Computational Linguistics (CLASIC) Master's Degree
More language has been recorded in the last twenty years than in the entirety of human history. Using computer science algorithms, computational linguists can automatically process vast amounts of written and spoken communication in mere moments. This is the mechanism that turns the chaos of billions of individual voices into the symphony that is our civilization. Computational Linguistics is an attempt to manufacture the keys to a library containing the sum total of human knowledge and experience. Many of the answers to our questions already exist; we need artificial intelligence to help us find them.
The Departments of Linguistics and Computer Science have teamed up to offer the first truly interdisciplinary professional master's in computational linguistics. The CLASIC (Computational Linguistics, Analytics, Search and Informatics) professional master鈥檚 degree is geared towards helping students find employment directly after graduation in Natural Language Processing, a growing and lucrative field.
CU is unique in its emphasis on having computational linguists undertake study in Computer Science and Linguistics in equal amounts. Computer science algorithms are needed to model language as a process, but optimal performance can only be achieved through understanding the nuances of language.
Companies
The interdisciplinary nature of CLASIC is a significant market strength because success in this developing field of Natural Language Processing requires a strong background in both Linguistics and Computer Science. Students receive training that will prepare them for careers in predictive text messaging, search engines, question-answering, interactive virtual agents, and machine translation, among others. Many of these jobs are at the following types of companies.
Amazon
Sensory
Roku
Allen Institute
CLEAR (The Center for Computational Language and Education Research)
Much of a CLASIC student's work outside of the classroom will be conducted within CLEAR, a center dedicated to advancing Natural Language Processing, and which houses many government funded research projects. The facilities include labs, meeting rooms, graduate student offices, and computing resources.
The NLP Process
Training computers to accurately deal with languages is a complex process that intricately weaves together linguistic insights and computational models that reference real world contexts. The process can begin with linguistic analysis, computational models, or a combination of the two. After it鈥檚 begun, however, it usually cycles in the following manner.