LINGUIST List 6.150

Sun 05 Feb 1995

Calls: Language origin, Tilburg Conference on OT, Celtic

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1. (Marc van Oostendorp", conference announcement and call for papers
2. "Marc van Oostendorp", Tilburg Conference on OT
3. , Conference announcement/call for papers: Celtic Linguistics

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Conference Announcement and Call for Papers
11th Annual Meeting of the Language Origins Society
July 28 - Aug 1, 1995
Janus Pannonius University, Pecs, Hungary

Papers on all aspects of the origin and evolution of signed and
spoken languages are welcome. Since progress in this field of
research is best achieved through a multidisciplinary approach, the
LOS and the organizers of this meeting are anxious to enlist the
combined efforts of all interested scholars, especially those of
anthropologists, archaeologists, biologists, cognitive scientists,
ethologists, linguists, palaeontologists, and psychologists. A
selection of the papers presented at this meeting will be published
as soon as possible.

Those who wish to present a paper (LOS membership is not a
prerequisite) are kindly requested to send a 300-word abstract to the
organizers. Computer users are asked to send their texts in
electronic format on 3.5" diskettes preferably processed with
WordPerfect or MS-Word. Downloading electronic files is also possible
(and indeed preferred), though authors using non-ASCII characters in
their texts are advised to send their abstracts on diskettes.

The standard registration fee will be US$ 50.00, the student US$
25.00.

Special arrangements have been made for lodging and some of the meals:
In the venue of the LOS Meeting:
The total cost for six nights starting July 27 plus breakfast and
lunch each day will be:
 US$ 310.00 for a single
 US$ 215.00 per person for a double
N.B. These prices could vary slightly with the exchange rate.

Tentative plans are being made for a 3-day post-conference tour. The
organizers will give out the details as they become available to them.

Correspondence should be addressed to:
Gabor Gyori
Janus Pannonius University
Department of English
Ifjusag utja 6.
7624 Pecs
Hungary
Phone/Fax: (Internat'l) 36 72 314-714
E-mail: GYORIGbtk.jpte.hu

The organizers ask that those who can be reached electronically
kindly indicate their e-mail addresses in their correspondence.

It is kindly requested that abstracts be in their possession no later
than April 15, 1995 and that hotel reservations be made also before
that date, by sending, along with the request, a deposit of US$ 50.00
or its equivalent in any other freely convertible currency. This sum
should be in the form of a CERTIFIED BANK CHECK payable to Gabor
Gyori.

 Call for Papers

 Tilburg University Conference on

 The Derivational Residue
 in Phonology

 1-7 October 1995

The Grammatical Models Group of Tilburg University plans to
organize a conference on the Derivational Residue in Phonology. In
this conference we hope to discuss all topics which were dealt with
in standard generative phonology by derivational means such as
level ordering, (strict) cyclicity and rule ordering, in the light
of the recent shift of attention towards theories that are more
representational in nature. Can all the derivational tools
mentioned be replaced by representational instruments? If they can,
what should the `optimal' representational theory look like? If
they cannot, what exactly is the residue of derivationalism that we
still need?

We invite all papers with these or related topics (a more complete
description of the conference topic can be found below) both for
and against purely representational approaches to phonology. We
expect to be able to (partially) reimburse travelling expenses and
lodging for our speakers. Furthermore we are proud that Bruce Hayes
and Geert Booij have already agreed to be our invited speakers.

Deadline

Those interested in presenting a paper (40 minutes talks, 15
minutes discussion) should send 5 copies of a two page abstract (10
anonymous; 1 camera-ready, with name(s), affiliation(s) and contact
address, including e-mail) to: Marc van Oostendorp or Ben Hermans,
Grammaticamodellen, Tilburg University, Postbus 90153, 5000 LE,
Tilburg, The Netherlands.

Abstracts must be received by 1 May 1995. Abstracts with page text
considered too condensed to be read will be rejected without
review. No email submissions accepted. For additional information
contact B.J.H.HermansKUB.NL or M.vOostendorpKUB.NL.

Topic of the Conference

During the past few years the main focus of attention in phonology
seems to have been shifted from derivational to representational
models, such as Prince and Smolensky's Optimality Theory,
Goldsmith's Harmonic Phonology and Burzio's PES-Model.

Yet generative phonologists have accumulated substantial evidence
for derivational analysis. In standard Lexical Phonology, for
instance, derivationalism plays a role in several ways: the model
is divided into a lexical and a postlexical component, the lexical
component itself is divided into several lexical levels, some
lexical levels are cyclic and every affix starts its own cycle and,
finally, the phonologicals rule within every cycle are ordered. The
question is how we have to evaluate all these derivational
instruments in a representational theory of phonology.

The distinction between Lexical and Postlexical Phonology seems to
be least controversial. Most Optimality Theory analyses seem to
accept at least this remnant of derivationalism. Yet one could
imagine a more radical version of a purely representational theory
in which the distinction between word-level and phrasal phonology
is accounted for in an appropriate theory of phonological domains.
In any case, the question remains as to how we have to evaluate the
traditional criteria for lexical-postlexical distinction
(exceptions, sensitivity to morphological and syntactic boundaries,
etc.) in a theory of constraints and constraint ranking.

Similar questions could be asked about the internal level ordering
within the Lexical component. Can all analyses which used to be
framed in terms of lexical levels be reframed in representational
terms? And to what extent can a theory which makes extensive use of
lexical levels still be called `representational'?

Most discussion on derivationalism within Optimality Theory seems
to have been concentrated on the issue of cyclicity. It has been
demonstrated that some cyclic analyses can be replaced by an
adequate theory of Alignment between phonological and morphological
structure. Is this everything that needs to be said about this
issue? Are, for instance, cyclic versions of OT feasible and
desirable?

Similarily, considerable effort has been put by several researchers
into showing that strict cyclicity as a theoretical concept is
superfluous or that it can be replaced by a theory of
underspecification. Whether this is an adequate answer to all
derived environment effects is another topic we hope to address.

Finally, we expect that even at the finest grained level of
derivationalism, viz. phonological rule ordering (both intrinsic
and extrinsic) interesting questions remain unanswered. In
particular all cases of what used to be known as counter-feeding
and counter-bleeding relations seem to us still to be open for
discussion.

All of these questions have considerable conceptual import, yet it
seems to us that they can ultimately be answered empirically. The
issue of derivationalism is one of the interesting challenges that
Optimality Theory and the other models mentioned earlier pose. We
hope to receive many abstracts dealing with it.

 ****** CELTIC LINGUISTICS CONFERENCE *****

 Second posting and call for papers


A conference on the formal linguistics of the Celtic languages will
be held in University College Dublin on June 22-23 1995. Invited
speakers include Jim McCloskey (University of California at Santa
Cruz), Ian Roberts (University of North Wales, Bangor), David Adger
(University of York) and James Scobbie (Queen Margaret College,
Edinburgh).

Abstracts are invited for 45-minute talks (30+15) on all aspects of
theoretically-oriented research on the Celtic languages. Please
submit 4 copies of a 1-page abstract (3 anonymous and one camera-
ready copy with name, affiliation etc.) to the address below.
Abstracts must be received by February 28th, 1995 [Please note
extended deadline].

The conference will be held on the Belfield Campus (approximately 5
Km from the city centre). Accommodation will be available on Campus.

Expressions of interest and requests for further information should
be sent to either of the following addresses:

 chiosainollamh.ucd.ie

 acquavivccvax.ucd.ie

or to

 Celtic Linguistics Conference
 Department of Linguistics
 University College Dublin
 Belfield, Dublin 4
 Ireland