The National Science Foundation will support the inaugural conference of Generative Approaches to Language Acquisition - North America (GALANA), to be convened at the University of Hawai`i at Manoa on 17-20 December 2004. The GALANA meeting is conceived as the North-American sister to the Europe-based conference, Generative Approaches to Language Acquisition (GALA), which has been held biennially since its inception in 1993. GALANA and GALA, both roving conferences, will henceforth alternate from year to year.
GALANA will complement other existing broad-based and specialized language acquisition conferences, and it will provide an outlet for the growing body of generative acquisition research. A major aim of GALANA is to bring together generative researchers in all subfields of language acquisition, including first language acquisition, second language acquisition, bilingual language acquisition, creole and pidgin studies, and disordered language development. Notable features of the conference designed to entice and excite wide participation include: (i) invited presentations by distinguished scholars from both the U.S. and abroad, more specifically, two plenary addresses and one half-day tutorial; (ii) two special thematic sessions, one on the acquisition of Mood/Aspect and the other on child second language acquisition; (iii) three poster sessions, one of them reserved for graduate students.
GALANA's broader impact occurs at several levels: First, we are initiating a conference that will benefit researchers for many years to come. Second, GALANA will promote the participation of beginning researchers, including those from under-represented minorities, by offering merit-based travel fellowships to approximately 15 graduate students. In addition, the conference will have a major impact on the infrastructure of linguistics scholarship at the University of Hawai`i by fostering cross-over between the two co-sponsoring departments (Linguistics; Second Language Studies), providing undergraduate and graduate students in both departments with numerous intellectual and professional opportunities, and spurring Pacific Islanders' interest in the study of the acquisition of their own languages. Finally, as a roving conference, GALANA will encourage collaboration among centers of generative studies in the U.S., thus strengthening the infrastructure of generative acquisition research in linguistics.
