LINGUIST List 18.1044
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Fri Apr 06 2007
Calls: General Ling/Belgium; Lang Acquisition/USA
Editor for this issue: Ania Kubisz
<ania linguistlist.org>
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Directory
1. Gunther
De Vogelaer,
Dutch Dialect Geography and Internal Factors
2. Brizan
David Guy,
Psychocomputational Models of Human Language Acquisition
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Message 1: Dutch Dialect Geography and Internal Factors
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Date: 05-Apr-2007
From: Gunther De Vogelaer <gunther.devogelaer ugent.be>
Subject: Dutch Dialect Geography and Internal Factors
Full Title: Dutch Dialect Geography and Internal Factors Date: 23-Nov-2007 - 23-Nov-2007 Location: Ghent, Belgium Contact Person: Gunther De Vogelaer Meeting Email: gunther.devogelaer ugent.be Web Site: http://users.ugent.be/~gdvogela/T&T-call_Eng Linguistic Field(s): General Linguistics Subject Language(s): Dutch (nld) Call Deadline: 30-Jun-2007 Meeting Description: Since the publication of the third volume of the Phonological Atlas of Dutch Dialects (FAND) and the first volume of the Morphological and the Syntactic Atlas of Dutch Dialects (MAND and SAND) in 2005, the Dutch language area may very well be the best described area in the world with respect to dialect variation. The present workshop aims at exploring the relevance of system-internal factors for the patterns of diffusion that are described in these atlases. To participate, send your one-page abstract (including references) to gunther.devogelaer ugent.be, to arrive no later than June, 30. Talks are 20 min. (+ 10 min. discussion). We encourage abstracts in Dutch, but non-native speakers of Dutch may submit English abstracts as well. Decisions on the acceptance of the abstract can be expected before September, 1. A selection of papers will appear as a theme issue of Taal & Tongval (http://www.meertens.knaw.nl/taalentongval/). Recent years have seen a renewed interest for dialect geography, including publications such as Barbiers, Cornips & van der Kleij (2002) on European dialect syntax; Kortmann & Schneider (2004) on varieties of English; Labov, Ash & Boberg (2006) on North American dialects. But quite unlike during the earlier heydays of dialect geography, this 'neo-dialectological' movement seems to be theory-driven rather than data-driven (see Kortmann 2002, Horvath 2004, and Filppula et al. 2005:vii for similar observations). In principle, the availability of geographical data opens up new possibilities as to the use of patterns of geographic diffusion as an information source, but these possibilities are currently underused. The main reason for this is probably the basic assumption in dialectology that system-internal (or 'functional') factors can only serve to explain the actuation of linguistic innovations, and not the success with which these innovations are diffused (see, e.g., Milroy 1992:201-202, Labov 1994:598, and especially Croft 2000:166). Recently, however, this assumption has been challenged (see Haspelmath 1999, Andersen 2005, Seiler 2005; see Rosenbach forthcoming for discussion). The present workshop aims at exploring the relevance of system-internal factors for the patterns of diffusion that are described in these atlases. More precisely, we invite talks on the following topics: 1. The relevance of one or more internal factors for the patterns of diffusion that are found in the Dutch dialect atlases (SAND, MAND, FAND) The data can also be found online, via: http://www.meertens.knaw.nl/projecten/mand/GTRPdataperitem.html (MAND, FAND) http://www.meertens.nl/sand/zoeken/index.php (SAND) 2. The broader question whether internal factors are indeed relevant for actuation and/or diffusion, and for language change in general, including the way in which this relevance is observed in the behaviour of individual language users 3. The methodology of theory-driven dialect geographical research, and the relevance of dialect geographical data for different theoretical frameworks
Message 2: Psychocomputational Models of Human Language Acquisition
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Date: 05-Apr-2007
From: Brizan David Guy <dbrizan gc.cuny.edu>
Subject: Psychocomputational Models of Human Language Acquisition
Full Title: Psychocomputational Models of Human Language Acquisition Short Title: PsychoCompLA-2007 Date: 01-Aug-2007 - 04-Aug-2007 Location: Memphis, TN, USA Contact Person: David Guy Brizan Meeting Email: Psycho.Comp hunter.cuny.edu Web Site: http://www.colag.cs.hunter.cuny.edu/psychocomp/ Linguistic Field(s): Language Acquisition Call Deadline: 22-May-2007 Meeting Description: The workshop is devoted to psychologically-motivated computational models of language acquisition. Call for Papers Psychocomputational Models of Human Language Acquisition PsychoCompLA-2007 August 1st at CogSci 2007 - Nashville, Tennessee Submission Deadline: May 22, 2007 http://www.colag.cs.hunter.cuny.edu/psychocomp/ Workshop Topic: The workshop is devoted to psychologically-motivated computational models of language acquisition. That is, models that are compatible with research in psycholinguistics, developmental psychology and linguistics. Invited Speakers: - Elissa Newport, University of Rochester - Shimon Edelman, Cornell University - Damir Cavar, University of Zadar, University of Indiana - Robert Frank, Johns Hopkins University - Terry Regier, University of Chicago - Alex Clark, Royal Holloway University of London - Charles Yang, University of Pennsylvania Workshop Description: This workshop will present research and foster discussion centered around psychologically-motivated computational models of language acquisition, with an emphasis on the acquisition of syntax. In recent decades there has been a thriving research agenda that applies computational learning techniques to emerging natural language technologies and many meetings, conferences and workshops in which to present such research. However, there have been only a few (but growing number of) venues in which psychocomputational models of how humans acquire their native language(s) are the primary focus. By psychocomputational models we mean models that are compatible with, or might inform research in psycholinguistics, developmental psychology or linguistics. Psychocomputational models of language acquisition are of particular interest in light of recent results in developmental psychology that suggest that very young infants are adept at detecting statistical patterns in an audible input stream. Though, how children might plausibly apply statistical 'machinery' to the task of grammar acquisition, with or without an innate language component, remains an open and important question. One effective line of investigation is to computationally model the acquisition process and determine interrelationships between a model and linguistic or psycholinguistic theory, and/or correlations between a model's performance and data from linguistic environments that children are exposed to. Although there has been a significant amount of presented research targeted at modeling the acquisition of word categories, morphology and phonology, research aimed at modeling syntax acquisition has just begun to emerge. Workshop History: This is the third meeting of the Psychocomputational Models of Human Language Acquisition workshop following PsychoCompLA-2004, held in Geneva, Switzerland as part of the 20th International Conference on Computational Linguistics (COLING 2004) and PsychoCompLA-2005 as part of the 43rd Annual Meeting of the Association for Computational Linguistics (ACL-2005) held in Ann Arbor, Michigan where the workshop shared a joint session with the Ninth Conference on Computational Natural Language Learning (CoNLL-2005). Workshop Organizer: William Gregory Sakas, City University of New York (sakas at hunter.cuny.edu) Workshop Co-organizer: David Guy Brizan, City University of New York (dbrizan at gc.cuny.edu) Submission details: Authors are invited to submit abstracts of 1 page plus 1 page for data and other supplementary materials. Abstracts should be anonymous, clearly titled and no more than 500 words in length. Text of the abstract should fit on one page, with a second page for examples, table, figures, references, etc. The following formats are accepted: PDF, PS, and MS Word. Please include a cover sheet (as a separate attachment) containing the title of your submission, your name, contact details and affiliation. Please send your submission electronically to Psycho.Comp hunter.cuny.edu. The accepted abstracts will appear in the online workshop proceedings. Full papers will be considered for a submission for a special issue of a Cognitive Science Society Journal in the fall. Submission deadline: May 22, 2007 Topics and Goals: Abstracts that present research on (but not necessarily limited to) the following topics are welcome: - Models that address the acquisition of word-order; - Models that combine parsing and learning; - Formal learning-theoretic and grammar induction models that incorporate psychologically plausible constraints; - Comparative surveys that critique previously reported studies; - Models that have a cross-linguistic or bilingual perspective; - Models that address learning bias in terms of innate linguistic knowledge versus statistical regularity in the input; - Models that employ language modeling techniques from corpus linguistics; - Models that employ techniques from machine learning; - Models of language change and its effect on language acquisition or vice versa; - Models that employ statistical/probabilistic grammars; - Computational models that can be used to evaluate existing linguistic or developmental theories (e.g., principles & parameters, optimality theory, construction grammar, etc.) - Empirical models that make use of child-directed corpora such as CHILDES. This workshop intends to bring together researchers from cognitive psychology, computational linguistics, other computer/mathematical sciences, linguistics and psycholinguistics working on all areas of language acquisition. Diversity and cross-fertilization of ideas is the central goal. Contact: Psycho.Comp hunter.cuny.edu FYI, Related 2007 Meetings Machine Learning and Cognitive Science of Language Acquisition 21-22 June, 2007 Cognitive Aspects of Computational Language Acquisition 29 June, 2007 Exemplar-Based Models of Language Acquisition and Use 6-17 August, 2007
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