (topicality)
(Aissen 2003). In Old Spanish, for example, DOM is obligatory with
personal names, but optional with place names (country names and city
names) and human definite NPs (Laca 2006).
4) Hypocoristics: The formation of hypocoristics offers a large number
of derivational suffixes depending on diatopic variation and
phonological, morphological, and sociolinguistic factors (see Marqueta
Gracia & Cañete Lairla 2023 for Spanish).
5) Kinship names: Kinship terms constitute an intermediate class
between proper names and common nouns since they can
morphosyntactically behave like personal names. This distinction can
be lexically encoded in doublets such as mom/mother, dad/father, etc.
In European Spanish, mamá/papá behave like proper names because they
lack the definite article, while madre/padre behave like common nouns
because they take it (see Dahl & Koptjevskaja-Tamm 2001 for more
examples). Further evidence for the onymic status of kinship terms
comes from morphosyntactic phenomena such as case marking and
possessive constructions.
6) Spatial relations: With regard to the coding of the place roles
locative (location), allative (goal) and ablative (source), place
names can be distinguished from common nouns by asymmetric coding
differences involving shorter (or even zero) coding as opposed to
longer (adpositional rather than affixal) coding (see Stolz et al.
2014; Haspelmath 2019).
Abstracts:
With this CfP, we invite abstract submissions for oral presentations
(20 minutes) that focus on one of the thematic areas covered by the
monographic session. Abstracts should use the corresponding template
(“plantilla para el envío de propuestas”) and be submitted in English
or Spanish via the registration website (“página web para la solicitud
de participación”)
(https://www.sel.edu.es/liv-simposio-madrid-2026/cuotas-e-inscripcion/).
References:
Ackermann, T. & Schlücker, B. (eds.) (2017). The morphosyntax of
proper names [Special issue]. Folia Linguistica, 51(2).
Aissen, J. (2003). Differential object marking. Iconicity vs. economy.
Natural Language & Linguistic Theory, 21(3), 435–483.
https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1024109008573
Bajo Pérez, E. (2002). La caracterización morfosintáctica del nombre
propio. Noia: Toxosoutos.
Caro Reina, J. (2022). The definite article with personal names in
Romance languages. In J. Caro Reina & J. Helmbrecht (eds.), Proper
names versus common nouns: Morphosyntactic contrasts in the languages
of the world, 51–92. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110672626-003
Caro Reina, J. & Helmbrecht, J. (eds.) (2022). Proper names versus
common nouns: Morphosyntactic contrasts in the languages of the world.
Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110672626
Dahl, Ö. & Koptjevskaja-Tamm, M. (2001). Kinship in grammar. In I.
Baron, M. Herslund & F. Sørensen (eds.), Dimensions of possession,
201–225. Amsterdam, New York: John Benjamins.
https://doi.org/10.1075/tsl.47.12dah
Dammel, A. & Handschuh, C. (eds.) (2019). Grammar of names [Special
issue]. Language Typology and Universals, 72(4).
Fernández Leborans, M. J. (1999). El nombre propio. In I. Bosque & V.
Demonte (eds.), Gramática descriptiva de la lengua española, vol. 1,
77–128. Madrid: Espasa Calpe.
Haspelmath, M. (2019). Differential place marking and differential
object marking. Language Typology and Universals, 72(3), 313–334.
https://doi.org/10.1515/stuf-2019-0013
Laca, B. (2006). El objeto directo preposicional. In C. Company
Company (ed.), Sintaxis histórica de la lengua española. Primera
parte: La frase verbal, vol. 1, 423–478. México: UNAM.
Marqueta Gracia, B. & Cañete Lairla, M. (2023). Análisis
teórico-cuantitativo de la constitución formal de los hipocorísticos
en español peninsular. Pragmalingüística, 31, 265–286.
https://doi.org/10.25267/Pragmalinguistica.2023.i31.12
Nübling, D., Fahlbusch, F. & Heuser, R. (2015). Namen. Eine Einführung
in die Onomastik. Tübingen: Narr.
Stolz, T., Lestrade, S. & Stolz, C. (2014). The crosslinguistics of
zero-marking of spatial relations. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton.
https://doi.org/10.1524/9783050065304
Stolz, T. & Levkovych, N. (2022). On Special Onymic Grammar (SOG):
Definiteness markers in Fijian and selected Austronesian languages. In
J. Caro Reina & J. Helmbrecht (eds.), Proper names versus common
nouns: Morphosyntactic contrasts in the languages of the world,
237–264. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110672626-009
Stolz, T. & Nintemann, J. (2024). Special Onymic Grammar in
typological perspective: Cross-linguistic data, recurrent patterns,
functional explanations. Berlin, Boston: De Gruyter Mouton.
https://doi.org/10.1515/9783111331874



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