An information-theoretic approach to the written transmission of old English

Information theory offers a means for analyzing some constraints on the reading and copying process in Old English. Entropy for strings of various lengths offers a baseline measure of the uncertainty involved in transmission of Old English texts, while avoiding the pitfalls of applying models of modern reading to early medieval practice. Analysis of lengthy prose and verse texts in Old English revealed uniformly high values for entropy at all string lengths. High entropies may be the result of the language's irregular orthography, poetic koiné, and several dialects and imply that the language may have been easy to write but difficult to read. The low redundancy of the language which its high entropy values indicate suggests that the reader of Old English played an enhanced role in decoding a text and may provide an explanation for the high variability in the transmission of Old English verse.Katherine O'Brien O 'Keeffe is Professor of English at Texas A&M University and a co-director of its Interdisciplinary Group for Historical Literary Study.William Rundell is Professor of Mathematics at Texas A&M University.     

The computer in literary analysis: UsingTACT with students

TACT, a freeware program from the University of Toronto's Centre for Computing in the Humanities, is a highly sophisticated tool for text retrieval; although written for experienced critics and researchers, it can teach undergraduate students to read literature in new, fresh ways. Without requiring that the user become either a programmer, linguist, mathematician, or statistician,TACT introduces the literature student to the computer as a research tool. Studies of imagery and symbolism, of structural patterns, and of prosody can result from the student's careful tagging of a literary text and can yield significant insights into the work of literature. Students who use the computer as such a tool learn to read literary texts more closely and to think more clearly about literary problems.Mark Hawthorne, Professor of English at James Madison University, has published books on Maria Edgeworth and John and Michael Banim and articles inModern Fiction Studies, Studies in Romanticism, Victorian Poetry, and Modern Language Notes. His research interests include Anglo-Irish literature, computer applications, and postmodern literature.     

Current uses of hypertext in teaching literature

Literature instructors are using hypertext to enhance their teaching in a broad variety of ways that includes putting course materials on the WWW; creating online tutorials; using annotated hypertexts in addition to or in lieu of print texts; having students write hypertexts; examining the medium of hypertext as a literary and cultural theme; and studying hypertext fiction in the context of traditional literature classes. The article describes examples of each of these uses of hypertext in teaching literature and provides sources of further examples of and information on using hypertext as a teaching tool in literature classes.Seth R. Katz is Assistant Professor of English at Bradley University in Peoria, IL. His research interests include computer applications in teaching literature and writing, and the grammatical analysis of poetic language. His recent publications include Graduate Programs and Job Training in Profession 95.I presented a version of this article as part of a session on Hypertexts for Teaching Imaginative Literature at the MLA Convention in Chicago, December 29, 1995.     

Metacognitive learning techniques in the user interface: Advance organizers and captioning

The use of metacognitive strategies of learning and instruction such as content abstracts or previews, subtitles and captioning (on-screen foreign language subtitles) have been recurrent pedagogical tools for facilitating foreign language (L2) instruction. New technology has broadened their scope and multiplied the ways in which they can be used in L2 computer-based applications. A pilot test was carried out using a hypermedia instructional application for Spanish: Operación Futuro. The test addresses the question of how two types of metacognitive strategies, written and spoken Advance Organizers (AOs) and verbatim Captioning (CP) may facilitate L2 comprehension and recall.Ana Beatriz Chiquito is an associate professor in the Department of Spanish and Latin American Studies and is the director of Project ECUT at the Norwegian Computing Centre for the Humanities, University of Bergen. She is currently a visiting research engineer at the Center for Educational Computing Initiatives (CECI) of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where project ECUT is producing four hypermedia applications for college students and developing the Macintosh version of the AthenaMuse 2^® system which is being developed by The AthenaMuse Consortium at CECI. Her research addresses theoretical issues of hypermedia technology and Spanish linguistics.     

