Language Varieties of Italy: Technology Challenges & Opportunities 
Posted inItalian NLP Research Technology

Language Varieties of Italy: Technology Challenges & Opportunities 

Researcher: Alan Ramponi | Italy is characterized by a one-of-a-kind linguistic diversity landscape in Europe, which implicitly encodes local knowledge, cultural traditions, artistic expressions, and history of its speakers. However, most local languages and dialects in Italy are at risk of disappearing within a few generations. The NLP community has recently begun to engage with endangered languages, including those of Italy.
How to do things with nonwords: pragmatics, biosemantics, and origins of language in animal communication
Posted inAnimals Pragmatics Research

How to do things with nonwords: pragmatics, biosemantics, and origins of language in animal communication

Recent discussions of animal communication and the evolution of language have advocated adopting a ‘pragmatics-first’ approach, according to which “a more productive framework” for primate communication research should be “pragmatics, the field of linguistics that examines the role of context in shaping the meaning of linguistic utterances” (Wheeler and Fischer, Evol Anthropol 21:195–205, 2012: 203). After distinguishing two different conceptions of pragmatics that advocates of the pragmatics-first approach have implicitly relied on (one Carnapian, the other Gricean), I argue that neither conception adequately serves the purposes of pragmatics-first approaches to the origins of human linguistic communication.
Animal linguistics: a primer
Posted inAnimals Research

Animal linguistics: a primer

The evolution of language has been investigated by several research communities, including biologists and linguists, striving to highlight similar linguistic capacities across species. To date, however, no consensus exists on the linguistic capacities of non-human species. Major controversies remain on the use of linguistic terminology, analysis methods and behavioural data collection.
Dissociating language and thought in large language models
Posted inCognition Research Technology

Dissociating language and thought in large language models

Large language models (LLMs) have come closest among all models to date to mastering human language, yet opinions about their linguistic and cognitive capabilities remain split. Here, we evaluate LLMs using a distinction between formal linguistic competence (knowledge of linguistic rules and patterns) and functional linguistic competence (understanding and using language in the world).
The social structure of signing communities and lexical variation: A cross-linguistic comparison of three unrelated sign languages
Posted inResearch Sign

The social structure of signing communities and lexical variation: A cross-linguistic comparison of three unrelated sign languages

Claims have been made about the relationship between the degree of lexical variation and the social structure of a sign language community (e.g., population size), but to date there exist no large-scale cross-linguistic comparisons to address these claims. In this study, we present a cross-linguistic analysis of lexical variation in three signing communities: Kata Kolok, Israeli Sign Language (ISL) and British Sign Language (BSL).
Empowering Literacy: AI-Enabled Decodable Story Generator Supported by IMSE Revolutionizes Learning
Posted inCognition English Language learning Literature News Technology

Empowering Literacy: AI-Enabled Decodable Story Generator Supported by IMSE Revolutionizes Learning

SOUTHFIELD, Mich., May 14, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- IMSE, the leading provider of structured literacy professional development, today announced a partnership with Project Read AI to provide educators with a tool to fight the literacy crisis - a Decodable Story Generator that uses artificial intelligence to create decodable stories that are aligned to IMSE's evidence-based literacy scope and sequence.
Contextual and combinatorial structure in sperm whale vocalisations
Posted inAnimals Research

Contextual and combinatorial structure in sperm whale vocalisations

Sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus) are highly social mammals that communicate using sequences of clicks called codas. While a subset of codas have been shown to encode information about caller identity, almost everything else about the sperm whale communication system, including its structure and information-carrying capacity, remains unknown. We show that codas exhibit contextual and combinatorial structure.
Lingualyzer: A computational linguistic tool for multilingual and multidimensional text analysis
Posted inForensic linguistics Stylistics Technology

Lingualyzer: A computational linguistic tool for multilingual and multidimensional text analysis

Most natural language models and tools are restricted to one language, typically English. For researchers in the behavioral sciences investigating languages other than English, and for those researchers who would like to make cross-linguistic comparisons, hardly any computational linguistic tools exist, particularly none for those researchers who lack deep computational linguistic knowledge or programming skills. Yet, for interdisciplinary researchers in a variety of fields, ranging from psycholinguistics, social psychology, cognitive psychology, education, to literary studies, there certainly is a need for such a cross-linguistic tool.