VariaForMea 2017
Doctoral Program VariaForMea
Macolin, November 27-29, 2017
Argumentation in Linguistic Theory and Experimental Pragmatics
The 2017 VariaForMea winter school (27-29 November) will be devoted to argumentation in linguistic theory (syntax and pragmatics) and experimental pragmatics.
Most of the assessments of scientific work are based not on background assumptions, but on the nature and the quality of arguments provided. Descriptions and explanations, both at the theoretical and experimental levels, are based on the ability to provide arguments relying on different sources (data, linguistic tests, etc.) towards the support of a general conclusion. Linguistics, as a scientific theory and practice, relies heavily on this capability from researchers to provide their work with sound argumentation, be it from a theoretical or an experimental perspective. Mastering argumentative strategies has become of extreme importance, and stands as a prerequisite for any young scholar in the field today. Consequently, the 2017 VariaForMea doctoral program aims at providing concrete examples of these skills in both theoretical and experimental studies.
The meeting represents a unique opportunity to interact with three researchers of international fame in theoretical linguistics and experimental pragmatics. It will consist in three lectures and two workshops. As customary, a student session will allow PhD students to present their work and benefit by comments from the lecturers and the audience.
The main issues to be raised during the meeting are the following:
– What is a valuable topic/problem to work on in linguistics?
– How does one begin with the analysis of a given phenomenon?
– How does one avoid the most common and frequent troubleshooting?
– How does one find good arguments? With which methods?
– What is the logic of an argumentation?
– Concerning experimental studies: What can be deduced from their results, and how are they to be discussed? What is the relation between the hypotheses, the results and the conclusions to be drawn?
Invited speakers:
Liliane Haegeman (Universiteit Gent)
Diana Mazzarella (ISC Marc Jeannerod, Lyon)
Nausicaa Pouscoulous (UCL, London)
Student session
Day 2 will feature a student session, where graduates will have the opportunity to present their work to a wide audience consisting of specialists of the field, as well as other PhD students and post-docs from all over Switzerland. The talks will be 30 minutes long (20' presentation + 10' for Q&A). 5 slots are available: note that priority will be given to secondtimers (VFM rule: if it's your second time, you have to present!) and newcomers who wish to introduce their work.
Articles workshop
On day 3, a mini-workshop about the argumentative features of three papers suggested by the lecturers will take place. Each participant will be asked to read and jointly prepare a very short presentation focusing on the argumentative outline of the paper, and link it to what was said during the school. Lecturers will then comment the presentations and the articles altogether.
Each participants will receive all three articles and be asked to choose one. They will then be assigned a working group, which will reunite in the morning of day 3 in order to put together their insights and comments, and prepare a short presentation. The articles will deal mainly with syntactic theory or pragmatics. When your mind is made up, please communicate your choice to , so the groups can be defined.