Analysis of the discourse structure of lyric poetry

Applying the method of discourse structure analysis described by Grosz and Sidner to lyric poetry, one views the poet as the Initiating Conversational Participant, and the reader as the Other Conversational Participant as she recreates the poem upon reading it. In poetry the linguistic and intentional structures function in counterpoint to the metrical and stanzaic structures, respectively, producing the effects that define poetry. Analysis of attentional state can reveal the dynamics of the focussing process in a poem, providing a unique perspective on its operation. More research is needed to extend the theory to adequately handle lyric poetry.Mary Dee Harris, Ph. D., is currently a consultant in Natural Language Processing and Artificial Intelligence in the Washington, DC, area. Her research interests are: interaction of metaphor and discourse structure, knowledge-based natural language processing, cognitive linguistic approaches to natural language processing. Her publications include: Introduction to Natural Language Processing (Prentice-Hall, 1985); Dylan Thomas the Craftsman: Computer Analysis of the Composition of a Poem,ALLC Bulletin, 7, 3 (1979), 295–300; Poetry vs the computer, in Festschrift in honor of Roberto Busa, S. J., edited by Antonio Zampolli and Laura Cignoni, University of Pisa, Fall, 1987.     

A computer study of systematic sound symbolism in classical Japanese verse

The analysis of sound symbolism in poetry is one of the more promising applications of computational methods. This paper proposes using database software with spreadsheet capabilities to give maximum versatility in the examination of consonant alliteration. In this case the database is drawn from a 10th century anthology of classical Japanese verse called theKokinshû. In recent years scholars have pointed out a few obvious examples of sound symbolism inKokinshû poetry. This study attempts to show that with these few notable exceptions, poetry of the period seems to have striven toward a balance in sound, avoiding techniques such as word initial alliteration which might call attention to itself.Jon W. LaCure is an Assistant Professor of Japanese in the Department of Romance and Asian languages and Literatures at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. His major research interest is in the rhetorical devices of classical Japanese verse. He is currently working on a book with the title:The Structure of Japanese Poetry: Implications of the Poetics of the Kokinshu.     

Computer-assisted techniques to enhance transformative learning in first-year literature courses

When students use computers as learning tools, the whole process of learning, and, indeed, the learners themselves, are transformed. This article illustrates some techniques that foster transformative learning in computer-assisted first-year literature classes: first, a lesson plan on A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning that uses Microsoft Word functions, including format painter, tables, and annotation to explore meaning in context; second, a plan for learners to use subconference options in the Daedalus Interactive Writing Environment to analyze Oedipus Rex; finally, a demonstration of how students engage in a meta-reflection process as they explore Barn Burning with Freelance Graphics.Marguerite Jamieson is an English instructor at Anne Arundel Community College in Arnold, Maryland, and a doctoral student at George Mason University. Her research interests include forming bridges between adult learning theory and contemporary literary theory — especially drawing on transformational learning theory and the work of Mikhail Bakhtin and Lev Vygotsky.Rebecca Kajs holds a doctorate in English from Texas Woman's University with a concentration in rhetoric. For ten years, she taught the use of heuristic tools for reading analysis at the University of Texas at Arlington. She is currently an associate professor of English and Philosophy at Anne Arundel Community College.Anne Agee holds a doctorate in rhetoric from The Catholic University of America. A professor of English and formerly director of the Humanities Computer Center at Anne Arundel Community College, she is currently the college's Coordinator of Instructional Technology. Dr. Agee and Professor Jamieson have collaborated in a study of the learning environment in a computer classroom, the results of which were published in the Fall 1995 issue of Teaching/Learning Conversations. Dr. Agee has also published Using [Daedalus] InterChange as a Teachers' Journal in the Fall 1995 issue of Wings.     

Computer-assisted instruction in engineering education and training

A computer-based economy implies a computer-based education. Learning and teaching are optimized by the student, as well as for the professor, if instructional redundancy is captured for reuse. One of the fundamental problems, to be confronted in the construction of complex learning programs, is that of providing ever higher-level authoring languages. This paper shows how instructional reuse, as mediated by a random seeded crystal learning algorithm, can facilitate the evolution of complex learning frames. A natural language interface enables the sharing of large software projects across a team. Here, a knoqledge-based system acquires a capability to map natural language phrases onto object invocations. The natural language phrases are iteratively normalized through a transformative process, which utilizes band theory. A human-machine system is described, which entails the construction of a self-referential program editor. The presented concepts and arguments are codified with examples taken from information systems and flexible manufacturing. Learning is shown to be a consequence of randomization and reuse.     

