Advanced NLP Seminar (11-713)
Course Goals
Description
This course aims to
improve participants' knowledge of current techniques, challenges,
directions, and developments in all areas of NLP (i.e., across applications, symbolic
formalisms, and approaches to the use of data and knowledge); to hone students' critical
technical reading skills, oral presentation skills, and written communication skills;
to generate discussion among students across research groups to inspire new research.
Format
In a typical semester, a set of readings will be selected (with student input)
primarily from the past 2-3 years' conference proceedings (ACL and regional variants,
EMNLP, and COLING), journals (CL, JNLE), and relevant collections and advanced
texts. Earlier papers may be assigned as background reading. The format of each
meeting will include a forty-minute, informal, critical student presentation on the week's
readings, with presentations rotating among participants, followed by general
discussion.
Each presentation will receive a grade and instructor feedback. Apart from the
presentation and classroom participation, each student will individually write a 3-4-page
white paper outlining a research proposal for new work extending research discussed in
class - this is similar to the Advanced IR Seminar.
White paper assignment instructions