Human behaviour recognition in data-scarce domains

This paper presents the novel theory for performing multi-agent activity recognition without requiring large training corpora. The reduced need for data means that robust probabilistic recognition can be performed within domains where annotated datasets are traditionally unavailable. Complex human activities are composed from sequences of underlying primitive activities. We do not assume that the exact temporal ordering of primitives is necessary, so can represent complex activity using an unordered bag. Our three-tier architecture comprises low-level video tracking, event analysis and high-level inference. High-level inference is performed using a new, cascading extension of the Rao–Blackwellised Particle Filter. Simulated annealing is used to identify pairs of agents involved in multi-agent activity. We validate our framework using the benchmarked PETS 2006 video surveillance dataset and our own sequences, and achieve a mean recognition F-Score of 0.82. Our approach achieves a mean improvement of 17% over a Hidden Markov Model baseline.

Hemeroteca digital temática: socialização da informação em cinema

MEDEIROS, Rildeci; MELO, Erica S. F.; NASCIMENTO, M. S. Hemeroteca digital temática: socialização da informação em cinema.In:SEMINÁRIO NACIONAL DE BIBLIOTECAS UNIVERSITÁRIAS,15.,2008,São Paulo. Anais eletrônicos... São Paulo:CRUESP,2008. Disponível em: http://www.sbu.unicamp.br/snbu2008/anais/site/pdfs/3018.pdf

Attribution et variation du genre d’emprunts à l’anglais, à l’italien, au japonais et à l’arabe dans le lexique du français

Le genre des emprunts lexicaux référant à des entités non-sexuées en français est parfois considéré comme arbitraire, alors qu’il est parfois vu comme motivé par sa forme physique et/ou ses significations. Puisque les avis diffèrent à ce sujet, nous nous sommes intéressé à analyser de nombreux critères pouvant contribuer à l’attribution du genre d’un emprunt. Nous avons constitué quatre corpus, chacun composé de textes issus d’une communauté linguistique emprunteuse (Québec et Europe) et d’un niveau de formalité (formel ou informel). Nous avons observé que le genre des emprunts varie considérablement dans de nombreux cas. Nous constatons que les emprunts des langues à genre (italien, arabe) conservent généralement leur genre originel. Les critères sémantiques et de forme physique peuvent autant justifier le genre d’un emprunt l’un que l’autre. Le critère sémantique le plus opératoire intègre chaque emprunt dans un paradigme conceptuel regroupant plusieurs unités lexicales sous une même conceptualisation et, généralement, un genre commun au paradigme.

Learning to Interpret and Generate Instructional Recipes

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Washington, 2016-08

El valor mitográfico del "Anonymi in Statii Achilleida commentum"

El breve commentum in Statii Achilleida resulta muy interesante para el estudio de la transmisión mitográfica de la Antigüedad tardía al Medievo, pues no sólo participa de las características propias de la mitografía (narraciones de mitos, exégesis racionalista y/o alegórica, interpretaciones etimológicas, anonimato, pseudepigrafía,…), sino que también es otro eslabón en la cadena textual de transmisión, simplificación y canonización de los mitos clásicos.

Hemeroteca digital temática: socialização da informação em cinema

MEDEIROS, Rildeci; MELO, Erica S. F.; NASCIMENTO, M. S. Hemeroteca digital temática: socialização da informação em cinema.In:SEMINÁRIO NACIONAL DE BIBLIOTECAS UNIVERSITÁRIAS,15.,2008,São Paulo. Anais eletrônicos... São Paulo:CRUESP,2008. Disponível em: http://www.sbu.unicamp.br/snbu2008/anais/site/pdfs/3018.pdf

