Newsletter

Col. 7 No 2, Spring 1995
Society for Germanic Philology

SGP Newsletter

With this issue, the Newsletter not only has a new look, but also a new editor; Anna Grotans will be taking charge with assistance from Joe Salmons. With that, the SGP Newsletter moves to the Department of Germanic Languages & Literatures at The Ohio State University. The Newsletter will appear biannually, in October and May. Beginning with the fall issue we will offer the Newsletter both in hard copy and in electronic format on the World Wide Web and email. If you are able to receive the Newsletter in electronic format, please let the editors know (agrotans@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu or jsalmons@facstaff.wisc.edu), since electronic distribution is faster and defrays costs. Please send any information for posting to Anna A. Grotans by email, or to the editorial address listed on the outside of this copy.

Return to top

New Conference: GLAC

The Society for Germanic Philology held the first Germanic Linguistics Annual Conference (GLAC), in Ann Arbor on April 20-22, 1995. The SGP is grateful to Rosina Lippi-Green, Robert Kyes and their graduate students at the University of Michigan, for making the new conference so successful, intellectually stimulating and collegial. The three day conference included 40 papers and 75 registered participants from Europe, Canada and across the US. We also thank the invited speakers, Elmer Antonsen (Illinois), Evelyn Firchow (Minnesota) and Gert Webelhuth (North Carolina), whose work reflects the breadth of research interests in our field.

GLAC2 will be held at the University of Wisconsin April 26-28, 1996; Friday morning-Sunday midday. The conference committee invites abstracts for thirty-minute (30) papers in all areas of Germanic linguistics and philology. Topics include but are not limited to Historical Linguistics, Sociolinguistics, Philology, Syntax, Morphology, Phonology/Phonetics, Yiddish, Netherlandic, Scandinavian, English and German. Abstracts will be evaluated anonymously by a panel. Please send:

• 5 hard copies of a 1-page abstract (12-point font), 1.5 or 2-spaced. Include the title of the paper, but not the authorŐs name.
• A 3x5 card with the authorŐs name, paper title, address (incl. telephone, fax, email).

For further information and to join the GLAC mailing list (electronic & US Mail), contact:

GLAC Committee
German Department
818 Van Hise
1220 Linden Drive
University of Wisconsin
Madison, WI 53706-1558
Phone: (608) 262-2192
Phone: (608) 262-2192
Fax: (608) 262-7949
Email: rhowell@macc.wisc.edu
Deadline for Abstracts: December 31, 1995

Invited speakers: James Milroy, Michigan; Ellen Prince, Penn; Robert Stockwell, UCLA

Likely future GLAC sites include Ohio State, North Carolina and Iowa. If you are interested in hosting GLAC in the future, please contact the 1996 organizers.

Please pass along membership information to colleagues who might be interested in the SGP but are not yet members. As indicated on the outside of this Newsletter, annual membership is $25 ($15 for graduate students). For this you receive two newsletters, GLAC information and a subscription to the AJGLL.

We are currently building ties with other professional organizations with similar interests. Eventually we hope this will include reciprocal exchange of publications and newsletters, mutual announcement of upcoming events, etc. Please let us know of organizations that we might want to contact.

Society for Medieval German Studies

The participants of the Medieval German Literature sessions at the Kalamazoo Medieval Conference have decided to form an organization for the planning of those sessions and for allied interests. The Society for Medieval German Studies will have its concentration in the areas of literature and cultural studies. The Society will be organizing four sessions of papers at the 1996 Kalamazoo meeting. Anyone wishing to submit an abstract or interested in receiving the Society newsletter should contact Prof. Stephanie Pafenberg, Department of German,Queens University, Kingston, Ontario, Canada K7L 3N6 or by fax (613/545-6522) or by email at
pafenber@post.queensu.ca.

Honorary Members

The Executive Committee of the Society for Germanic Philology voted at its last meeting to recognize distinguished senior scholars in the fields of Germanic Linguistics and Philology with an honorary lifetime membership in the Society. Honorees will be selected by a committee (Robert Kyes of Michigan, Anna Grotans of OSU, Paul Roberge of UNC) based on nominations from the membership. Please send nominations to the Newsletter editor by 12/31/95. The first honorees will be announced at GLAC2.

SGP Elections

This fall we will seek nominations for three openings on the Executive Committee as well as for Secretary/Treasurer and Vice-President. Current EC members and officers are: J. Salmons, Purdue/Wisconsin (Pres., through 1996); T. Shannon, UC-Berkeley (Vice-Pres., 1995); Ed Fichtner, CUNY-Queens (Acting Sec./Treas., 1995); R. Lippi-Green, Michigan (1995); E. PolomŽ, Texas (1995); W. Benware , UC-Davis (1995); R. Howell, Wisconsin (1996); N. Jacobs, Ohio State (1996); M. Louden, Texas (1996); G. Davis, UW-Milwaukee (1997); S. Fagan, Iowa (1997).

The American Journal of Germanic Linguistics & Literatures.

