Project

Discipline

automatic langage processing; Croatian, Serbian; language corpora; distance learning; empirical methods

Lead
Die durch das SCOPES-Projekt ermöglichte institutionelle Partnerschaft zwischen der Schweiz (Partnerschafts-Koordinator), Serbien (Partner A) und Kroatien (Partner B) zielt auf die Gründung einer regionalen Initiative zur Verbesserung der Ressourcen- und Forschungsmethoden auf dem Gebiet der empirischen Sprachforschung. Es soll dabei die enge Verbundenheit Kroatiens und Serbiens genutzt werden. Im Mittelpunkt der Zusammenarbeit stehen die Bereiche (1) Sprachdaten und damit verbundene Werkzeuge und Ressourcen einerseits, und (2) Forschungsdesign und Methoden in der korpus-basierten Sprachforschung andererseits; statistische Methoden kommen in beiden Bereichen zur Anwendung. Die miteinander verknüpften Massnahmen der geplanten Aktivitäten umfassen zum einen (1) die Erstellung eines Datenaufbewahrungsortes (sog. „data repository“), und zum anderen (2) pädagogische Aktivitäten.
Lay summary
Die vorgeschlagene Partnerschaft ist für verschiedene Bereiche der Sprachforschung relevant. Diese reichen von der theoretischen Linguistik bis zur angewandten Linguistik (Spracherwerb, Übersetzung, Lexikologie), die „Digital Humanities“ im Allgemeinen und die maschinelle Verarbeitung natürlicher Sprache im Besonderen. Die Zusammenarbeit zwischen den Ländern Schweiz, Serbien und Kroation in diesem Projekt hat bedeutendes Potenzial mit Langzeitauswirkungen: Die zentrale Datenaufbewahrung wird es erlauben, dass die Projektpartner die weitere Entwicklung der Ressourcen aufrechterhalten und aufeinander abstimmen können. Werkzeuge und Anwendungen für Kroatisch und Serbisch werden entwickelt und bereitgestellt, wobei die Ähnlichkeit der beiden Sprachen ausgenutzt wird. Diese Entwicklung war bisher aufgrund der schwierigen politischen Beziehungen zwischen Serbien und Kroation erschwert. Darüber hinaus werden die pädagogischen Aktivitäten eine wichtige Lücke in der Schulung der Forscher schliessen, da sie ihnen nicht nur ermöglichen, neue Methoden und Ressourcen in ihren linguistischen Forschungen zu erproben und anzuwenden, sondern sie auch befähigen, andere Wissenschaftler und ihre Studierenden entsprechend auszubilden. Das Projekt wird dazu beitragen, dass sich im linguistischen Forschungskontext die Handhabung von Sprachdaten in dieser Region in Zukunft effektiver und ökonomischer gestaltet. Ausserdem wird erwartet, dass Möglichkeiten zum Networking zwischen Universitätsangehörigen und Industrie entstehen und dadurch auch gesellschaftliche Effekt in den Partnerländern bewirkt werden können.

Direct link to Lay Summary

Last update: 21.04.2015

Active participation

Active participation

An important global trend in the study of human language in the past decades has been a growing reliance on empirical data. This is due to the rapid development and wider accessibility of large collections of machine-readable text and tools needed for its processing, as well as to a rise in standards of experimental research on language, often criticised in the past for lack of solid experimental design. With the advent of larger amounts of data, statistics has also become integral for linguists, and mastering the methodology of language research has turned into an increasingly complex task. At the same time, more attention has started being paid to the issues of replicability and reproducibility of language research and exciting steps have been made towards establishing common standards for sharing data and resources, as evidenced by the rising number of initiatives focused on creating dedicated repositories.Due to the difficulties brought by the transition period following the breakup of former Yugoslavia, Serbia and Croatia lag behind most other European countries in the implementation of these trends. The countries’ isolation during the 1990s, insufficient institutional support and the continuing lack of funds needed for joining some of the wider European initiatives have largely left language researchers to their own devices, leading to a situation in which a number of individuals and groups do conduct internationally visible research, but no impetus is given to the wider linguistic community. The developed resources and experimental instruments are often unavailable to external users, and the training of language specialists remains largely traditional, preventing them from using even those resources and instruments that are available to them. In addition, the split of the once shared Serbo-Croatian into two distinct official languages has led to a separate development of resources, with very little transfer and with many missed joint effort opportunities.With the above in mind, the main objective of the proposed institutional partnership between Switzerland, Croatia and Serbia is to establish a regional initiative that will improve resources and research methodology in the domain of language studies based on empirical data, focusing on Croatian and Serbian and fully exploiting their close relatedness. The two core areas of interest are (1) language corpora and related tools and resources, and (2) experimental design in language research and related instruments; statistical analysis will be covered in both areas. Two (intertwined) strands of planned activity are (1) the creation of a resource repository, and (2) pedagogical activities. The resources will be integrated within a web platform comprising portions dedicated to corpus-based and experimental research, as well as an e-learning environment for web courses and tutorials dedicated to resource use. The pedagogical activities will also include traditional live seminars, serving as both training and networking events.The proposed partnership is relevant for different sub-fields of language study, ranging from theoretical linguistics to the applied areas of language acquisition, translation and lexicology, as well as for information retrieval and digital humanities. It has significant potential for long-term impact, as the resource repository will allow the project partners to sustain and synchronise the development of language resources and instruments for Croatian and Serbian, making future resource management more effective and more economical, while pedagogical activities will fill an important lacuna in the researchers’ training, enabling them not only to use new methods in their research, but also to train others. Lastly, networking opportunities involving both members of academia and industry are expected to bring about a wider societal effect.