Linguística de Corpus no Ensino das Línguas

Este artigo constitui uma reflexão sobre as vantagens da utilização de corpora no processo de ensino/aprendizagem das línguas. O trabalho com corpora na sala de aula acarreta uma aproximação entre as práticas de investigação e as práticas de ensino-aprendizagem. O aluno adquire o papel de um investigador que pretende obter respostas a partir dos dados disponíveis no corpus. Deste modo, o aluno descobre a língua por meio das suas próprias observações, transformando-se em agente do seu processo de aprendizagem. Equacionada sob um certo ponto de vista de configuração tradicionalista, a utilização da informática na análise lexical afigura-se improfícua, no entanto, muitos estudiosos das Humanidades em geral, para além de revelarem a salutar consciência da indispensável adesão das Humanidades à informática, como forma de garantir a vitalidade das Humanidades, no que respeita à análise estatístico-lexical, preconizam que a utilização do computador constitui uma mais-valia. Ao longo deste artigo, procuraremos refletir sobre as seguintes questões: Quais são os benefícios das abordagens lexicais inspiradas na exploração de corpora ou em conceitos da Linguística de Corpus? Qual é o papel da informática na análise lexical? Que novas potencialidades apresentam as concordâncias na sala de aula?

POSTDATA – Towards publishing European poetry as linked open data

POSTDATA is a 5 year's European Research Council (ERC) Starting Grant Project that started in May 2016 and is hosted by the Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED), Madrid, Spain. The context of the project is the corpora of European Poetry (EP), with a special focus on poetic materials from different languages and literary traditions. POSTDATA aims to offer a standardized model in the philological field and a metadata application profile (MAP) for EP in order to build a common classification of all these poetic materials. The information of Spanish, Italian and French repertoires will be published in the Linked Open Data (LOD) ecosystem. Later we expect to extend the model to include additional corpora. There are a number of Web Based Information Systems in Europe with repertoires of poems available to human consumption but not in an appropriate condition to be accessible and reusable by the Semantic Web. These systems are not interoperable; they are in fact locked in their databases and proprietary software, not suitable to be linked in the Semantic Web. A way to make this data interoperable is to develop a MAP in order to be able to publish this data available in the LOD ecosystem, and also to publish new data that will be created and modeled based on this MAP. To create a common data model for EP is not simple since the existent data models are based on conceptualizations and terminology belonging to their own poetical traditions and each tradition has developed an idiosyncratic analytical terminology in a different and independent way for years. The result of this uncoordinated evolution is a set of varied terminologies to explain analogous metrical phenomena through the different poetic systems whose correspondences have been hardly studied – see examples in González-Blanco & Rodríguez (2014a and b). This work has to be done by domain experts before the modeling actually starts. On the other hand, the development of a MAP is a complex task though it is imperative to follow a method for this development. The last years Curado Malta & Baptista (2012, 2013a, 2013b) have been studying the development of MAP's in a Design Science Research (DSR) methodological process in order to define a method for the development of MAPs (see Curado Malta (2014)). The output of this DSR process was a first version of a method for the development of Metadata Application Profiles (Me4MAP) (paper to be published). The DSR process is now in the validation phase of the Relevance Cycle to validate Me4MAP. The development of this MAP for poetry will follow the guidelines of Me4MAP and this development will be used to do the validation of Me4MAP. The final goal of the POSTDATA project is: i) to be able to publish all the data locked in the WIS, in LOD, where any agent interested will be able to build applications over the data in order to serve final users; ii) to build a Web platform where: a) researchers, students and other final users interested in EP will be able to access poems (and their analyses) of all databases; b) researchers, students and other final users will be able to upload poems, the digitalized images of manuscripts, and fill in the information concerning the analysis of the poem, collaboratively contributing to a LOD dataset of poetry.

