News

The interdisciplinary Research Training Group (RTG) 1808

“Ambiguity – Production and Perception”

Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen offers 1 PhD Position (TV-L E13,
65%) with a temporary employment first for a period until March 31, 2018
(a proposal for the extension of the funding is in preparation, which,
if successful, will result in an offer of another two years, i.e. three
years total) to a student with expertise in cognitive science or a
closely related discipline. General programming skills are a mandatory
requirement.

As the University of Tübingen intends to increase the proportion of
female employees in research and teaching, women are particularly
encouraged to apply. The PhD-Student will be employed through the
central administration of the University of Tübingen and will work on
modeling ambiguity and enhancing a database on various disciplinary
cases of ambiguity.

Application deadline: Wednesday, March 22, 2017.

The doctoral student will enjoy excellent conditions in an
interdisciplinary environment and will participate in a systematically
structured curriculum, comprising project-oriented guidance in small
teams as well as activities of the entire RTG. The student’s project
will be supervised by the Chair of Cognitive Modeling:
http://www.cm.inf.uni-tuebingen.de <http://www.cm.inf.uni-tuebingen.de/>

RTG 1808 Summary
Ambiguity, defined as an expression or utterance that has two or more
meanings, is a characteristic feature of language and communication. It
is as relevant to the most ordinary situ¬a¬tions of everyday life as it
is to the most complex text productions. Accordingly, ambiguity has been
a central topic of investigation in linguistics and in other disciplines
concerned with the interpretation of language. These different
approaches, however, have never been syste¬matically brought to¬gether.
In order to understand why communication may be successful in spite of
or even be¬cause of ambiguity, why ambiguity may also cause its failure
and what effects it has, the isolated approaches will have to be overcome.
It is the aim of the proposed Research Training Group (RTG) to show that
by a collaborative approach of language-oriented disciplines new
insights may be gained into the production and perception of ambiguity,
i.e. when it comes into being and when it is resolved. The pursuit of
this aim is based on the conviction that ambiguity is an excellent
paradigm for developing new ways of col-laboration between the various
language-oriented disciplines.
The research program links investigations into the language system as a
field of linguistic research with investigations into the areas of
discourse focused upon by the other discipli¬nes. This will lead to
innovative approaches: From a linguistic perspective, the challenge will
be to represent (strategic) ambiguity in a broad range of texts, and
from the perspective of the other disciplines, it will mean taking into
account the role of grammatical structures for the interpretation of
ambiguity. The program rests on the assumption that both the production
and the perception of ambiguity, as well as its strategic and
non-strategic occurrence, can only be understood by exploring how these
factors interact when ambiguity is generated and resolved. This may
concern the speaker-hearer-interaction as well as long-term
develop¬ments such as the strategic reinterpretation of canonical texts.
For additional information see www.ambiguitaet.uni-tuebingen.de <http://www.ambiguitaet.uni-tuebingen.de/>.

Application details:
Applications (in English) including informative documents, a cover
letter, a brief research proposal (maximum 2 pages), signed CV, copies
of earned university degrees and transcripts of individual grades, the
names and email addresses of two potential referees (university
professors) as well as, optionally, a letter of recommendation are to be
sent in digital form (one pdf document) by March 22, 2017 under the
reference RTG “Ambiguity: Production and Perception” to the speaker of
the RTG, Professor Matthias Bauer: m.bauer@uni-tuebingen.de <mailto:m.bauer@uni-tuebingen.de>.