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<p class="" align="center" style="text-align:center"><span lang="EN-US"><b>SIGDIAL 2014 CONFERENCE</b><br></span><b><span lang="EN-US">Wednesday, June 18 to
Friday, June 20, 2014 </span></b></p>
<p class="" align="center" style="text-align:center"><span lang="EN-US">The 15th Annual Meeting of the Special Interest Group on Discourse
and Dialog will be<br></span>co-located with the 8th International Conference on Natural Language
Generation (<a href="http://inlg2014.wordpress.com/">INLG
2014</a>) in Philadelphia, PA, USA and immediately preceding ACL 2014.</p>
<p class="" align="center" style="text-align:center"><b><span lang="EN-US"> </span></b><span lang="EN-US"> <a href="http://www.sigdial.org/workshops/conference15/">http://www.sigdial.org/workshops/conference15</a>
</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">CALL FOR PAPERS<br><br></span></b>The 2014 SIGDIAL
conference continues a series of fourteen conferences, providing a regular
forum for the presentation of cutting edge research across the areas of
discourse and dialog and attracting a diverse set of participants from academia
and industry. The conference is sponsored by the SIGdial organization, which
serves as the Special Interest Group on discourse and dialog for both ACL and
ISCA.</p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">KEYNOTE SPEAKERS<br><br></span></b>We are pleased to announce our keynote
speakers will be Prof. Steve Young from the University of Cambridge and Prof.
Lillian Lee from Cornell University.</p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">TOPICS OF INTEREST<br><br></span></b>We welcome formal,
corpus-based, system-building or analytical work on discourse and dialog including
but not restricted to the following themes and topics:</p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">- Discourse
Processing and Dialog Systems</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">- Corpora, Tools
and Methodology</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">- Pragmatic and/or
Semantic Modeling</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">- Dimensions of
Interaction</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">-
Open Domain Dialog</span><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">-
Style, Voice and Personality in Spoken Dialog and Written Text</span><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">- Applications of
Dialog and Discourse Processing Technology</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">- Novel Methods
for Generation Within Dialog for a joint special session with INLG</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">SPECIAL SESSIONS<br><br></span></b>There will be one
special session co-located with <a href="http://inlg2014.wordpress.com/">INLG</a> on the morning of June 20th. There will
be a second special session on the <a href="http://camdial.org/~mh521/dstc/">Dialogue State Tracking Challenge (DSTC)</a><b>. </b>Proposals for additional special sessions
are also still welcome. Special sessions submission will undergo regular
SIGdial review process.</p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">IMPORTANT DATES<br></span></b></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">Special Session Proposal Deadline: </span></b><span lang="EN-US"> Sunday,
9 February 2014 (23:59, GMT-11)</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">Special Session Notification: </span></b><span lang="EN-US"> Monday,
17 February 2014</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">Long, Short and Demonstration</span></b><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">Paper Submission Deadline: </span></b><span lang="EN-US"> Sunday,
9 March 2014 (23:59, GMT-11)</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">Paper Notification:
</span></b><span lang="EN-US"> Friday,
18 April 2014</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">Final Paper Due</span></b><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">- For papers
accepted subject</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> to receiving mentoring Wednesday,
14 May 2014</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">- For accepted
papers Friday, 23 May 2014</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">Conference </span></b><span lang="EN-US"> Wednesday, June 18, 2014 to Friday, June
20, 2014</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">SUBMISSIONS</span></b></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">Special Session Proposals</span></b><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">The SIGdial
organizers welcome the submission of special session proposals. A SIGDIAL special session is the length of a
regular session at the conference; may be organized as a poster session, a
poster session with panel discussion, or an oral presentation session; and will
be held on the last day of the conference.