Members of the Society for Germanic Philology have received the American Journal of Germanic Linguistics and Literature as part of their membership ever since the journal was established seven years ago. The journal has been published under the editorship of Richard K. Seymour with the support of the University of Hawaii. In a letter mailed with volume 7.1 of the AJGLL , Dick Seymour announced that Irmengard Rauch had been named co-editor and Gerold Carr review editor, and that the journal would be co-sponsored by International and Area Studies of the University of California, Berkeley. According to Dick, this move was motivated by a desire to seek broader support for the journal in the form of increased readership and institutional support. At the same time, these changes also implied a dissolution of the relationship between the Society and the journal. Our colleagues never notified the SGP Executive Committee of their intentions nor, as far as we have been able to ascertain, did they consult with all of the journal's associate editors and advisory board members.

In a communication dated 2 May 1995, Dick informed the SGP president, Joe Salmons, that he has dissociated himself and the University of Hawaii completely from the journal and has further withdrawn from any cooperative arrangement with International and Area Studies at the University of California at Berkeley. In a subsequent communication (19 May 1995) Dick adds that Berkeley's International and Area Studies has ceased all support for the journal. The SGP Executive Committee has not heard from colleagues Rauch and Carr on the matter, but we infer from their silence that they, too, have terminated their involvement.

In the light of these developments the SGP Executive Committee has canceled its plans to publish a yearbook (as announced at GLAC) and will continue the AJGLL under the existing editorial team: Paul T. Roberge (UNC, Chapel Hill), Sarah M. B. Fagan, Review Editor (Iowa), Robert Howell (Wisconsin), Joseph C. Salmons (Purdue/Wisconsin), and Evelyn Firchow (Minnesota, Twin Cities).

Dick has returned all mss. accepted for publication in AJGLL and under consideration. Authors who would still like to publish their work in the journal and have not yet contacted a member of the editorial team are urged to do so as soon as possible. We have not received books for review or book review mss. from Berkeley and are therefore unable to offer any information on their disposition at this time. For the time being, we suggest that reviewers and presses contact colleagues Rauch and Carr directly. Beginning immediately, manuscripts should be sent to:

Prof. Paul T. Roberge
Chair, AJGLL Editorial Committee,
Dept of Germanic Languages
CB# 3160 438 Dey Hall
University of North Carolina
Chapel Hill, NC 27599-3160
USA.

On behalf of the membership of the SGP, we want to express our thanks to Dick for all of his hard work over the years and to wish him well in his retirement. We further thank the University of Hawaii for its generous support in the past.

Paul T. Roberge and Joseph C. Salmons

Upcoming Conferences

• Functionalism/Formalism. 23rd Annual UWM Linguistics Symposium, 18-20 April 1996, seeks papers on the relationship between linguistic functionalism and formalism. Papers will be 20 minutes long. Send 8 copies of an anonymous abstract and a small (3x5) card with the title of the paper and your name, affiliation, and address. The abstract may be up to one typed page, with figures and references allowed on a second page. Send by regular mail to:

  '96 UWM Symposium Committee,
  Dept of Linguistics,
  University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
  Milwaukee, WI 53201-0413
  Deadline: Fri., Nov. 17, 1995
  

  Further information: Edith Moravcsik (edith@.csd.uwm.edu), Michael Noonan (noonan@.csd.uwm. edu) Phone: Noonan (414) 220-4539, Moravcsik (414) 229-6794, Messages (414) 229-4285, Fax: (414) 229-6258.

• 8th Annual UCLA Indo-European Conference: May 1996, includes various aspects of Indo-European Studies: linguistics, archaeology, comparative mythology & culture. Further information, contact:

  IE Conference
  Classics Department
  7349 Bunche Hall, UCLA
  405 Hilgard Ave
  Los Angeles, CA 90024-1475
  email: iep0rmr@mvs.oac.ucla.edu
  phone: (310) 825-4171.
  
  

• 31st International Congress on Medieval Studies: Medieval Institute, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo , May 1996. One-page abstracts for 20 minute papers due September 15, 1995:
  • Medieval Continental Germanic:
    Anna Grotans
    314 Cunz/German
    The Ohio State University
    Columbus, OH 43210-1229
    email: agrotans@magnus.acs.ohio-state.edu
    
  • Society for Medieval German Studies:
    Stephanie Pafenberg
    Department of German
    Queens University
    Kingston, Ontario
    Canada K7L 3N6
    email: pafenber@post.queensu.ca
    

  
  

• Comparative Germanic Syntax Workshop XI: Rutgers, Nov. 3-5, 1995. Abstracts to:
  CGSW XI, Department of Linguistics, Rutgers University, 18 Seminary Place, New Brunswick, NJ 08903; Fax (908) 932-1370

  Abstracts must arrive by July 1 and may not exceed 2 pp. or have type smaller than 12 point. Submit 7 copies of abstracts by mail, only one of which should have your name and affiliation. Include also a 3x5 card with paper title, name, address, affiliation, email and/or fax. For details, contact Ken Safir at the address above, by email (Safir@cancer.rutgers.edu).

The Society for Germanic Philology invites you to submit material for the Newsletter. Contributions accepted for publication will be edited to conform to Newsletter style, space limitations, and other requirements. Accuracy in editorial material is the responsibility of the author and/or contributor.

Return to top