Second call for papers

WORKSHOP PROPOSALS AND GENERAL SESSION PAPERS

The Societas Linguistica Europaea (SLE) and the Osnabrück University are pleased to announce the “59th Annual Meeting of the Societas Linguistica Europaea (SLE 2026)”, to be held in Osnabrück, 26-29 August 2026.

SLE meetings provide a forum for high-quality linguistic research from all (sub)domains of linguistics. The upcoming edition of the SLE meeting will also host a round table of experts to discuss topics of special linguistic interest.

The deadline for all abstracts is 15 January 2026. Notification of acceptance/rejection will be by 31 March 2026.

PLENARY SPEAKERS

• Maria Koptjevskaja Tamm, Presidential address
• Steffen Hoeder, plenary speaker
• Alexandra Bosshard, winner of the Best Postdoc paper at SLE 2025
• Elena Shvedova, winner of the Best PhD paper at SLE 2025.

WORKSHOP PROPOSALS: SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

Workshops will be organized in 20 minute slots (20 min. presentation, 5 min. discussion, 5 min. room change). Each workshop comprises:

1. an introductory paper by the convenor(s) or by a keynote speaker, which summarizes previous research, specifies the approach(es) to be taken and sets the scope of the papers to be presented.
2. minimum of eight papers.
3. a slot for a final discussion on the topics covered by the papers, methodological issues and questions for future research.

Further details can be discussed with the SLE Conference Manager (sle.cm@kuleuven.be).

Workshop proposals must contain:

• five keywords
• a description of the topic and research questions (between 900 and 1.100 words).
• a (provisional) list of workshop participants and their provisional abstracts (max. 300 words per abstract)

Workshop convenors are encouraged to announce their proposal on the conference website (please send it to the conference manager sle.cm@kuleuven.be) and on the LinguistList as a session of SLE 2026 (for detailed instructions how to do this, see below), as well as other fora in the linguistic area of the workshop.

Workshop proposals must be submitted as one file in pdf and be sent to the chair of SLE workshops Anetta Kopecka (anetta.kopecka@univ-lyon2.fr) and to the Conference Manager (sle.cm@kuleuven.be).

ATTENTION: The deadline for the submission of workshop proposals is 20 November 2025. Notification of acceptance/rejection will be by 15 December 2025. After a workshop proposal has been accepted, the convenors will be requested to invite all preliminary workshop participants to submit their full abstracts in EasyChair before 15 January 2026. The link for workshop abstract submission will be available in the Third Call for Papers (published by 15 December). Accepted workshop proposals will be published on the conference webpage. Other authors interested in the workshop may submit their papers to the workshop at the conference general call. Finally, all abstracts submitted to the workshop in EasyChair will be reviewed individually by the Scientific Committee and the workshop convenors.

GENERAL SESSION PAPERS AND POSTERS

The deadline for all abstracts is 15 January 2026. Notification of acceptance will be given by 31 March 2026.

Abstracts are submitted to EasyChair via the SLE Members’ Area: https://societaslinguistica.eu/members/login/. Please keep in mind that SLE is a members’ association run by and for members. Hence, submitters have to be SLE members to submit an abstract. For SLE membership, please click here. Abstracts submitted by non-members will not be considered.

Abstracts should clearly state the research questions, approach, method, data and (expected) results. They should not contain the names of the presenters, nor their affiliations or addresses, or any other information that could reveal their authorship. They should not exceed 500 words (including examples, excluding references). Abstracts should have the same title as the entry submitted via EasyChair. Some guidelines about how to write a good abstract can be found under the tab “How to write a good abstract”.

Presentations will last 20 minutes, allowing 5 min. for discussion, 5 min. for speaker and room changes.

SUBMITTING MULTIPLE PAPERS. In order to guarantee diversity, one person may be the first author of only one submission of any kind (workshop paper, general session paper, poster, or workshop proposal); nobody is allowed to present or co-present more than two papers at an SLE conference (including workshops). You can co-author more than two papers but you cannot figure among the co-presenters at the conference (i.e. if you co-author more than two papers, you will have to play a background role).

Presentations will last 20 minutes, allowing 5 min. for discussion, 5 min. for speaker and changes.

PRESENTING A POSTER

The SLE 2026 meeting will have one or two poster sessions for both senior and junior researchers. In order to foster interaction, all other sessions will be suspended during the poster session. Posters will be displayed in a gathering area and may remain available during the rest of the conference. The maximum size of the poster is usually 1.20 m (vertical) x 1 m (horizontal). For some information about how to make a good poster, click here.

REVIEWING PROCEDURE

Abstracts will be reviewed anonymously by three referees. Workshop abstracts receive two evaluations by Programme Committee members and one by the workshop convenors. Abstracts submitted to the general session and to the poster session will be evaluated by three members of the Programme Committee. The threshold for acceptance is the same for general session papers, posters and workshop papers.

PRIZE FOR THE BEST PRESENTATION AND THE BEST POSTER

At SLE conferences there are prizes for the following categories (see Award winners 2025):

• best oral presentation by a PhD student,
• best oral presentation by a postdoc, and
• best poster.

Applicants can mark the option for each of the award categories in EasyChair upon abstract submission.

Rules

PhD students should not have completed their PhD before the conference. Postdocs should have completed their PhD not earlier than three years before the year of the conference (for example 2023 for the SLE 2026 conference). All posters will be eligible for the best poster prize.

A shortlisted paper may be co-authored. Co-authored papers in categories i) and ii) above, should be presented at the conference by the nominee, who will also have to be the first author of the paper.

Prizes

The first prize in each of the three categories is 500 Euros. The winners of the first prizes in the PhD and Postdoc categories are also awarded a 20+5 mins. plenary talk at SLE 2027 (Košice). The 2nd and 3rd prizes will receive a three-year SLE membership.

IMPORTANT DATES

20 November 2025: workshop proposals submission deadline

15 December 2025: notification of workshop acceptance

15 January 2026: deadline for submission of all abstracts

31 March 2026: notification of paper acceptance

1 April 2026: early bird registration starts

1 May 2026: full fee registration starts

31 May 2026: closing registration date for participants with a paper

31 July 2026: closing registration date for participants without a paper, and for co-authors of papers were at least one author has already registered.

Please note that papers for which none of the authors has registered by 31 May will not be scheduled. The schedule will be published online in June after the registration deadline. The schedule will then be modified only in the event of cancellations.

REGISTRATION

Registration will open on 1 April 2026. SLE meetings are member-only conferences. That is, all participants will have to be(become) members of the Societas Linguistica Europaea so as to be able to register.