NACLO 2008 North American Computation Linguistics Olympiad Brandeis CL Olympiad Team James Pustejovsky Tai Sassen-Liang Sharone Horowit-Hendler Noam Sienna Batia Snir Boston Chapter

What is Computational Linguistics? Linguistics is the study of language itself – how languages are formed, how we learn and understand languages, how languages work, etc. Computational linguistics is the science of designing algorithms and programming computers to “understand” the rules of languages that we intuitively know. –Syntax –Semantics –Phonology –Morphology –Pragmatics

Language subtleties Adjective order and placement –A big black dog –A big black scary dog –A big scary dog –A scary big dog A black big dog Antonyms –Which sizes go together? Big and little Big and small Large and small Large and little

Headline Ambiguity Iraqi Head Seeks Arms Juvenile Court to Try Shooting Defendant Teacher Strikes Idle Kids Kids Make Nutritious Snacks British Left Waffles on Falkland Islands Red Tape Holds Up New Bridges Bush Wins on Budget, but More Lies Ahead Hospitals are Sued by 7 Foot Doctors Ban on nude dancing on Governor’s desk Local high school dropouts cut in half

Computational Linguistics in the World: Artificial Intelligence Internet Search Engines/Web Agents Machine Translation Speech Recognition Cryptography Education Technology

A sample problem… 1. Antukaq chakranpiqa t'ikashanmi papa. 2. Siskuq chakranpiqa wiñashanmi sara. 3. Siskuq chakranpiqa rurushansi kiwña. 4. Antukaq chakranpiqa t'ikashanchá kiwña. 5. Siskuq chakranpiqa wiñashansi sara. 6. Antukaq chakranpiqa wiñashanchá papa. How can we solve this? A. Potatoes may be growing in Antuka's field. B. Barley may be flowering in Antuka's field. C. Corn is growing in Sisku's field. D. I've heard corn is growing in Sisku's field. E. I've heard barley is yielding fruit in Sisku's field. F. Potatoes are flowering in Antuka's field.

Now you try! Imagine that you have heard these sentences: Jane is molistic and slatty Jennifer is cloovy and brastic Molly and Kyle are slatty but danty The teacher is danty and cloovy Mary is blitty but cloovy Jeremiah is not only sloshful but also weasy Even though frumsy, Jim is sloshful Strungy and struffy, Diane was a pleasure to watch Even though weasy, John is struffy Carla is blitty but struffy The salespeople were cloovy and not slatty Which of these phrases would you be likely to hear? Meredith is blitty and brastic The singer was not only molistic but also cloovy Mary found a dog that was danty but sloshful

How did you solve that? (Now imagine trying to get a computer to do the same thing!)

So…what is this Olympiad thing? The Olympiad will test your logical and analytical thinking skills to solve problems similar to the one you just saw You’ll be given a packet of problems to solve individually within a three-hour period Success at the two state-level competitions will give you the opportunity to participate in the International Linguistics Olympiad

Dates February 5, 2008: –Qualifying Brandeis March 11, 2008: –Final Brandeis June 2008: –CL Training Camp August 2008: –International Linguistics Olympiad in Bulgaria

Perks Prizes for 1 st, 2 nd, and 3 rd place in Boston A chance to travel world-wide Looks great on college resumes Get introduced to an ever-growing field No prior experience necessary – just a head for analytical thinking and a can-do attitude

Thanks! For more information: – –Phone: Registration: – Additional problems can be found at: –namclo.linguistlist.org –boston-olympiad.org