Workshop on Topic, Focus and Intonation, Santa Barbara, CA, July 20-21, 2001

最近在句法和语义学方面的研究，使我们对主题和焦点在语言中的作用的理解在深度和跨语言的广度上取得了巨大的进展。与此同时，语音学家和音韵学家对语调的跨语言研究也越来越感兴趣。语调的一个领域被证明是一个丰富的研究领域，但相对较少的研究领域是焦点和主题。对各种语言的研究表明，涉及焦点或话题化元素的话语通常与没有任何焦点或话题化元素的话语具有不同的语调特征，例如音调范围的增加，音调结构的专业化，持续时间的不同。这些研究表明，韵律差异与各种主题化和焦点相关的意义差异之间存在密切联系。然而，尽管最近在语调主题和焦点特性的研究方面取得了进展，但在语调的语音学和音系与话题化和焦点的句法和语义之间的相互作用方面，我们仍有足够的空间进一步推进我们的跨语言知识。特别是，句法学家、语义学家、音韵学家和语音学家之间越来越多的互动，有望在与话题化和焦点相关的意义的语调相关性研究中取得重要进展。在加州圣巴巴拉市举行的2001年美国语言学会暑期学院将举办一个主题、焦点和语调的研讨会。在这个研讨会上，我们希望进一步探讨各种主题化和语调焦点的影响。我们特别希望这次研讨会能够为今后致力于意义研究的语言学家和从事语调定量研究的语言学家之间的合作奠定基础。欢迎就语调与主题和/或焦点之间关系的任何方面发表描述性和理论性论文。论文可能涉及任何语言的主题和/或焦点的语调方面，无论是研究相对充分还是文献相对不足。

Recent work in syntax and semantics has yielded dramatic developments in the depth and cross-linguistic breadth of our understanding of the role of topic and focus in language. At the same time, there has been increased interest among phoneticians and phonologists in the cross-linguistic study of intonation. One area of intonation which has proven to be a rich yet relatively understudied area of research is focus and topic. Studies of various languages have indicated that utterances involving a focused or topicalized element are typically associated with intonational properties different from utterances without any focused or topicalized elements, e.g. increased pitch range, specialized tonal configurations, different durational characteristics. These studies suggest a close link between differences in prosody and the kinds of differences in meaning associated with various kinds of topicalization and focus.Nevertheless despite recent advances in the study of intonational properties of topic and focus, there is ample room for further advancing our cross-linguistic knowledge of the interaction between the phonetics and phonology of intonation and the syntax and semantics of topicalization and focus. In particular, increased interaction between syntacticians, semanticists, phonologists and phoneticians promises to yield important progress in the study of intonational correlates of the meanings associated with topicalization and focus. A workshop on Topic, Focus and Intonation will be held at the 2001 Linguistic Society of America Summer Institute in Santa Barbara, CA. In this workshop, we hope to explore further the effects of various kinds of topicalization and focus on intonation. It is especially hoped that the workshop will lay the groundwork for future collaborative efforts between linguists devoted to the study meaning and linguistics engaged in the quantitative study of intonation. Both descriptive and theoretical papers on any aspects of the relationship between intonation, on the one hand, and topic and/or focus, on the other hand, are welcome. Papers may deal with intonational aspects of topic and/or focus in any language, whether relatively well-studied or relatively underdocumented.