10th International Pragmatics
Conference
Göteborg, 8-13
July
2007
Panel: Prosody
and Pragmatics in Spoken Language Corpora
organised
by Dagmar
Barth-Weingarten (Universität Potsdam), Nicole
Dehé (FU Berlin) and Anne Wichmann (University of Central
Lancashire)
Last updated by
Nicole Dehé: 18 July 2007
Contact
email addresses:
Dagmar Barth-Weingarten: dbarth AT rz.uni-potsdam.de
Nicole Dehé: ndehe AT zedat.fu-berlin.de
Anne Wichmann: awichmann AT uclan.ac.uk
Many
thanks to all panel contributors and to all other participants for
inspiring presentations, fruitful discussions and valuable comments.
You made the workshop a great success.
Final panel programme
Panel
description
and call for papers:
This
panel will focus on the interface between prosody and pragmatics.
Particular
emphasis will be placed on prosodic phrasing and its relevance for
pragmatics.
We aim to focus on empirical studies of prosodic features in natural
spoken
language.
Prosody is an integral part of spoken language in use, and in various
research areas such as Conversation Analysis, Interactional
Linguistics, the study of semantic change and applications in speech
technology, it has been convincingly shown to contribute to meaning not
only on the interpersonal but also on the referential and the textual
language levels (cf., e.g., Couper-Kuhlen & Selting 1996, 2001;
Culpeper et al 2003, Couper-Kuhlen & Ford 2004, Wichmann
&
Blakemore 2006).
Yet, except for work on focusing strategies, prosody has so far not
figured prominently in pragmatic research, even though information
structuring, interaction management and the expression of affect and
attitude among others lie at the heart of pragmatics and prosody alike.
Corpus linguistics, too, has paid increasing attention to the
investigation of large corpora of spoken language, with increasing
awareness that the actual sound files should be the basis of
investigation (Lancaster/IBM-corpus, ICE-GB, DCPSE). However, while a
corpus-based description of (the differences between) spoken and
written language has entered grammar writing (e.g., Biber et al 1999),
pragmatic aspects of the use of prosody in spoken language corpora
still await further exploration. This includes the use of the variable
prosodic components pitch, loudness, tempo and voice quality as well as
prosodic phrasing.
Embarking on any such project the first difficulty encountered is that
of appropriately notating the flow of speech and thus identifying its
smaller units. The nature of these units and the applicability of those
already described to natural spoken language is still widely discussed
(cf. Chafe 1994, Ladd 1996, Mindt 2001). Among the questions to be
dealt with are:
- What kinds of
prosodic units can be found in natural spoken language (paratone,
declination unit, intonation unit, prosodic phrase, etc)?
- What is their
relevance for the participants?
- How are they
signaled in actual discourse (boundary cues, obligatory features)?
- What is their
pragmatic value, e.g. in terms of securing the floor (prosodic
projection), signaling actions (prosodic (dis-)integration) and
emphatic uses of prosodic phrasing?
- To what extent
do they correlate with other units (syntax-prosody, action-prosody
interfaces)?
- What is their
role in signaling changes in these correlations, as e.g. with
grammaticalisation?
Hence,
in this panel
we would like to particularly encourage contributions on the nature and
role of prosodic units from a pragmatic point of view. In addition,
papers related to all aspects of prosody in spoken language and its
relevance for pragmatics are welcome.
Panel organisers:
Dagmar Barth-Weingarten (Universität Potsdam;
email:
<dbarth AT uni-potsdam.de>)
Nicole Dehé (Freie Universität Berlin; email:
<ndehe AT
zedat.fu-berlin.de>)
Anne Wichmann (University of Central Lancashire; email: <awichmann AT
uclan.ac.uk>)
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