20-24 July 2009
Bordeaux, France
FINAL CALL FOR PAPERS
Vagueness in Communication (ViC 2009)
http://www.fit.fraunhofer.de/~hcschmitz/esslli2009/
July 20-24, 2009
organised as part of the European Summer School on Logic, Language and
Information ESSLLI 2009 (http://esslli2009.labri.fr/), 20-31 July, 2009 in
Bordeaux, France
Workshop Organiser:
Nikolaus Bourbax (Manfred Krifka, Rick Nouwen, Robert van Rooij, Uli Sauerl
and
and Hans-Christian Schmitz)
The workshop is organised as an event of the VAAG project of the ESF Euroco
re
LogicCC.
Workshop Purpose and Topics:
Although vagueness has long since been an important topic in philosophy, lo
gic
and linguistics, some recent advances have made the functions of vagueness
in
natural language communication an exciting and timely research area. This
renewed interest has a distinct cross-disciplinary character and has spawne
d
many new research questions. While the classical instruments of dealing wit
h
vagueness -- like multi-valued logics, truth value gaps or gluts, or
supervaluations -- have not been significantly extended, new approaches
investigate questions like context-sensitivtiy of vagueness (Kyburg & Morea
u
2000), the sharpening of vague predicates in context (Barker 2002), and the
modeling of precision levels with expressions like 'roughly' or 'like' (Ken
nedy
2007). Within the study of comparatives and degree modification, moreover,
researchers are now exploring cross-linguistic aspects of vagueness (Beck e
t al
2004). On a more fundamental level, the question why there is vagueness to
begin with, what role vagueness serves in human communication, has been
addressed. For example, it has been argued that vagueness is an epiphenomen
on
of the impossibility of complete shared knowledge about the extension of ma
ny
terms (e.g. Williamson 1994), hence a consequence of the cognitive limitati
ons
of humans. It has been shown why this does not affect the utility of these
terms in communication (Parikh 1994). Game-theoretic methods have been empl
oyed
that show that being vague or imprecise can be beneficial for communication
even if the speaker could truthfully use more precise terms (de Jaegher 200
3).
Furthermore, the important role of vagueness became evident in a number of
empirical domains beyond obvious examples such as the language of diplomacy
--
for example, in geographical terms (e.g. Bennett 2008) or in the descriptio
n of
measures of economy (Qizilbash 2005). There are also initial experimental
investigations into the ways how speakers interpret vague terms (e.g., Boni
ni
e.a. 1999).
The workshop aims to bring together researchers whose work contributes to t
he
broad inter-disciplinary line of inquiry outlined here. In particular, we
welcome:
* papers that broaden the empirical base for the study of vagueness, b
e it
linguistic or otherwise;
* papers offering a synthesis of theories from different disciplines;
and
* papers addressing the pragmatics of vagueness.
The workshop aims to provide a forum for researchers (including advanced Ph
D
students) to present and discuss their work with colleagues and researchers
who
work in the broad subject of the disciplines relevant for vagueness in
communication, as represented in ESSLLI.
Submission Details:
Authors are invited to submit an anonymous, extended abstract. Submissions
should not exceed 2 pages, including references. Submissions should be in P
DF
format. Please submit your abstract via the EasyChair system:
http://www.easychair.org/conferences/submission_new.cgi?c=.103147. For
questions regarding the submission procedure, contact Rick Nouwen (rnouwen
[AT]
gmail.com) The submissions will be reviewed by the workshop's programme
committee.
Workshop Format:
The workshop is part of ESSLLI and is open to all ESSLLI participants. It w
ill
consist of five 90-minute sessions held over five consecutive days in the f
irst
week of ESSLLI. There will be 2-3 slots for paper presentation and discussi
on
per session. On the first day the workshop organisers will give an introduc
tion
to the topic.
Invited Speakers:
* Graeme Forbes (Boulder, Colorado)
* Ewan Klein (Edinburgh)
* Louise McNally (Barcelona)
Workshop Programme Committee:
* Graeme Forbes
* Peter Grdenfors
* Hans Kamp
* Chris Kennedy
* Ewan Klein
* Manfred Krifka
* Manfred Kupffer
* Louise McNally
* Rick Nouwen
* Barbara Partee
* Uli Sauerland
* Hans-Christian Schmitz
* Marieke Schouwstra
* Markus Schrenk
* Robert van Rooij
* Yoad Winter
* Thomas Ede Zimmermann
Important Dates:
Submission Deadline: February 15, 2009
Notification: April 1, 2009
Preliminary programme: April 24, 2009
ESSLLI early registration deadline: April 15, 2009
Final papers for proceedings: June 1, 2009
Final programme: June 19, 2009
Workshop dates: July 20-24, 2009
Local Arrangements:
All workshop participants including the presenters will be required to regi
ster
for ESSLLI. The registration fee for authors presenting a paper will corres
pond
to the early student/workshop speaker registration fee. There will be no
reimbursement for travel costs and accommodation.
Further Information about ESSLLI: http://esslli2009.labri.fr/