PLIN065 Tools for theories

Faculty of Arts
Spring 2018
Extent and Intensity
0/2/0. 4 credit(s). Type of Completion: z (credit).
Teacher(s)
Mgr. Michal Starke, Docteur es Lettres (lecturer)
Guaranteed by
Mgr. Michal Starke, Docteur es Lettres
Department of Czech Language – Faculty of Arts
Contact Person: Jaroslava Vybíralová
Supplier department: Department of Czech Language – Faculty of Arts
Timetable
Wed 17:30–19:05 G13
Prerequisites
- English comprehension,
- basic linguistic theory (for instance CJBB177 Approaches to Morphosyntax) or willingness to learn it
- basic programming (for instance PLIN48 Základy programování pro humanitní obory) or willingness to learn it,
Course Enrolment Limitations
The course is also offered to the students of the fields other than those the course is directly associated with.
The capacity limit for the course is 20 student(s).
Current registration and enrolment status: enrolled: 0/20, only registered: 0/20, only registered with preference (fields directly associated with the programme): 0/20
fields of study / plans the course is directly associated with
Course objectives
In this seminar we will aim to create computational tools that can be used by theoretical linguists during their research. To make things as concrete as possible, our goal will be to start making tools that are useful to the theoretical morphosyntax research done right now in the department, trying to facilitate that research or speed it up.
Many such tools are needed, and it will take time to develop them. There is also almost no prior work on this in the field of "generative" linguistics. This is therefore a long-term project. This seminar will be the starting point to bring people together who are interested in contributing to the project and deciding on the first orientations to take. Everybody is welcome - if you lack either a linguistic background or a programming background, we will give you tutorials during the semester, and you will choose a subproject that is more appropriate to your interests and skills.
Learning outcomes
This seminar will help you with:
- the skills of real world programming for a concrete and useful project;
- the skills of transforming an abstract conceptual issue into practical steps, in new and unexplored domains;
- thinking about theoretical linguistics issues in terms that maximise the usefulness of automatic searching and automatic calculations (science often advances thanks to the availability of new tools, and that hasn't happened much in theoretical syntax/morphology yet, so this is an excellent opportunity)
Syllabus
  • data access: creating and easy searching of corpora, lexica, paradigms, optimised for the kind of questions theoretical linguists ask
  • theory modelisation: computing and visualising how syntactic structures are spelled out given a lexicon (phrasal spellout, elsewhere principle, etc), computing and visualising spellout-driven movement, computing and visualising the result of hypothesised locality constraints in syntax, etc.
  • presentation and collaboration tools: basic needs such as visualising a derivation step by step, easy sharing of trees in online meetings, etc are not met. There are currently no tools to do that easily.
Teaching methods (in Czech)
Each student will work on the subproject(s) that are most appropriate to their knowledge and interest and will lead discussions around it, and participating in the discussion of other projects.
Assessment methods (in Czech)
The assessment of participant will be based on the project submitted at the end of the semester, as well as on the participation in discussions and presentations during the seminar.
Language of instruction
English
Further Comments
The course is taught each semester.
The course is also listed under the following terms Autumn 2019, Autumn 2020, Autumn 2021, Spring 2023, Spring 2024, Spring 2025.
  • Enrolment Statistics (Spring 2018, recent)
  • Permalink: https://is.muni.cz/course/phil/spring2018/PLIN065