Found this while grepping thru tons of posts on linguistlist (19.2502). Could be of interest.
Date: Wed, 13 Aug 2008 13:39:46 From: Kerstin Fischer [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Usage-based Computational Language Acquisition E-mail this message to a friend: http://linguistlist.org/issues/emailmessage/verification.cfm?iss=19-2502.html&submissionid=186781&topicid=3&msgnumber=1 Full Title: Usage-based Computational Language Acquisition Date: 28-Jul-2009 - 03-Aug-2009 Location: Berkeley, CA, USA Contact Person: Kerstin Fischer Meeting Email: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Linguistic Field(s): Cognitive Science; Computational Linguistics; Language Acquisition Subject Language(s): English (eng) Call Deadline: 07-Sep-2008 Meeting Description: Usage-based models of language acquisition: computational perspectives Theme Session at ICLC 11, Berkeley, CA. Date: July 28-August 3, 2009 Organizers: Kerstin Fischer & Arne Zeschel, University of Southern Denmark Call for Papers Theme Session Description: Usage-based approaches to language acquisition have not only produced many valuable insights in the field of child language studies (cf. Tomasello 2003 and Goldberg 2006 for overviews), but have also helped to corroborate important assumptions of emergentist theories of language in general (cf. Dabrowska 2005). In line with basic tenets of Cognitive Linguistics, these approaches emphasize the key role of communicative and experiential grounding in language use and language structure, and seek to explain its acquisition in terms of general (i.e., non-specialized) cognitive principles and mechanisms as far as possible. At the same time, explicit, testable models of how these principles and mechanisms are implemented in the context of grounded construction learning are only beginning to be developed (cf. Bod, to appear). The purpose of this workshop is to bring together language acquisition researchers from linguistics, psychology and computer science who work on such models in order to discuss how usage-based constructionist accounts of language acquisition can benefit from such research. Topics will include, but are not restricted to: - cognitive capacities that constitute prerequisites for normal child language acquisition (cf. Tomasello et al. 2005, Tomasello 2006) and how they can be accommodated in language learning simulations (e.g., Steels and Kaplan 2002); - the basic mechanisms and psycholinguistic plausibility of different approaches to automatic construction learning (e.g., Chang & Maia 2001; Batali 2002; Steels 2004; Dominey and Boucher 2005); - the kinds of semantic representations that grounded language learning experiments or simulations should draw on (Bergen & Chang 2005; Feldman 2006); - the way in which the acquisition of particular constructions may be grounded in the previous acquisition of certain other constructions (Johnson 2001; Morris, Cottrell & Elman 2000; Abbot-Smith & Behrens 2006); and, finally, - ways of accommodating useful notions from Cognitive Linguistics in computational models of language processing and acquisition (cf. Chang et al. 2002). The session will compare different approaches to automatic construction learning and consider the extent to which they can inform usage-based accounts of child language acquisition. In that, it seeks to bridge the gap between kindred research in Cognitive Linguistics and related areas of Cognitive Science, and to provide a forum for discussing important challenges for future research on emergentist models of language. Submission Procedure: Abstracts should be: - 500 words max - submitted in .rtf or .doc format - turned in by Sept 7th at the latest - accompanied by an e-mail specifying the title of the paper, name(s) of author(s), affiliation and a contact e-mail address - sent to [EMAIL PROTECTED] and [EMAIL PROTECTED] Please note that both the theme session proposal itself and the individual contributions will undergo independent reviewing by the ICLC program committee. ------------------------------------------- agi Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/303/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/303/ Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=8660244&id_secret=114414975-3c8e69 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