Suomen essiivi

Essiivi on suomen kielen sijamuoto, jota käytetään nykykielessä erilaisten olotilojen ilmaisemiseen (Hän on opettajana ~ sairaana). Se on taustaltaan lokatiivi, jonka paikanilmaisutehtävä näkyy edelleen erilaisissa kiteytymissä (kotona, luona). Essiivi kuuluu myös ajankohdanilmaisujärjestelmään (lauantaina, ensi vuotena). Tässä tutkimuksessa kuvaan essiivisijan käyttöä erityisesti olotilan ilmaisemisen näkökulmasta. Kiinnitän huomiota sijan merkitykseen ja pyrin tarkentamaan sen lauseopillista kuvausta hyödyntämällä yleislingvistis-kielitypologisia olotilanilmausten kategoriointitapoja. Tutkimukseni aineisto on kolmijakoinen. Pääaineistonani on Lauseopin arkisto, jota koskevan haun tuloksena olen saanut 9096 essiivisijaisen sanan sisältävää lauseketta virkekonteksteineen. Täydennän tätä aineistoa käytöstä poimituilla esimerkeillä ja intuitioon pohjautuvilla ns. selvillä tapauksilla. Tutkimusmenetelmänä on pääosin aineiston kvalitatiivinen tarkastelu, mutta tarkastelen essiiviä myös teoreettisemmin sääntöjärjestelmän näkökulmasta. Tärkeimpänä lähtökohtanani on tuottaa tutkimustietoa, joka kykenee käymään vuoropuhelua kielitypologisen tutkimuksen kanssa siten, että tutkimus kuitenkin tapahtuu yksittäiskielen ehdoilla. Erityisesti semantiikan kuvauksessa tarkastelutapani on kognitiivisen kielitieteen mukaisesti orientoitunut. Essiivin tehtävänä on pelkistetyssä nominaalilauseessa ilmaista olotilan tilapäisyyttä ja muutoksellisuutta, kun taas merkitystä kantavan verbin yhteydessä essiivisijainen olotilan ilmaus saa usein muita merkityksiä ja voi ilmaista myös vaihtoehtoisen tai tilanteen syynä olevan olotilan. Aspektinäkökulmasta essiivi tuo tilaan toimin¬nallisia piirteitä, ja se myös muodostaa selvästi omanlaisensa reviirin suhteessa muihin olotilaa ja sen lähimerkityksiä ilmaiseviin kieli- ja johto-opin kategorioihin. Syntaktisen luokittelun näkökulmasta essiivisijaiset predikoivat olotilanilmaukset jakautuvat kolmeen pääryhmään sen perusteella, millainen niiden suhde lauseen predikaattiin on. Ne voivat toimia kopulalauseen nominaalipredikaatteina, merkitystä kantavien verbien täydennyksinä ja sekundaarisina predikaatteina, jotka ovat määritteitä. Lisäksi essiivisijaiset olotilan ilmaukset voivat toimia predikoimattomina lauseadverbiaaleina. Tutkimus on essiivisijan laaja aineistopohjainen kuvaus, joka osoittaa, että yleislingvistis-kielitypologinen lähestymistapa sopii suomen essiivin kuvaukseen. Alakategorioinnissa joudutaan kuitenkin turvautumaan semantiikkaan. Myös pääkategorioiden jatkumomaisuus on hyväksyttävä. Tulosten perusteella on mahdollista käydä keskustelua siitä, olisiko predikoivien lauseenjäsenten syntaktista luokittelua mahdollista uudistaa. Lisäksi tutkimus avaa uusia kysymyksiä tutkittavaksi erityisesti sijojen käyttöä vertailevasta näkökulmasta.

Carbon reduction activism in the UK: lexical creativity and lexical framing in the context of climate change

This article examines discourses associated with a new environmental movement, “Carbon Rationing Action Groups” (CRAGs). This case study is intended to contribute to a wider investigation of the emergence of a new type of language used to debate climate change mitigation. Advice on how to reduce one's “carbon footprint,” for example, is provided almost daily. Much of this advice is framed by the use of metaphors and “carbon compounds”—lexical combinations of at least two roots—such as “carbon finance” or “low carbon diet.” The study uses a combination of tools from frame analysis and lexical pragmatics within the general framework of ecolinguistics to compare and contrast language use on the CRAGs' website with press coverage reporting on them. The analysis shows how the use of such lexical carbon compounds enables and facilitates different types of metaphorical frames such as dieting, finance and tax paying, war time rationing, and religious imperatives in the two corpora.

La lengua de las inscripciones métricas del Peloponeso (siglos VII- IV a.C.)

