LINGUIST List 9.570

Tue Apr 14 1998

Calls: Child Language, Phonology

Editor for this issue: Anita Huang <anitalinguistlist.org>

Directory

1. Mick Perkins, Child Language Seminar 98 deadline
2. SIGPHON98, SIGPHON98 Workshop --- 2nd Call for Papers

 Child Language Seminar 1998

 Sheffield, UK, 4-6 September 1998


*REMINDER*

The deadline for abstract submission is 1 May, 1998.
For details concerning the conference, please check our web page at

 http://www.shef.ac.uk/uni/academic/R-Z/spsu/conf.html




______________________________________________________________________
 Dr Mick Perkins

 Senior Lecturer in Clinical Linguistics
 Department of Human Communication Sciences
 University of Sheffield
 18/20 Claremont Crescent
 Sheffield S10 2TA
 UK

Phone: (+44) (0)114 2222408/2222400
Fax: (+44) (0)114 2730547
http://www.shef.ac.uk/uni/academic/R-Z/spsu/staff/mick.html

 The Third CFP
 =====================================
 <<C A L L ----- F O R ----- P A P E R S>>
 =====================================


 The Computation of Phonological Constraints
 ===========================================

 The 4th Meeting of the ACL
 Special Interest Group in Phonology
 (http://www.cogsci.ed.ac.uk/~sigphon/98)

 In conjunction with
 The COLING-ACL'98 Joint Conference
 Montreal, Canada, 15th August 1998


The Meeting
- ---------
Constraint-based theories of phonology have become enormously popular
in recent years. Such theories express generalizations by stating how
and when a language's phonological forms are constrained, rather than
relying on rules that actively modify the forms.

Computational ideas have often provided an impetus for these
innovations. Koskenniemi's (1983) 2-level morphophonological processor
introduced parallel constraining relations as an alternative to an
ordered system of rewrite rules. Declarative Phonology (c 1990)
focusses on the unity of representations and rules as constraints,
drawing on various computational ideas from unification to temporal
logic to finite-state calculi.

One current constraint-based theory is Optimality Theory (OT)
(Prince&Smolensky 1993). This theory found, at least partial,
inspiration in computational work by Smolensky on the relation between
symbolic and subsymbolic computation. Although this link with
connectionism has been left largely unexplored, OT has proved to be a
computationally productive theory, giving rise to several theoretical
papers on computational issues related to complexity and learnability,
as well as inspiring a number of implementations.

This workshop is designed to foster the link between computational
work and constraint-based phonology in general. To this end, it
invites submissions on topics related to the computation of any
constraint-based phonological formalism, including but not limited to
the three mentioned above. Here are some example topics:

 * the computational interpretation of phonological theories,
 * constraint ranking and interaction, eg. as in OT,
 * implementations of particular analyses,
 * results in the complexity of constraint application,
 * algorithms for learning constraints or constraint ranking,
 * results on the learnability of such constraints,
 * novel formalisms for constraint-based phonology,
 * representational issues raised by constraint-based approaches.

In short, papers are invited which address computational issues in
constraint-based theories of phonology.

Submission
- --------
 What: original research, not published elsewhere
 a completed study is prefered to proposals and progress reports
 originality, topicality and clarity will be the assessment criteria 
 How: submissions must be sent by email to sigphon98cogsci.ed.ac.uk 
 When: April 20 Submissions due
 May 22 Notification of acceptance
 June 23 Final (accepted) versions due


Submission Format
- ---------------
(Note that apart from the Medium and Length sections, these
requirements are as for submissions to COLING-ACL98.)
 Medium: postscript, emailed to sigphon98cogsci.ed.ac.uk
 please check postscript compatibility using either
 ghostview, or by printing the postscript file
 before sending
 Length: 10 pages maximum (including references and appendices)
 optional extra page for abstract in a second language
 Paper size: Please use A4 page-size
 Typesetting: LaTeX is encouraged, but not required.
 Layout: set margins so that text lies centred within a rectangle of
 6.5 x 9 inches (16.5 x 23 cm)
 Use Times Roman or Computer Modern font
 11 to 12 point for text
 14 to 16 point for headings and title
 centred page numbers in footers
 2 columns after title and abstract
 figures may range across columns

Since reviewing will be blind, a separate identification notice should
be emailed (in ASCII) to sigphon98cogsci.ed.ac.uk. It should include:
 title 
 author(s) name(s) 
 affiliation(s) 
 complete addresses 
 abstract in English
 submission to other conferences ('none' or list) 
 and author of record (for correspondence). 

Authors should not identify either themselves or their affiliations,
either directly or indirectly in the body of the text (the postscript
file).

Authors should use the COLING-ACL98 style files and templates for
preparing submissions (see http://coling-acl98.iro.umontreal.ca/Styles.html). 
This will help ensure that the layout requirements are met, and that
the effort required to format the final version will be minimized.


Registration
- ----------
Information about registration procedures will be available as soon as
possible.


Organisation
- ----------
Organiser: T. Mark Ellison (Edinburgh)

Organising/Program Committee: Steven Bird (Edinburgh)
 Jason Eisner (Pennsylvania)
 Bruce Tesar (Rutgers)
 Markus Walther (Duesseldorf)

Correspondence
- ------------
Should be sent to: SIGPHON98
 Centre for Cognitive Science
 Edinburgh University
 2 Buccleuch Place
 Edinburgh EH8 9LW, UK
 Tel. +44 (131) 650-4416
 Fax. +44 (131) 650-6626
 email: sigphon98cogsci.ed.ac.uk
 web: http://www.cogsci.ed.ac.uk/~sigphon/98