LINGUIST List 11.1115

Wed May 17 2000

Calls: General:ConSOLE, Computers&Lang:M/C: A Journal

Editor for this issue: James Yuells <jameslinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Erik Jan van der Torre, General Linguistics:Ninth Meeting of the Student Organisation of Linguistics in Europe
2. Felicity Meakins, Computers & Lang:M/C: A Journal of Media and Culture

ConSOLE 9 - Call for Papers

The ninth meeting of the Student Organisation of Linguistics in Europe
(ConSOLE) will be held at the University of Lund, Sweden, from 8 to 10
December 2000.

SOLE aims at providing students of generative linguistics with a possibility
of gaining international experience and a publication forum of their own.
Furthermore, SOLE strives to enhance contacts and cooperation between
students of generative linguistics in Europe and around the world. Papers
are solicited from students in the field of generative linguistics, more
specifically in, but not limited to, phonology, morphology, semantics, sign
language, language acquisition and syntax. Submissions may be sent either by
regular mail or e-mail. If regular mail is used, please send eight copies,
of which seven should be anonymous and one should contain your name,
affiliation, address and e-mail address.

Abstracts should be set in at least 10 point and must not exceed two pages,
including references, diagrams, and examples. Please send abstracts to:

ConSOLE 9
Department of Linguistics and Phonetics
Helgonabacken 12
S-22362 Lund
Sweden

E-mail submissions must be rich text format (RTF, preferred) or text only
(ASCII format). Abstracts submitted in this way should not exceed 1300
words, including references, diagrams, and examples. They should be sent to:
console9ling.lu.se

At most one individual and one co-authored abstract may be submitted; all
authors must be students -- undergraduate or graduate -- at the time of
submission.

The deadline for submission is 1 August, 2000 (regardless of mode of
submission). Abstracts received after 1 August will not be considered.
Submissions by fax will not be accepted. Questions regarding submission and
the conference in general can be addressed to the local organisers at the
following e-mail address:

console9ling.lu.se

or to the SOLE board at the following e-mail address:

SOLErullet.LeidenUniv.nl

Information about the conference will be made available on the following
webpage:

http://www.ling.lu.se/conference/console9

Local Organizers: Joost van de Weijer

SOLE-Board: Erica Thrift
 Erik Jan van der Torre
 Malte Zimmermann

Call for Contributions to the 'Chat' issue of M/C - A Journal of Media and
Culture

Edited by Felicity Meakins and Sean Rintel

Feature Writer: Charles Antaki

M/C (Media/Culture) is an electronic journal of media and culture published
by the Department of English Media and Cultural Studies Centre at the
University of Queensland in Australia. Established in 1998, M/C has
successfully grown in international standing among serious internet
journals. Please visit the site (http://english.uq.edu.au/mc/cover.html) to
read through the latest issue and for more information.

Each issue of M/C is themed. For the issue released on the 23rd of August,
the theme is 'Chat' and the feature writer is Charles Antaki. The M/C 'Chat'
issue is intended to be as broad a survey of the mechanics, media, contexts
and analysis of chat as possible.

Robert Hopper once described argued chat as technology - "humanmade
instrumentality that partially restructures the world." Hopper's notion is
an excellent starting point for the 'Chat' issue of M/C, devoted to the
exploration of this most pervasive of discursive modes, and, indeed, to the
reflexive exploration of how researchers analyse chat.

How does the technology of talk work, and what happens when talk is itself
mediated by other technologies? In what sense is chat "humanmade"? What
parts of the world can be restructured by chat, and how is this
accomplished? In M/C 'Chat' , any chat artefacts - semantic, syntactic,
phatic, contextual - may be put under the microscope.

The artefacts and underpinnings of the analysis of chat, as themselves
partially restructuring of the world, may also be highlighted in this issue.
Methodology and ideology of analysis certainly shape the
understandings of chat, particularly if those understandings are argued to
be of practical significance. What results might inductive, deductive or
adductive approaches to chat analysis provide, and how might they be
compared and contrasted? Similar questions could be asked of qualitative and
quantitative analysis. Are combinatory approaches viable?

Of course the next question becomes, not how chat restructures the world,
but what world it restructures. The world exists as a fractured entity, both
in the way we understand it, and in the way it breaks down along
cultural, social and relational lines. How do two people chat when their
perceptions of the world are inherently different? How much of this
represented information is mutual? In what ways does chat create ethnic
groups, perpetuate racism, sexism and ageism or generally signify the other?
How is it that we can swear at close friends and not at our superiors? Chat,
in these situations becomes a point of mediation between
the world and self - a highly constructed moment. But what happens when chat
itself is mediated? What happens to the world as we know it?

And to turn Hopper's statement on its head, we can ask how does the world
structure our chat? Why does a person who has been living in a foreign
country for 40 years still have an accent? When does "You saw that gas can
explode" become a declaration about gas exploding or a can exploding. Who
does "you" refer to. It seems obvious, but "you" in isolation is
meaningless. It seems that meaning sought from the world also enriches our
chat.

Articles are due by the 24th of July 2000. M/C 'Chat' will be released on
the 23rd of August 2000. Contributors are directed to previous issues of M/C
(http://english.uq.edu.au/mc/cover.html) for article length and style
guidelines.

Please direct submissions to Sean Rintel (s.rintelmailbox.uq.edu.au) or
Felicity Meakins (s331564student.uq.edu.au).
=========
The opinions expressed in this email do not
reflect those of The University of Queensland.
=========
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Felicity Meakins
UQ English Department
Brisbane 4072
ph 3365 4748

'Queen Victoria was like a great paperweight
 that for half a century sat upon men's minds
and when she was removed their ideas began
 to blow all over the place haphazardly.'

 - H.G. Wells