Sign Language Grammars, Parsing Models, & the Brain (Interdisciplinary Workshop)

Date: 06-Nov-2025 - 07-Nov-2025
Location: Leipzig, Germany
Contact: Patrick C. Trettenbrein
Contact Email: trettenbrein@cbs.mpg.de
Meeting URL: https://sign-language-grammars-parsers-brain.github.io

Linguistic Field(s): Applied Linguistics; Cognitive Science; Linguistic Theories; Neurolinguistics; Psycholinguistics
Language Family(ies): African Deaf Sign Languages; Asian Deaf Sign Languages; European Deaf Sign Languages; North American Deaf Sign Languages; South American Deaf Sign Languages

Submission Deadline: 31-Jul-2025

Call for Papers in International Sign (IS): https://s.gwdg.de/ZZsMdS (Note: Link opens MP4 video file.)

Background:

The world’s different sign languages offer a unique perspective on the human capacity for language and their rigorous scientific study within linguistics since the 60s of the past century has provided a multitude of novel insights. Some of these have significantly and lastingly changed how we conceptualize and investigate our species’ faculty of language: We now understand language as a seemingly universal and modality-independent capacity.

Just like in research on spoken language, the relationship between theoretical descriptions of different phenomena in sign languages and how they may apply or relate to phenomena usually studied by psychologists and neuroscientists is not straightforward. However, we nevertheless believe that any serious experimental investigation of (sign) language should be grounded in a well-motivated theoretical framework provided by linguistics as the scientific study of grammar.

Goal:

Derivation chains in cognitive neuroscience of language. Auxiliary assumptions range from Marr's computational, to the algorithmic, and implementational level. Derivation chains in cognitive neuroscience of language. Auxiliary assumptions range from Marr's computational, to the algorithmic, and implementational level. (Source: van der Burght et al., 2023, J. Cog. Neurosci.)
The goal of this workshop is to bring together sign language researchers of different theoretical persuasions with practitioners in psycho- and neurolinguistics of sign language to jointly determine:
- To what extent are current theoretical approaches themselves accurate or need to be expanded to capture phenomena of the visuo-spatial modality of sign languages?
- How do different formal descriptions and theoretical approaches relate and are relevant to psycho- and neurolinguistic studies of sign language processing and language processing in general?
- In this context, we also explicitly invite contributions dealing with similar issues in research on spoken language that adopt a multimodal perspective on speech or integrate speech and gesture.

Key Questions:

Topics that are of particular interest for discussion at the workshop are:
- What impact has research on the grammar (in a broad sense) of sign languages had on how we look at and study spoken languages and conceptualise the human language capacity and its neurocognitive basis?
- How can seemingly modality-specific phenomena of sign languages (e.g., the impact of iconicity) be accounted for theoretically and what is the impact of such “enlarged” theoretical accounts on the psycho- and neurolinguistics of sign language (e.g., algorithmic accounts aiming to create parsing models that account for sign language processing)?
- How can non-manual components of sign languages best be accounted for and integrated in theories of grammar, what is their linguistic and neurocognitive status, and how can we integrate them in theories of (sign) language processing?
- What, if anything, can psycho- and neurolinguistic studies on sign languages feed back into our theoretical understanding of grammar (of sign languages, but also language in general)?

Invited Presenters:

To get the discussion going our workshop will feature invited presentations by leading researchers in the study of sign language grammars, parsing models, and the neural basis of sign language processing. The invited presenters will also participate in the scheduled round-table session as discussants.

The following Invited Presenters have confirmed their participation:
- Carlo Cecchetto
- David Corina
- Karen Emmorey
- Vadim Kimmelman
- Rachel I. Mayberry
- Marloes Oomen

Call for Papers:

Call for papers submission portal: https://sign-language-grammars-parsers-brain.github.io/call-for-papers/#abstract-submission

Besides the contributions by our invited speakers, we invite contributions from the scientific community for which we have generously allocated time slots in the preliminary Workshop Programme. Accordingly, we currently have an open Call for Papers and are looking forward to receiving your submissions.

The workshop will feature a select number of on-stage presentations, but will also include a poster session. Notice that we particularly encourage submissions from junior researchers (advanced master’s or PhD students, as well as early post-docs).

Visit the official Call for Papers page to learn more about the requirements and deadlines for abstract submission: https://sign-language-grammars-parsers-brain.github.io/call-for-papers/