Honours Course 20: Literary and Linguistic Computing for English

1. Class Hours

Monday: 2 p.m,  STELLA Lab, 6 University Gdns:  Workshop

Tuesday: 2 p.m, Room 1, 12 University Gardens: Lecture/seminar

Thursday: 2 p.m., STELLA Lab, 6 University Gardens:  Workshop

2. Course Convener

The Course Convener is Mrs Jean Anderson, Room 201, 6 University Gardens, telephone 0141 330 4980, email  j.anderson@arts.gla.ac.uk

The Course Team:

• Mrs Jean Anderson, telephone 0141 330 4980, email: j.anderson@arts.gla.ac.uk
• Dr Wendy Anderson, telephone 0141 330 2382, email: w.anderson@englang.arts.gla.ac.uk
• Mr Dave Beavan, telephone 0141 330 2382, email: d.beavan@englang.arts.gla.ac.uk
• Dr Rachel Smith, telephone 0141 330 5533, email: r.smith@englang.arts.gla.ac.uk
• Dr Alison Wiggins, telephone 0141 330 3918 , email: a.wiggins@englang.arts.gla.ac.uk

Guest Lecturers

• Dr Maggie Scott, Scottish Language Dictionaries, email: maggie.scott at scotsdictionaries.org.uk
• Dr Emma Lister, Department of English Literature, email: e.lister@englit.arts.gla.ac.uk

3. Your programme

Topics studied will include: Web authoring, Corpus studies, Text Encoding, Copyright, Electronic Editions, Databases and dictionaries, Speech Analysis and Synthesis, Machine translation, Artificial intelligence.

Lectures will either introduce new materials or will examine the more theoretical aspects of materials introduced at a practical level in the workshops. They will also function as seminars, and you are invited to bring along for discussion any problems or queries from the workshops. Workshops will be used for demonstrations of programs useful for English studies generally and your project in particular. You are expected to attend these workshops.
Lecture outlines and worksheets will be posted on this Web page at Worksheets and Lecture Outlines above.

The STELLA lab is open on a drop-in basis on Wednesdays and at other times when classes are not in session (see timetable on the lab door for details). It is also possible to access STELLA programs from the other Arts Faculty labs and the Library.

Students with minimal typing skills are advised to go to the drop-ins and make use of the typing tutor.

4. Aims of the Course:

(a) to introduce students to a range of computing skills and packages; (b) to provide an understanding of the tools, techniques and methodologies of literary and linguistic computing; (c) to demonstrate the use of these in linguistic and literary studies; (d) to consider some of the theoretical issues involved in processing natural language; (e) to develop students’ capacity for independent and creative work.

Outcomes: By the end of the course, you should understand and be able to use packages in a range of areas such as lexicography, stylistics and linguistics. You should understand the uses and limitations of computers in both theoretical and practical terms, in areas such as Artificial Intelligence and Natural Language Processing, and develop your skills and knowledge in an independent project.

(You may hear about aspects of Artificial Intelligence in other papers you take, since it is a subject with many implications for linguistics. In Module 7b, Pragmatics and Spoken Discourse, for example, reference may be made to the program Eliza, which is treated more technically in Module 20.)

Your project has to be approved by one of your tutors before you start. It is due in Semester 2, but there are many advantages to completing it early.

5.  Written work:

It is important that you keep up with the workshops and written work, since each new skill depends on a mastery of the preceding ones. The class assignments are short and can be completed in your workshop hours. There are also two essays. Work should be handed in to the English Language Department Office, Room 2, 12 University Gdns, at the specified times.

Your final assessment will have three components:

• the mark for the better of the two essays (25%),
• the project (25%),
• a two-question examination at the end of Senior Honours (one question may be a prepared question) (50%),
• OR for Junior Honours students, an Extended Project (50%), with accompanying dissertation of about 6000 words, instead of the Examination.

Essay topics list: Given out in November 2007 and January 2008

For general regulations covering written work, see the handouts issued by the departments in the School of English and Scottish Language and Literature (SESLL) and the handbook on the SESLL web site.

6. Project

The project will be an analysis of encoded texts or a digital edition.

See the project instruction sheets: Text Analyis, Digital Edition and the project proposal form and a project cover sheet.

The draft proposal form is to be handed in and discussed with your tutor by Monday 10th December 2007, 3pm.
The final Project Proposal form is to be handed in by Tuesday 11th December 2007, 3pm.
The project deadline is Wednesday 5th March 2008, 3pm.

Project reports are normally c.2000 words long, double-spaced pages, including any illustrative material. There is usually a short introduction explaining why you undertook the project and what you hoped to find out. The next section is a report on what you actually did: how you collected information, what program(s) you used, what problems you encountered and what you found out. The third section should be a discussion in literary or linguistic terms rather than computing terms of what your data reveals.

All projects must be submitted in electronic (memory stick, floppy disk or CD, 1 copy) and printed (2 copies) forms. Things like tables and screen dumps, if appropriate, can be used as illustrations; if too long, they can be put in an appendix. There should be apropriate references and a bibliography using the normal academic conventions.

The report is really an essay, NOT a dissertation. The marks are awarded partly on how well you make use of the computing resources and partly on the skill with which you analyse and discuss the non-computing aspects of the project. In other words, you should show that you understand what a computer can do to help in some area of English, and also that you know something about English/Scottish Language and/or Literature or a cognate subject. There is no penalty on negative results; if you try something that doesn't work, then say so - negative results can be just as interesting as positive ones.

Please note that projects should be submitted anonymously (by student number). The electronic copy will not be returned, so you should make a copy for yourself. Essays should also be submitted anonymously and in duplicate, using the cover sheets available from the English Language Department. One copy will be returned to you.

The project is an integral part of the course; all students are expected to do it, and to hand it on time. Given the length of time you have to do the project, the only exceptions are (a) last minute crises; (b) circumstances such as prolonged illness, in which case alternative examination arrangements may be made. Otherwise, a mark of zero will be awarded.

Some points to remember when doing your projects:

• Always use short names for your files. Parts of the network here cannot deal with file names longer than 8 characters. No spaces, just the letters a-z and the numerals 0-9. If you want the examiners to be able to see all your files, be sure to follow this rule.
• Make sure ALL the files needed are on the disk you submit. Get a friend to check it - you can't be sure they are all there if you check it on your computer or while you are logged in to the GU network.
• For dissertations, essays and reports, use the SESLL rules for bibliographical references, footnotes, font size, spacing etc. See A Student's Guide to Writing for some notes on essay-writing.

10. Deadlines:

Staff Key:

JGA = Jean Anderson, WA = Wendy Anderson, DB = Dave Beavan, AW = Alison Wiggins, RS = Rachel Smith, MS = Maggie Scott, EM = Emma Lister