Many works deal with the study of Greek epigrams. These texts gather precious historical, religious and epigraphic content whose analysis has been addressed from a literary point of view. The degree of dependence of Hellenistic epigrams of earlier period epigrams are of great interest, as shown by recent and numerous papers on this matter (Harder et al . 1998; 2002; 2006; 2012; Bing and Bruss 2007; Baumbach et al. 2010). Another major line of research is focused on the origin of epigrams and their relation to elegy (Gentilli 1968; Passa 1998b) or to hexametric poetry and the oral-formulaic language inherited from Homeric tradition (di Tillio 1969; Moranti 1971, 1972; Gentili and Giannini 1977). Furthermore, other authors, such as Day (2010), have pointed out the significance of the performative and ritual nature of epigrams. Likewise, this field of study has undergone a renewal because of new papyrological findings enriching the existing epigram collection corpora. Compared to all these works, monographs and studies dedicated to the analysis of the language of the verse inscriptions are fewer. Many of them explore the linguistic differences between literary epigrams and those epigrams preserved by epigraphic means, as well as the degree of intervention of later tradition on such texts (Tiberi 1996, del Barrio Vega 2008; Kaczko 2009). The first exclusively linguistic reviews were published by the end of the 19th century (Wagner 1883; Fengler 1892), however, they are descriptive analyses lacking from an independent methodology. Kock(1910) was the first researcher who systematized and suggested a linguistic hypothesis and upheld the use of epichoric dialects by poets. His theory was supported by adepts such as Kretschmer (1913; 1915) although some discordant voices appeared soon, such as Buck (1923) who denied the existence of a linguistic standard and endorsed the importance of the Ionic model over the epichoric one. Traditionally, Greek language manuals point out the significance of the Ionic model and accept the adaptation of Homeric language to epichoric dialect. The study of verse inscription language was not systematically resumed until Mickey's publications (1981a; 1981b). According to this researcher, epigraphic poetry consists of a tempered version of the epichoric dialect where the dialect-characteristic features are avoided. Following the same line but with some differences, Alonso Déniz and Nieto Izquierdo (2009) conclude that the most distinctive features of Argolic are not avoided, at least at the metrical inscriptions from Argolid...

Lexicon-grammar of Russian verbal idioms

Dissertação de Mestrado, Ciências da Linguagem, Faculdade de Ciências Humanas e Sociais, Universidade do Algarve, 2016

Diálogos culturales entre ayer y hoy : Ecos lucrecianos en la ciencia actual

Teniendo en cuenta que el motivo convocante de estos "diálogos culturales" es la naturaleza, el texto lucreciano insta a interrogarnos sobre los principios y "la naturaleza de las cosas". A partir de la consideración de Duncan Kennedy (2007: 376-377) en cuanto a la significación de la obra de Lucrecio, "haciendo un texto del universo" (Making a Text of the Universe), resulta pertinente analizar las hipótesis que el epicúreo latino expone acerca de la Física atomista. La evocación de los axiomas nullam rem e nilo gigni divinitus umquam (I.150: "ninguna cosa se engendra jamás de la nada por obra divina") y quicque in sua corpora rursum / dissolvat natura neque ad nilum interemat res (I.215-216: "la naturaleza inversamente disuelve cada cosa en sus elementos y no reduce las cosas a la nada") constituye la idea transversal del sistema, que busca contemplar la Naturaleza y obtener un saber surgido de ese acto de pensamiento. Es por ello que, según D. Sedley (2004: 37), el meollo temático del texto reside en el estudio del aspecto y la racionalidad de lo natural, procedimientos especulativos que están comprendidos en el término epicúreo physiología. Este fue el comienzo de un derrotero que, para P. de la Llosa (2000: 10-11), significó "una intuición genial" de los atomistas griegos, completándose más tarde con un segundo impulso a partir de los fundamentos "físicos" de los epicúreos. Lucrecio, sin encajar en el establishment romano, sentó las bases de este labor científico atomista que, eclipsado por varias centurias, se reavivó en el s. XIV para continuar con altibajos hasta el presente. Desde la perspectiva de esta perduración, los objetivos de esta comunicación residen en comprobar la aproximación de los postulados lucrecianos y su veracidad en relación con algunas de las concepciones científicas-físico-químicas-actuales