Special sessions may, at the discretion of the SIGdial organizers, be
held as parallel sessions. Those wishing
to organize a special session should prepare a two-page proposal
containing: a summary of the topic of
the special session; a list of organizers and sponsors; a list of people who
may submit and participate; and a requested format (poster/panel/oral
session). These proposals should be sent
to </span><u><span lang="EN-US" style="color:rgb(17,85,204)">conference[a]<a href="http://sigdial.org">sigdial.org</a></span></u><span lang="EN-US"> by the special session proposal deadline. Special session proposals will be reviewed
jointly by the general and program co-chairs.</span> </p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">Papers</span></b> </p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">The program
committee welcomes the submission of long papers, short papers, and
demonstration descriptions. All accepted submissions will be published in the
conference proceedings.</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Long papers may,
at the discretion of the technical program committee, be accepted for oral or
poster presentation. They must be no longer than 8 pages, including title,
content, and examples. Two additional pages are allowed for references and
appendices, which may include extended example discourses or dialogs,
algorithms, graphical representations, etc.</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Short papers will
be presented as posters. They should be no longer than 4 pages, including title
and content. One additional page is allowed for references and appendices.</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Demonstration
papers should be no longer than 3 pages, including references. A separate
one-page document should be provided to the program co-chairs for demonstration
descriptions, specifying furniture and equipment needed for the demo.</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Authors of a
submission may designate their paper to be considered for a SIGDIAL special
session, which would highlight a particular area or topic. All papers will undergo regular peer review.</span> </p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Papers that have
been or will be submitted to other meetings or publications must provide this
information (see submission format). A paper accepted for presentation at
SIGDIAL 2014 must not have been presented at any other meeting with publicly
available proceedings. Any questions regarding submissions can be sent to the
program co-chairs at </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color:rgb(17,85,204)">program-chairs[at]<a href="http://sigdial.org">sigdial.org</a></span><span lang="EN-US">.</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Authors are
encouraged to submit additional supportive material such as video clips or
sound clips and examples of available resources for review purposes.</span></p>
<p class="">Submission is
electronic using paper submission software.</p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">FORMAT</span></b><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class="">All long, short,
and demonstration submissions should follow the two-column ACL 2014 format. We
strongly recommend the use of ACL LaTeX style files or Microsoft Word style files
tailored for the ACL 2014 conference. Submissions must conform to the official
ACL 2014 style guidelines (<a href="http://www.cs.jhu.edu/ACL2014/CallforPapers.htm">http://www.cs.jhu.edu/ACL2014/CallforPapers.htm</a>),
and they must be electronic in PDF. As in most previous years, submissions will
not be anonymous.</p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">MENTORING SERVICE</span></b></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">For several years,
the SIGDIAL conference has offered a mentoring service. Submissions with
innovative core ideas that may need language (English) or organizational
assistance will be flagged for "mentoring" and conditionally accepted
with recommendation to revise with a mentor. An experienced mentor who has
previously published in the SIGDIAL venue will then help the authors of these
flagged papers prepare their submissions for publication. Any questions about
the mentoring service can be addressed to the mentoring chair at </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color:rgb(17,85,204)">mentoring[at]<a href="http://sigdial.org">sigdial.org</a></span><span lang="EN-US">.</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">STUDENT SUPPORT</span></b></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">SIGdial also
offers a limited number of scholarships for students presenting a paper
accepted to the conference. Application materials will be posted at the
conference website.</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">BEST PAPER AWARDS</span></b></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">In order to
recognize significant advancements in dialog and discourse science and
technology, SIGDIAL will recognize two best paper awards. A selection committee
consisting of prominent researchers in the fields of interest will select the
recipients of the awards.</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">SPONSORSHIP</span></b></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">SIGDIAL offers a
number of opportunities for sponsors. For more information, email the
conference organizers at </span><span lang="EN-US" style="color:rgb(17,85,204)">sponsor-chair[at]<a href="http://sigdial.org">sigdial.org</a></span><span lang="EN-US">.</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">DIALOG AND DISCOURSE</span></b></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">SIGDIAL authors
are encouraged to submit their research to the journal Dialog and Discourse,
which is endorsed by SIGdial.</span></p>
<p class=""><b><span lang="EN-US">ORGANIZING COMMITTEE</span></b><span lang="EN-US"></span></p>
<p class="">General Co-Chairs</p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Kallirroi
Georgila, University of Southern California, USA</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Matthew Stone,
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, USA</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Technical Program
Co-Chairs</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Helen Hastie,
Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, UK</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Ani Nenkova,
University of Pennsylvania, USA</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Mentoring Chair</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Svetlana
Stoyanchev, AT&T Research Labs, USA</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Local Chair</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Keelan Evanini,
Educational Testing Service, USA</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Sponsorships Chair</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Giuseppe Di
Fabbrizio, Amazon.com, USA</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">SIGdial President</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Amanda Stent,
Yahoo! Labs, USA</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">SIGdial Vice
President</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Jason Williams,
Microsoft Research, USA</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US"> </span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">SIGdial
Secretary/Treasurer</span></p>
<p class=""><span lang="EN-US">Kristiina Jokinen,
University of Helsinki, Finland</span></p>
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