Call for Papers – Workshop on Sound Change 5

The 5th International Workshop on Sound Change (WSC 5) will take place June 21-23, 2019, at the University of California, Davis. The WSC 5 is part of the conference series held in conjunction with the 2019 Linguistic Institute at UC Davis.

The WSC began as a small meeting where researchers investigating aspects of sound change from a variety of theoretical and methodological perspectives could be brought together and work on substantive issues in the field and share ideas and findings. The core idea behind the WSC 5 is to bring together researchers working on sound change who come from a variety of different backgrounds and disciplines to have conversations, integrate their perspectives and insights, and make substantive progress on questions the remain in the field.

The Special theme of the 5th WSC is sound change in endangered and small speech communities. Sound change research, as in most work in phonetics and phonology, have focused on languages that have historically been dominant or where speakers are easily accessible. The dynamic of language endangerment and interaction between small groups of speakers may provide unique opportunities for sound change to take place. Small speech communities has different social factors than large communities, leading to the phonetic and cognitive influences to interact and diffuse in different ways when there are fewer agents. How sound change might originate and diffuse in speech communities of different sizes is poorly understood. Furthermore, endangered and small languages are often heavily influenced by other languages and cultures, making sound change more likely. In order to make useful models and predictions about when and how sound change will occur, we need to explore these patterns in diverse speech communities.

Selections of papers on the theme of WSC 5 will also be considered for publication in a special collection (the online equivalent of a special issue).

In addition to the Special theme, the WSC 5 will be a place where scholars come together and make substantive progress on outstanding theoretical questions and issues in the field. General issues addressed at the workshop often include questions regarding the identification of the sources of sound change, and the mechanism of sound change propagation.

We welcome Abstracts from researchers investigating any aspect of sound change from a variety of theoretical and methodological approaches. Submissions addressing any and all aspects of sound change are encouraged – there is no need for submitted abstracts to engage with the theme.

Possible topics might include:

• Perceptual, articulatory, and aerodynamic investigations into the phonetic origins of sound change

• The role of individual variation in articulation, perception, and sociolinguistic monitoring in sound change actuation

• Computational modeling of sound change propagation

• The connection between language acquisition and language learning on sound change

• Contact-induced variation in sound change

• Biological foundations of sound change

The workshop will consist of oral presentations, discussion sessions, and poster sessions. Abstract submitters may choose to have their abstract considered either for a poster only, or for a poster or a talk.

Travel grants of up to $400 will be awarded on a competitive basis for graduate student presenters!