Diálogos culturales entre ayer y hoy : Ecos lucrecianos en la ciencia actual

Teniendo en cuenta que el motivo convocante de estos "diálogos culturales" es la naturaleza, el texto lucreciano insta a interrogarnos sobre los principios y "la naturaleza de las cosas". A partir de la consideración de Duncan Kennedy (2007: 376-377) en cuanto a la significación de la obra de Lucrecio, "haciendo un texto del universo" (Making a Text of the Universe), resulta pertinente analizar las hipótesis que el epicúreo latino expone acerca de la Física atomista. La evocación de los axiomas nullam rem e nilo gigni divinitus umquam (I.150: "ninguna cosa se engendra jamás de la nada por obra divina") y quicque in sua corpora rursum / dissolvat natura neque ad nilum interemat res (I.215-216: "la naturaleza inversamente disuelve cada cosa en sus elementos y no reduce las cosas a la nada") constituye la idea transversal del sistema, que busca contemplar la Naturaleza y obtener un saber surgido de ese acto de pensamiento. Es por ello que, según D. Sedley (2004: 37), el meollo temático del texto reside en el estudio del aspecto y la racionalidad de lo natural, procedimientos especulativos que están comprendidos en el término epicúreo physiología. Este fue el comienzo de un derrotero que, para P. de la Llosa (2000: 10-11), significó "una intuición genial" de los atomistas griegos, completándose más tarde con un segundo impulso a partir de los fundamentos "físicos" de los epicúreos. Lucrecio, sin encajar en el establishment romano, sentó las bases de este labor científico atomista que, eclipsado por varias centurias, se reavivó en el s. XIV para continuar con altibajos hasta el presente. Desde la perspectiva de esta perduración, los objetivos de esta comunicación residen en comprobar la aproximación de los postulados lucrecianos y su veracidad en relación con algunas de las concepciones científicas-físico-químicas-actuales

Regional variation and change in the history of English strong verbs

This thesis investigates how the strong verb system inherited from Old English evolved in the regional dialects of Middle English (ca. 1100-1500). Old English texts preserve a relatively complex system of strong verbs, in which traditionally seven different ablaut classes are distinguished. This system becomes seriously disrupted from the Late Old English and Early Middle English periods onwards. As a result, many strong verbs die out, or have their ablaut patterns affected by sound change and morphological analogy, or transfer to the weak conjugation. In my thesis, I study the beginnings of two of these developments in two strong verb classes to find out what the evidence from Middle English regional dialects can tell us about their origins and diffusion. Chapter 2 concentrates on the strong-to-weak shift in Class III verbs, and investigates to what extent strong, mixed and weak past tense and participle forms vary in Middle English dialects, and whether the variation is more pronounced in the paradigms of specific verbs or sub-classes. Chapter 3 analyses the regional distribution of ablaut levelling in strong Class IV verbs throughout the Middle English period. The Class III and IV data for the Early Middle English period are drawn from A Linguistic Atlas of Early Middle English, and the data for the Late Middle English period from a sub-corpus of files from The Penn-Helsinki Parsed Corpus of Middle English and The Middle English Grammar Corpus. Furthermore, The English Dialect Dictionary and Grammar are consulted as an additional reference point to find out to what extent the Middle English developments are reflected in Late Modern English dialects. Finally, referring to modern insights into language variation and change and linguistic interference, Chapter 4 discusses to what extent intra- and extra-linguistc factors, such as token and type frequency, stem structure and language contact, might correlate with the strong-to-weak shift and ablaut levelling in Class III and IV verbs in the Middle English period. The thesis is accompanied by six appendices that contain further information about my distinction of Middle English dialect areas (Appendix A), historical Class III and IV verbs (B and C) and the text samples and linguistic data from the Middle English text corpora (D, E and F).