German Linguistics - Pragmatics

• Fuchs, Julia. 2020. Erwerb von informationsstrukturellen Fähigkeiten. Produktion und Rezeption von (in)definiten Artikeln bei deutschsprachigen Kindern (Empirie und Theorie der Sprachwissenschaft 5). Heidelberg: Winter.

• Fuchs, Julia. 2023. Ironic, isn't it!? A review on irony comprehension in children and adolescents with ASD. Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders 108. 102248.
• Fuchs, Julia. Accepted. 40 years of research into children’s irony comprehension: A review. Pragmatics & Cognition 30(1).
• Canut, Emmanuelle, Julia Fuchs, Juliette Delahaie, Magali Husianycia & Oliver Torres. Accepted. ‘Easy Language’ for migrants in France: looking for linguistic criteria. International Journal of Applied Linguistics.
• Borghardt, Liv, Silvana Deilen, Julia Fuchs, Anne-Kathrin Gros, Silvia Hansen-Schirra, Arne Nagels, Laura Schiffl & Johanna Sommer. 2021. Neuroscientific Research on the Processing of Easy Language. Frontiers in Communication 6:698044.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2021. Corona-Komposita und ‚Corona‘-Konzepte in der Medienberichterstattung in Standardsprache und in Leichter Sprache. Zeitschrift für Germanistische Linguistik 49(2). 335–368.
• Fuchs, Julia, Ulrike Domahs & Christina Kauschke. 2021. Information structure in language acquisition. Production and comprehension of (in)definite articles by German-speaking children. Journal of Child Language 48(1). 55–87.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2019. Leichte Sprache auf dem Prüfstand. Realisierungsvarianten von kausalen Relationen in Leichte-Sprache-Texten. Sprachwissenschaft 44(4). 441–480.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2018a. Zwei konkurrierende Ansätze zur optischen Gliederung komplexer Wörter in Leichter Sprache. Bindestrich und Mediopunkt in Theorie und Praxis. Sprachwissenschaft 43(4). 405–424.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2018b. Was versteht man in der Informationsstrukturtheorie unter Fokus? Sprachwissenschaft 43(1). 31–70.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2017. Leichte Sprache und ihr Regelwerk – betrachtet aus der Perspektive der Informationsstruktur. Sprachwissenschaft 42(1). 97–119.
• Fuchs, Julia & Kristina Krieger-Laude. 2017. Leichte Sprache als Lerngegenstand im Deutschunterricht. Theoretische Hintergründe und Ansätze für die Unterrichtspraxis. Der Deutschunterricht 5. 89–95.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2016. Rettungsschirm, Rettungstopf, Rettungspaket. Kontrastive Untersuchungen zur Metaphorik der Eurokrise in der deutschen, französischen und spanischen Presseberichterstattung. Zeitschrift für Angewandte Linguistik 64(1). 97–125.
• Heim, Nils, Anton Faron, Julia Fuchs, Markus Martini, Rudolf H. Reich & Karin Löffler. 2016. Die Lesbarkeit von onlinebasierten Patienteninformationen in der Augenheilkunde. Der Ophthalmologe 114(5). 450–456.

• Fuchs, Julia. 2022. Overcoming language barriers on the way to knowledge. Linguistic reflections on German Easy Language as a tool for barrier-free information and participation. In Moa Hagafors, Lydia Heiden & Louise Tarrade (eds.), ICODOC 2021 : Le savoir au prisme du langage. Acquisition, transmission, manifestations. ENS de Lyon, Lyon, 6-8 octobre, 2021. SHS Web of Conferences.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2021. The German Vorfeld (prefield) in texts in German Easy Language: Syntactic and information-structural considerations. In Susanne J. Jekat, Steffen Puhl, Luisa Carrer & Alexa Lintner (eds.): Proceedings of the 3rd Swiss Conference on Barrier-free Communication (BfC 2020). Winterthur (online), June 29–July 4, 2020, 115–124. Winterthur: ZHAW Zurich University of Applied Sciences.
• Hansen-Schirra, Silvia, Walter Bisang, Arne Nagels, Silke Gutermuth, Julia Fuchs, Liv Borghardt, Silvana Deilen, Anne-Kathrin Gros, Laura Schiffl & Johanna Sommer. 2020. Intralingual translation into Easy Language – or how to reduce cognitive processing costs. In Silvia Hansen-Schirra & Christiane Maaß (eds.), Easy Language research: Text and user perspectives (Easy – Plain – Accessible 2), 197–225. Berlin: Frank & Timme.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2015. Zum Zusammenhang von Theory of Mind und informationsstrukturellen Fähigkeiten bei Menschen mit Autismus-Spektrum-Störung: Kritischer Überblick, Stand der Forschung und Desiderate. In: Sévérine Adam, Daniel Jacob & Michael Schecker (eds.), Informationsstrukturen in Kontrast. Strukturen, Kompositionen und Strategien (Cognitio 18), 227–270. Frankfurt am Main u.a.: Peter Lang.

