StarSem Conference on Computational Semantics (*SEM)
Conference positioning
StarSem Conference on Computational Semantics (*SEM) is a top computer-science conference venue for semantics, meaning representation, semantic parsing, inference, and evaluation of meaning. It rewards a semantics paper where meaning representation and linguistic validity are core evidence. Treat this skill as a fit / venue-selection / re-framing tool for conference submission strategy, not as a substitute for the current year's CFP, author kit, ethics policy, or submission portal.
Because CS conferences change deadlines, templates, page limits, review workflow, artifact rules, AI-use policy, and rebuttal formats every cycle, always verify the live official instructions before making a submission-ready recommendation. Start from the official source anchor recorded for this venue in ../../resources/conference-roster.md and ../../resources/official-source-map.md.
When to trigger
The author names *SEM / StarSem Conference on Computational Semantics as the target venue.
A manuscript in semantics needs a conference-fit read before being formatted or submitted.
The paper must be re-framed from journal style or arXiv style into a selective CS conference narrative.
The author needs an evidence-gap, anonymity, artifact, rebuttal, or re-routing diagnosis for this venue.
Scope & topic fit
Core fit: semantics, meaning representation, semantic parsing, inference, and evaluation of meaning.
Best submissions make a precise contribution type visible: algorithm, theorem, system, dataset, benchmark, empirical finding, design artifact, tool, or socio-technical analysis.
The paper should explain why the result matters to *SEM's reviewers, not just why it is interesting to the authors' lab or product context.
Position related work against the most recent conference-cycle papers in this venue and its closest siblings; stale comparisons are a common early-review weakness.
If the contribution is interdisciplinary, state which part is CS research and which part is domain evidence.
Venue-specific calibration
Reviewer lens: Treat *SEM as a computational semantics venue whose reviewers expect the scope and evidence to match its own community. Do not submit a generic CS paper until the introduction names the exact subcommunity, contribution type, and proof or empirical standard.
Contribution hook to foreground: the venue-specific contribution bar.
Scope vocabulary to use naturally in the abstract and introduction: semantics, meaning representation, semantic parsing, inference, and evaluation of meaning.
Official anchor domain: starsem.org. Quote annual rules only after opening that source and the current-year CFP/author kit.
Close-neighbor routing guardrail
Use this profile only when the manuscript's central contribution is genuinely in computational
semantics and the author can say why *SEM reviewers are the primary audience, not merely a
convenient deadline.
Closest roster neighbors to compare before final routing: sigdial-conference-on-discourse- and-dialogue (SIGDIAL), joint-international-conference-on-computational-linguistics- language-resources-and-evaluation (LREC-COLING), interspeech (INTERSPEECH), ieee- automatic-speech-recognition-and-understanding-workshop (ASRU). Break ties by contribution
type, evidence shape, reviewer community, and the current official CFP from starsem.org.
What distinguishes this venue from its closest siblings
*What SEM is. The Joint Conference on Lexical and Computational Semantics (ACL SIGLEX + SIGSEM) — meaning representation, word-sense and semantic-role work, semantic parsing, and entailment.
vs INLG. INLG (SIGGEN) is generation; route semantics/meaning-analysis contributions here and text-production work there.
vs ACL/EMNLP. The flagship ACL-family venues also take semantics; choose *SEM when the lexical/computational-semantics community is the primary audience.
*SEM-specific routing detail
Prefer *SEM when the contribution is meaning representation, lexical semantics, semantic parsing, inference, entailment, semantic role labeling, or evaluation of meaning.
Route text production, controllable generation, and NLG evaluation to INLG; route broad NLP models to ACL/EMNLP/NAACL when semantics is only one benchmark slice.
*SEM evidence should foreground linguistic validity, annotation design, meaning-theoretic assumptions, error categories, and cross-dataset or cross-linguistic semantics when claimed.
Method & evidence bar
Use task-appropriate baselines, multiple datasets or languages when the claim is broad, and error analysis that explains model behavior.
For LLM work, control for data leakage, prompt sensitivity, evaluation contamination, and human-evaluation reliability.
For resources, document annotation, licensing, demographics, quality control, and intended use.
For *SEM, the evidence must support the venue-specific signature: a semantics paper where meaning representation and linguistic validity are core evidence.
Include limitations, negative results, compute/resource reporting, data provenance, and ethics details when they affect the claim.
Structure & house style
State the language phenomenon, task, or system behavior before the model name.
Connect examples to measured errors; reviewers dislike anecdotal examples presented as evidence.
Use the current official template exactly; do not guess page limits, font sizes, supplement rules, anonymity exceptions, or camera-ready requirements from old cycles.
The introduction should answer: problem, why now, what is new, why this venue, and what evidence proves the claim.
Put the strongest result in the main paper, not only in the appendix or supplement; reviewers should not have to reconstruct the contribution.
Re-check the current cycle's CFP, author kit, submission system, abstract/paper deadlines, page limits, supplementary-material rules, anonymity policy, dual-submission policy, ethics policy, AI-use policy, artifact/code/data expectations, rebuttal/author-response format, and camera-ready requirements.
Confirm the review workflow and portal: ARR/START/ACL Rolling Review or the current ACL-family submission portal, plus ACLPUB formatting when applicable.
Check whether accepted papers require in-person presentation, separate registration, artifact badges, proceedings copyright, or post-acceptance release forms.
If the live official instructions conflict with this skill, the official instructions win.
Pre-submission self-check
One sentence states why this manuscript belongs at *SEM, using the venue's scope rather than generic "top conference" language.
The claim is calibrated to the evidence: no broader than the datasets, proofs, systems, user studies, deployments, or threat model support.
Related work includes the nearest current-cycle computational semantics papers and explains the technical delta.
The paper satisfies the current official template, anonymity, ethics, artifact, and rebuttal requirements.
The main paper is self-contained enough for reviewers to evaluate novelty and correctness without hunting through external links.
Common desk-reject triggers
Evaluation that is only a prompt table or cherry-picked generation examples.
Missing dataset documentation, licensing, or annotation reliability.
Claims of general language understanding from narrow English-only benchmarks.
Formatting, anonymity, dual-submission, external-link, or supplement violations under the current-year policy.
A contribution framed for a neighboring field while giving *SEM reviewers too little technical or empirical substance.
Re-routing decision
If the paper misses *SEM's bar, compare against annual-meeting-of-the-association-for-computational-linguistics / conference-on-empirical-methods-in-natural-language-processing / north-american-chapter-of-the-association-for-computational-linguistics / european-chapter-of-the-association-for-computational-linguistics. Re-route based on contribution type, not prestige: theory to a theory venue, systems to a systems venue, application-heavy work to a domain venue, and early ideas to workshops or shorter tracks when the official CFP supports them.
Output format
[Fit] High / Medium / Low (one-line reason)
[Target] StarSem Conference on Computational Semantics (*SEM)
[Contribution type] algorithm / theory / system / dataset / benchmark / empirical / design / security / other
[Main evidence gap] <single most important missing proof, experiment, study, artifact, or policy check>
[Official items to re-check] CFP / author kit / deadline / format / anonymity / ethics / AI-use / artifact / rebuttal / camera-ready
[Top rejection risk] <venue-specific risk>
[Re-route suggestion] <better-matched conference or journal if not a fit>
