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a Satellite Event of:
the 2013 Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society
Berlin, Germany
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First Announcement
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Paper submission deadline: February 24, 2013

Workshop Aims
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Narratives are ubiquitous in human experience. We use them to communicate, 
convince, explain, and entertain. As far as we know, every society in the 
world has narratives, which suggests they are rooted in our psychology and 
serve an important cognitive function. It is becoming increasingly clear 
that, to truly understand and explain human intelligence, beliefs, and 
behaviors, we will have to understand why and to what extent narrative is 
universal and explain (or explain away) the function it serves. The aim of 
this workshop series is to address key questions that advance our 
understanding of narrative and our ability to model it computationally.

Special Focus: Cognitive Science
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This workshop will be an appropriate venue for papers addressing fundamental
topics and questions regarding narrative.  The workshop will be held as a
satellite event of the 2013 Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society
(to be held in Berlin 31st July - 3rd August), and so will have a special
focus on the cognitive science of narrative. Papers should be relevant to
issues fundamental to the computational modeling and scientific understanding
of narrative; we especially welcome papers relevant to the cognitive,
linguistic, or philosophical aspects of narrative. Cognitive psychological or
neuroscientific experimental work which may provide insights critical to
computational modeling is appropriate for this workshop, and is encouraged.
Discussing technological applications or motivations is not prohibited, but is
not required. We accept both finished research and more tentative exploratory
work.

Illustrative Topics and Questions
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* What cognitive competencies underlie narrative, and how may they be studied?
* Can narrative be subsumed by current models of higher-level cognition, or
   does it require new approaches?
* How do narratives mediate our cognitive experiences, or affect our cognitive
   abilities?
* How are narratives indexed and retrieved?  Is there a universal scheme for
   encoding episodic information?
* What comprises the set of possible narrative arcs?  Is there such a set? How
   many possible story lines are there?
* Is narrative structure universal, or are there systematic differences in
   narratives from different cultures?
* What makes narrative different from a list of events or facts? What is
   special that makes something a narrative?
* What are the details of the relationship between narrative and common sense?
* What shared resources are required for the computational study of narrative?
* What should a "Story Bank" contain?
* What shared resources are available, or how can already-extant resources be
   adapted to the study of narrative?
* What impact do the purpose, function, and genre of a narrative have on its
   form and content?
* What are appropriate formal or computational representations for narrative?
* How should we evaluate computational and formal models of narrative?

Organizing Committee
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* Mark A. Finlayson, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
* Benedikt Löwe, Universiteit van Amsterdam, The Netherlands, and Universität
   Hamburg, Germany
* Bernhard Fisseni, Universität Duisburg-Essen and Universität Hamburg, Germany
* Jan Christoph Meister, Universität Hamburg, Germany

Questions should be directed to:
narrative-ws13@csail.mit.edu