<OT> CASTL workshop on the Freedom of Analysis - first call

[Rutgers Optimality Archive]

FREEDOM OF ANALYSIS?

The Center for Advanced Study in Theoretical Linguistics (CASTL) at the 
University of Tromso will be hosting a workshop on The Freedom of 
Analysis in phonology (see call for papers below) on September 1st and 
2nd, 2005. The workshop will consist of 5 slots for invited talks and 
an additional 10 slots for which we are inviting abstracts.

DEADLINE FOR SUBMISSION: 12th June 2005.

Partial TRAVEL SUPPORT will be available for presenters without 
sufficient financial support from their home institutions. Applications 
will be evaluated on an individual basis after acceptance.

We are pleased to announce that the following researchers have accepted 
our invitation:

Chris Golston (CSU Fresno)
Bruce Moren (CASTL Tromso)
Marc van Oostendorp (Meertens)
Curt Rice (CASTL Tromso)
Christian Uffmann (Marburg)

CALL FOR PAPERS

The bulk of contemporary research in OT focuses on constraints and 
their interaction, yet other aspects of the overall OT model remain 
largely unexplored. This workshop takes up the problem of Freedom of 
Analysis in its broadest sense, and asks to what extent the very 
phonological properties of candidate outputs are restricted by things 
like representational considerations, 'output viability', the content 
of CON and the ranking of constraints in EVAL. The issue of 
restrictions is an important one, since if it turns out to be possible 
to formulate principled restrictions on the space of inputs and output 
candidates in a way that does not duplicate the job of the constraints 
in EVAL, a more restrictive view of CON and the typology emerges. 
Sensible discussion of variation presupposes some conception of the 
limits on the universal space of variation.
Much work in OT fails to spell out its representational assumptions 
adequately, using representations in a way that sacrifices long-term 
explanatory goals to short-term descriptive ones. The fundamental 
choice between binary features and unary elements is just as pregnant 
with ramifications for analyses in OT as, say, a rule-based framework, 
both as regards the content of CON and the predicted typology. The same 
holds true of theories of the hierarchical organisation of phonological 
primitives. Yet, despite the continued relevance of the prosodic 
hierarchy and the recent renaissance of feature geometry, many analyses 
simply rely in practice on an SPE-style conception of segments as 
unordered feature bundles or flat autosegmental structures.
A related representational question involves the extent  to which 
inputs and candidate outputs must be 'viable outputs', i.e. 
phonetically interpretable as they are. For example, to what extent 
must we allow for inputs with un(der)specified nodes or floating 
features?
Representational issues like these figure in defining the absolute 
variation space. On the classical conception of Freedom of Analysis, 
the absolute variation space must be one and the same as the space of 
candidates for any given input.

To take stock of these issues, we invite abstracts dealing with the 
place of inviolable restrictions in the OT architecture, addressing 
questions including but not limited to the following:

- Do universally inviolable constraints on linguistic structures exist? 
If so, are they part of GEN, or EVAL with a fixed top ranking?
- What is the relation between GEN and the function EVAL, the 
constraint set and the input?
- Does the generator contain restrictions on the combination of 
phonological primitives?
- Would limitations on the generator resolve any of the current 
challenges to OT, such as opacity, forbidden repairs, typological 
overgeneration, proliferation of candidates or constraints?


IMPORTANT DATES

12th June 2005: Abstract deadline

1st July 2005: Notification of acceptance

1-2 September 2005: Workshop


SUBMISSION GUIDELINES	

Abstracts must be submitted electronically in PDF format to 
freedom at hum.uit.no by 12th June 2005.

All-inclusive abstract length is 2 A4 pages with the following 
formatting requirements:
- 2,5 cm margins on top, bottom, left and right,
- in 12 pt Times New Roman (10 pt for references),
- single line spacing, and
- normal character spacing.

The length of the abstract text excluding the title, the name(s) and 
affiliation(s) of the author(s), examples, figures and references must 
not
exceed 50 lines.

Please submit two versions of your abstract, one anonymous and one 
named. The named abstract should include your name, affiliation and 
e-mail address, and should be called freedom-named-lastname.pdf; the 
anonymous abstract should be called freedom-anon-lastname.pdf.
So, for instance, if the author's name is Joe Black, he'll send two 
files called freedom-named-black.pdf and freedom-anon-black.pdf.

Please heed these formal requirements and the deadline.

Should you have any questions or comments, please don't hesitate to 
contact the organisers.

CONTACT DETAILS
workshop e-mail address: freedom at hum.uit.no
homepage: http://uit.no/castl/

Organisers:
Sylvia Blaho (sylvia.blaho at hum.uit.no)
Patrik Bye (patrik.bye at hum.uit.no)
Martin Kraemer (martin.kraemer at hum.uit.no)