14:15 – 15:00 Dr. James McElvenny: The “mark”, from Gestalt phenomenon to language universal

15:00 – 15:45 Dr. Susanne Kokel: „Unvermeidbare Beobachtung. Kooperation und Kredit – die Kreditauskunft“

Abstracts:

James McElvenny (University of Siegen): The “mark”, from Gestalt phenomenon to language universal

The notion of “markedness” has played an important role in linguistic theory since the early 20^th century. In essence, markedness describes an opposition in the analysis of language between an “unmarked” or default form and its “marked” counterpart. This opposition has variously been used as a metric for evaluating competing proposals in linguistic theories and in the postulation of universal hierarchies of possible and probable language structures.

As is well known, the study of markedness has its origins in the phonological theory of the Prague School, and specifically in the work of Nikolai Trubetzkoy (1890–1938) and Roman Jakobson (1896–1982). What is less well known is that the conceptual basis of the “mark” was influenced by the broadly Gestaltist phonemic theory of the Vienna psychologist Karl Bühler (1879–1963). In its migration between perceptual psychology, phonological theory and the study of language universals, the “mark” has undergone a number of conceptual developments, many of which are not necessarily compatible with one another. This talk traces this evolution and the problems it presents.

More information coming soon.