Category: colloquium

New format of GLOW colloquium

After two townhall meetings, we decided on a revised format for the GLOW colloquium.

HERE are the new guidelines for organizing a GLOW conference, reached by the GLOW board after taking into consideration the issues and suggestions raised at the town hall meetings. The conclusions reflect, on the one hand, the need to keep up a venue for substantial (and hence long) contributions in generative grammar and, on the other hand, make GLOW significantly more inclusive—make it more accessible to junior scholars and to non-core approaches to generative grammar.

GLOW proceedings: looking for task force!

The questionnaire results as well as the town hall discussions have revealed that the community finds it important to have GLOW proceedings. We agree with this assessment, and while no definitive decision has been made, the board has agreed on an initial concept, sketched and motivated below. To develop the details and reach a concrete procedure for the GLOW proceedings, we would like to form a task force to handle this further. If you are interested to be part of the task force (note this will not bind you to be involved in the actual proceedings later), please let us know.

Proposal: 

Although Glossa (special collections called “GLOWing papers”) is considered a good venue, there are significant limitations in the number of submissions, which in turn poses a challenge of the selection process; note that the community is skeptical about the GLOW board deciding on which papers should be included in the selected proceedings.

Taking the above into account and considering that GLOW is to become a more inclusive conference, the GLOW board would like to support a more inclusive proceedings model, too, along the lines of SuB, WCCFL, or SALT. More particularly, what we have in mind is a sizeable collection of short papers (say, up to 15 pages), non-reviewed, but copyedited, published online and diamond open access (free to both author and reader, accessible via a stable repository), within about a year from the conference. The publisher would be the organizing institution, the editorial team could be composed of senior and junior scholars; for the latter this would be an opportunity to gain experience. The editors would only check the papers for copyediting and stylesheet adherence, the editing itself would be up to the authors. This is basically the model applied in the Proceedings of Sinn und Bedeutung. We are aware that a non-reviewed publication is worth less than a reviewed one, let alone a journal publication. However, as has been pointed out multiple times, good papers have a high chance of finding their way into journals even without GLOW proceedings. And while non-reviewed publications often “score” less points in official evaluation systems, their quality is easily recognized by peer experts, which in turn can translate to higher chances in the job market for junior people. Finally, speed and inclusiveness are the benefits which we think outweigh the downsides.

No GLOW colloquium in 2024 & reduced membership fee

The result of the latest vote showed that the majority of the GLOW members approved the proposal to hold a gap year and use the time to reorganize GLOW.

As GLOW will not be held in 2024, a general meeting will be organized by the GLOW board to discuss the restructuring of GLOW. Details will follow later. Since we would like the GLOW membership to be as large as possible during this gap year (to make sure that anyone in the generative community interested in contributing to the further development of GLOW will be heard and have the opportunity to contribute), we are offering a regular yearly membership for €8 and a reduced yearly membership (students, unemployed) for €5. 

04/2023 – 03/2024, covering GLOW Vienna (2023):  €8 / €5

04/2024 – 03/2025, restructuring of GLOW:    €8 / €5

04/2025 – 03/2026, covering GLOW 47 (2025): €25 / €11.50

Members who already paid the full one-year membership for 2023-2024 (e.g., to participate in GLOW in Vienna) will have their membership automatically extended until 03/2026 (i.e., including the 2025 meeting and up to but not including the meeting in 2026). All existing 4-, 5-, and 10-year memberships will be extended by one year.

Being a member allows people to participate in all votes and thereby shape the future of GLOW. GLOW will, if financially possible, continue to support summer schools and possibly other important functions serving the generative community (such as open access publishing).

Online participation at the main colloquium in Vienna will be free for GLOW members. The Zoom link will be sent to the membership on April 11. Please sign up as a GLOW member by April 8 to receive the link. You can sign up via the GLOW46 online form HERE or via the general GLOW form HERE.

Vote: skipping GLOW 47 colloquium (2024)?

The GLOW board is considering to skip the annual GLOW colloquium in 2024.

This is partly motivated by the turning down of Israel as a venue for 2024, but mainly as a way of providing the GLOW board and the broader GLOW community with enough time to restructure GLOW as an organization that serves its community as best as it can.

An email announcing the vote has been sent to all current GLOW members.

Over the next year we will be in touch with the community and solicit feedback, ideas and constructive solutions to the issues that have been mentioned. Currently, we are envisaging to do this in the form of a multi-day meeting (online or hybrid), or a series of meetings, where anyone will be welcome (member or not) and where we want to give everyone an opportunity to be heard and to express their wishes and concerns.

We realize that skipping a year also has disadvantages (e.g, taking away the opportunity to present one’s current research at a prominent venue such as GLOW), which is why we want to see how the majority of the GLOW members feels about the proposal.

An email announcing the vote including the voting options has been sent to all current GLOW members.

Result of vote: GLOW 47 will not take place in Israel

The vote about GLOW 47 in Israel has finished.

  • 113 of the total of 170 members (66%) cast a valid vote.
  • 52 members (46% of the valid votes cast) were in favor of GLOW 47 in Israel.
  • 61 members (54% of the valid votes cast) were against GLOW 47 in Israel.

The General Assembly has thus decided that GLOW 47 will not take place in Israel.

Herewith the search for a new venue for GLOW 47 (2024) is initiated. If you have a proposal, please don’t hesitate to share it with the board. Our hope is that a new venue can be confirmed at GLOW 46 in Vienna.

GLOW 45: April 2022

The 45th GLOW Colloquium will take place at Queen Mary University of London on 27th-29th April, 2022 in a hybrid fashion.

In addition to the main session, there will be two thematic workshops (26th April): 

Workshop I:
Typological generalizations and semantic theory

Workshop II:
Sources of variation in phonological theory

See the GLOW 45 website for more information.