Metalinguistic Markers: Emergence, Discourse, Variation 

Web Site: https://www.metamem.ro 
08-Jun-2022 - 09-Jun-2022 
“Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University of Iași, Romania 

Call Deadline: 01-Apr-2022 

Conference organized within the research project “Metalinguistic Markers between Lexicon, Grammar and Discourse. A Diachronic Approach”, funded by the Romanian Ministry of Research, Innovation and Digitization, CNCS/CCCDI – UEFISCDI, project number PN-III-P4-ID-PCE-2020-1505 

During the last decades metalinguistic markers have been the subject of ongoing research in linguistics. Indeed, the metalinguistic activities that these markers refer to, such as reformulating, terminological borrowing, correcting, approximating, exemplifying, etc., are essential features of language functioning. 

“Metalinguistic markers” will be considered in a broad sense as referring to the different illustrations of the reflexivity of natural languages, whether they are phrases concerning language use (metalinguistic markers, in a narrow sense), the act of saying (meta-enunciative markers) or discourse itself (metadiscursive markers). 
Whether they are lexemes or phrasemes, these phrases present various degrees of lexicalization and grammaticalization/ pragmaticalization, this property being reflected in the approaches dealing with their emergence. More broadly, studying the way in which these expressions evolved provides elements that shed light on the relationship between lexicon, grammar and discourse. 


Call for Papers: https://www.metamem.ro

Contributions should question, among others, the semantic-pragmatic functioning of metalinguistic markers in different types of discourse, their relationship to variation, as well as the mechanisms of their emergence, using oral/written corpora. Papers may concern one particular language or propose contrastive approaches involving two or more languages. 
Contributions related but not limited to the following research areas and topics are welcome: 
- metalinguistic markers and types of discourse (literary, scientific, journalistic, didactic, etc.). Papers should aim at establishing connections between a particular phrase and a specific type of discourse and at identifying, where appropriate, the textual/discursive environments that trigger the emergence of a particular metadiscursive expression. Comparisons may be carried out between different types of discourse from the point of view of the use of metalinguistic markers; 
- diachronic approach of metalinguistic markers. The discussion will focus on the changes in use or frequency that metalinguistic markers can undergo in diachrony; 
- metalinguistic markers and variation. Papers could also focus on identifying factors of variation (regional, situational, social) in the use of the markers, in written/oral discourse; 
- metalinguistic markers in translation. Contributions should aim to provide answers to questions such as: What are the processes involved in the translation of these markers from one language to another? Could the translation process lead to the emergence of some new markers in the target language?, etc. 
- metalinguistic markers and language acquisition. Comparisons can be made between the metalinguistic operations accomplished by means of the various markers studied in different types of discourse and the metalinguistic activities involved in the process of acquisition of a given language. 

Languages of communication: French and English. 

Keynote speakers: 

Wiltrud Mihatsch, University of Tübingen 
Laurence Rouanne, Complutense University of Madrid