36.2960, Confs: Workshop at SLE 2026: Constructions With Multiple Wh-words Across Languages (Germany)

[The LINGUIST List]

LINGUIST List: Vol-36-2960. Fri Oct 03 2025. ISSN: 1069 - 4875.

Subject: 36.2960, Confs: Workshop at SLE 2026: Constructions With Multiple Wh-words Across Languages (Germany)

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Date: 02-Oct-2025
From: Valentina Apresjan [Valentina.Yuryevna.Apresyan at dartmouth.edu]
Subject: Workshop at SLE 2026: Constructions With Multiple Wh-words Across Languages


Workshop at SLE 2026: Constructions With Multiple Wh-words Across
Languages
Short Title: SLE 2026

Date: 26-Aug-2026 - 29-Aug-2026
Location: Osnabrück, Germany
Contact: Valentina Apresyan
Contact Email: Valentina.Yuryevna.Apresyan at dartmouth.edu
Meeting URL: https://blogs.helsinki.fi/wh-words-cle2026/

Linguistic Field(s): Morphology; Pragmatics; Semantics; Syntax;
Typology

Submission Deadline: 05-Nov-2025

Together with Piotr Sobotka, Mikhail Kopotev, and Mladen Uhlik, I am
pleased to announce that we are organizing a workshop at the next
meeting of the Societas Linguistica Europaea (SLE), which will take
place in Osnabrück, Germany, from 26 to 29 August 2026. If you are
working on any aspect of multiple-wh words, we warmly invite you to
join us and submit an abstract by 5 November 2025. You will find the
workshop description below, and the full proposal along with further
details here: https://blogs.helsinki.fi/wh-words-cle2026/
Convenors:
Valentina Apresjan (Dartmouth College, USA)
Mikhail Kopotev (University of Helsinki, Finland / Stockholm
University, Sweden)
Piotr Sobotka (Institute of Slavic Studies, PAS, Poland)
Mladen Uhlik (Fran Ramovš Institute of the Slovenian Language &
University of Ljubljana, Slovenia)
Meeting Description:
The workshop aims to bring together researchers interested in the
syntax, semantics, and pragmatics of constructions with multiple
wh-words across languages, which are understood as constructions
structured with two or more wh-elements that can fulfil different
functions. We propose the following questions for discussion:
 - What semantic, syntactic, and pragmatic factors underlie the
restrictions on wh-variables and their possible pairings in
polypronominal wh-constructions, especially in their distributive
readings?
 - Under what semantic and pragmatic conditions are such constructions
licensed in discourse, and what communicative functions do they
perform across languages?
 - What syntactic positions can these constructions occupy within the
clause, and how do they interact with the valency requirements of the
predicate (if present)?
 - How do frequency, idiomatization and formulaicity influence the
grammatical status of these constructions across different languages?
 - What are the historical sources of such constructions (e.g.
indirect questions > quasi-relatives > distributives), and what
grammaticalization paths can be identified cross-linguistically?
 - Can we detect areal or genealogical patterns in the distribution
and structure of these constructions, and what do such patterns reveal
about contact-induced change versus independent development?
 - How do distributive constructions with multiple wh-words compare
with other distributive strategies (lexical, morphological, or
clausal) cross-linguistically?
We welcome submissions that employ a range of theoretical frameworks,
including but not limited to Construction Grammar, formal semantic and
pragmatic analyses, corpus-based studies, cross-linguistic typological
comparisons. We are particularly interested in studies that combine
theoretical analysis with empirical data from diverse languages, using
methodologies such as corpus linguistics, experimental pragmatics and
comparative linguistics.
For full information about the call please visit the workshop site at
https://blogs.helsinki.fi/wh-words-cle2026/
Contact mail: ktokudachego at gmail.com



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