• Fuchs, Julia. Submitted. Regine Eckardt: Sprache und Kontext. Eine Einführung in die Pragmatik. Berlin & Boston: de Gruyter 2021. Germanistik. Internationales Referatenorgan mit bibliographischen Hinweisen.
• Fuchs, Julia. Submitted. Bock, Bettina M. & Sandra Pappert. Leichte Sprache, Einfache Sprache, verständliche Sprache. Mit Beiträgen von Pirkko Friederike Dresing, Mathilde Hennig und Cordula Meißner. Tübingen: Narr 2023. Zeitschrift für Angewandte Linguistik.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2021. Detmer Wulf: Pragmatische Bedingungen der Topikalität. Zur Identifizierbarkeit von Satztopiks im Deutschen (Studien zur Pragmatik 1). Tübingen: Narr Francke Attempto 2019. Zeitschrift für Angewandte Linguistik 75(1). 431–435.
• Fuchs, Julia. 2021. Jürgen Pafel: Referenz (Kurze Einführungen in die germanistische Linguistik 22). Heidelberg: Winter 2020. Zeitschrift für Sprachwissenschaft 40(1). 89–93.

• Fuchs, Julia. Ironieverstehen im Spracherwerb. Stand der Forschung und Projektskizze. (Irony comprehension in language acquisition. State of research and project outline) Sprachwissenschaftliche Vorträge am Institut für Germanistik in Leipzig (SPIGL), 31 January 2023.
• Fuchs, Julia. Verstehen Kinder mit Autismus-Spektrum-Störung Ironie? Stand der Forschung und Projektskizze. (Do children with autism spectrum disorder understand irony? State of research and project outline) Kolloquium am Leipziger Forschungszentrum für frühkindliche Entwicklung, 20 December 2022.
• Fuchs, Julia. Frühkindlichen Ironieerwerb erforschen: Eye-Tracking als methodischer Schlüssel? (Investigating the acquisition of irony in early childhood: Eye-tracking as a methodological key?) Linguistik an der Philologischen Fakultät, 12 December 2022.
• Fuchs, Julia. Verstehen Kinder Ironie? (Do children understand irony?) Dies Academicus Leipzig University, 2 December 2022.
• Fuchs, Julia. Realising causal relations in an addressee-oriented manner in German Easy Language. State of research and perspectives (Exprimer des relations causales de manière adaptée au destinataire en langage facile allemand. État de la recherche et perspectives). Journée d’étude « Simplifier les textes : quels critères linguistiques pour quel public ? », Université de Lille, 16 September 2022.

with Beat Siebenhaar

The lecture introduces the aims, questions and basic concepts of German linguistics. Using relevant examples, it gives an overview of the linguistic fields represented at the Institute – grammar of contemporary German, historical linguistics, communication and varieties of German – and lays the foundations for subsequent university studies.

The subject of this seminar is 'Easy Language' – a form of barrier-free communication that is intended to facilitate participation for certain target groups who cannot easily understand standard language texts. In the seminar, you will get to know the relevant rules of easy language and critically reflect on them against the background of current psycholinguistic findings.

In this practical course, you will apply the theoretical knowledge acquired in the seminar by translating a standard-language visitor brochure of the Egyptian Museum into Easy Language, which will then be made available to visitors of the museum. This involves an excursion to the Egyptian Museum.

The subject of the seminar are linguistic aspects of hate speech, which we will explore on the basis of relevant research literature and through analyses of authentic language material. As part of a cooperation with Mephisto 97.6, we also design and produce popular scientific podcast contributions on hate speech from a linguistic point of view (the willingness to do so is assumed).

You can listen to the podcast on Spotify.

Article on the podcast seminar in the Uni-Magazin

This teaching research project in the „Kollektion: Lehrpraxis”

On the basis of linguistic rules for Easy Language, we are translating a visitor brochure of the Botanical Garden of the University of Leipzig into Easy Language, which will be made available to visitors with special communication needs after the end of the semester. As part of this teaching project, an excursion to the Botanical Garden with a guided tour is also planned.

Article on the Practical course on  Easy Language in the Uni-Magazin

Download the Easy Language brochure

Linguistic pragmatics interacts in many ways with other levels of language and sometimes even with other scientific disciplines. The colloquium is dedicated to these pragmatic interfaces. The sessions are each divided into two parts: First, with the help of the basic knowledge acquired in the seminar, you present selected research literature on interfaces between pragmatics and the lexicon, syntax, semantics, language change, language acquisition and experimental linguistics in short presentations; then we will discuss the relevant literature.

Linguistic pragmatics interacts in many ways with other levels of language and sometimes even with other scientific disciplines. In this seminar, we systematically examine these interfaces of pragmatics. Based on teaching texts and exercises, we develop the basics of selected interfaces between pragmatics and the lexicon, syntax, semantics, language change, language acquisition and experimental linguistics.

Have you ever thought about when and how children acquire pragmatic skills? How does the acquisition of the ability to produce different speech acts or to understand ironic utterances develop? As part of this seminar, we deal with the acquisition of central pragmatic skills in childhood and adolescence, the respective cognitive and linguistic requirements as well as with relevant experimental methods that are used to investigate the acquisition of pragmatics.

Reading and understanding standard language texts plays a very important role in our everyday lives. However, not all people are able to do this. Some have an intellectual disability, others are poorly literalised. Easy Language was developed for people with such special communicative needs; it is a form of barrier-free communication that is systematically simplified on different linguistic levels (e.g. lexicon and syntax). As part of the seminar, we deal with Easy Language from a linguistic perspective, get to know several simplification strategies and critically reflect their scientific foundation and functionality; we also look at Easy Language in pedagogical contexts.

In 2023, Julia Fuchs received one of Leipzig University's two transfer prizes. The prizes are € 15,000 each.

As part of the project „From Science to Society: Student podcasts about linguistics” and the seminar „Destructive Linguistic Communication: Hate Speech” (Summer Term 2023), a popular science podcast on hate speech from a linguistic perspective has been created in cooperation with radio mephisto 97.6.

Article on the project in the Uni-Magazin

Podcast on Spotify

In the context of the call for proposals „Élysée-Vertrag – Zusammen den Blick in die Zukunft richten”, the Franco-German University (FGU) funded the project „Let's keep it simple! Participatory workshops on Easy Language in France (Lille) and Germany (Leipzig)”. Together with professors Emmanuelle Canut and Juliette Delahaie from the Université de Lille and Magali Husianycia from the Association AsFoRel in Nancy, Julia Fuchs organised participatory transfer workshops in Leipzig (9 October 2023) and in Lille (20 October 2023) for  professionals from the field.

At the conference on communication organised by the „Werkstätten für behinderte Menschen Sachsen” on 20.06.2023, Julia Fuchs gave a workshop on Easy Language for target groups of this form of barrier-free communication.

As part of the „Seniorenakademie”, Julia Fuchs will give a lecture on 14.12.2023 on the topic of „Easy Language – from the perspective of (psycho-)linguistics”.

Julia Fuchs also advises the University of Leipzig's Equal Opportunities, Diversity and Family Office on Easy Language.

As part of the Leipzig Children’s University, Julia Fuchs will give a lecture on 23 June 2023 on the topic „Irony. How can you say something and mean something completely different at the same time?”.

You can register here.