The surface of language and humanities computing

Recent articles have noted that humanities computing techniques and methodologies remain marginal to mainstream literary scholarship. Mark Olsen's paper discusses this phenomenon and argues for large scale analyses of text databases that would incorporate a shift in theoretical orientation to include greater stress on intertextuality and sign theory. Part of Olsen's argument revolves on the need to move away from the syntactic and overt grammatical elements of textual language to more subtle semantics and meaning systems. While provocative and important, Olsen's stance remains rooted in literary theoretical constructs. Another level of language, the cognitive, offers equally interesting challenges for humanities computing, though the paradigms for this type of computer-based exploration are derived from disciplines traditionally removed from the humanities. The riddle, a nearly universal genre, offers a window onto some of the cognitive processes involved in deep level language function. By analyzing the riddling process, different methods of computational modelling can be inferred, suggesting new avenues for computing in the humanities.Charles Henry has a Ph.D. in Comparative Literature and is presently the Director of Libraries at Vassar College. His research includes non-literal aspects of language, and the cognitive processes involved in understanding symbolic language. Recent articles include The Image of Word,in Humanities and the Computer: New Directions, ed. D. Miall (Oxford, 1990), and Non-Literal Aspects of Language and Knowledge Structuring, inCybernetics and Systems Research '92, ed. R. Trappl (World Scientific Press, 1992).     

MUMEDALA: An approach to multi-media authoring

Education and instruction are each critically dependent upon appropriate techniques for the dissemination and communication of knowledge, information and data. In order to achieve these objectives a variety of different communication channels (or media) are employed—either simultaneously or in sequence. An integrated multi-media instructional environment is one in which a number of teaching resources are used to implement an instructional process: sound, text, static/dynamic imagery, simulations and diversions. Such systems usually include a computer as a necessary control element. Because of their complexity, computer-based multi-media teaching systems often require the use of a special type of courseware development tool known as an author language.The MUMEDALA (MUlti-Media Authoring LAnguage) system is an authoring facility that is designed to enable the creation and control of a sophisticated interactive learning environment. Such an environment might contain a variety of channels that enable (1) the presentation of instructional material and (2) the capture of student response and monitoring data. The latter provides the means of achieving highly individualised instructional schema based upon the use of a range of teaching media. This paper presents an overview of the MUMEDALA system, its design features and the progress being made towards its realisation.     

Test Resource Partitioning Based on Efficient Response Compaction for Test Time and Tester Channels Reduction

This paper presents a test resource partitioning technique based on an efficient response compaction design called quotient compactor(q-Compactor). Because q-Compactor is a single-output compactor, high compaction ratios can be obtained even for chips with a small number of outputs. Some theorems for the design of q-Compactor are presented to achieve full diagnostic ability, minimize error cancellation and handle unknown bits in the outputs of the circuit under test (CUT). The q-Compactor can also be moved to the load-board, so as to compact the output response of the CUT even during functional testing. Therefore, the number of tester channels required to test the chip is significantly reduced. The experimental results on the ISCAS ‘89 benchmark circuits and an MPEG 2 decoder SoC show that the proposed compactionscheme is very efficient.     

The evolution of the SR language

As a result of our experience, the SR distributed programming language has evolved. One change is that resources and processes are now dynamic rather than static. Another change is that operations and processes are now integrated in a novel way: all the mechanisms for process interaction — remote and local procedure call, rendezvous, dynamic process creation, and asynchronous message passing — are expressed in similar ways. This paper explains the rationale for these and other changes. We examine the fundamental issues faced by the designers of any distributed programming language and consider the ways in which these issues could be addressed. Special attention is given to the design objectives of expressiveness, simplicity, and efficiency. Gregory R. Andrews was born in Olympia, WA, in 1947. He received the B.S. degree in mathematics from Stanford University in 1969 and the Ph.D. degree in computer science from the University of Washington in 1974. From 1974–1979 he was an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Cornell University. Since 1979 he has been an Associate Professor of Computer Science at the University of Arizona. During 1983–1984, he was a Visiting Associate Professor of Computer Science at the University of Washington. He has also consulted for the U.S. Army Electronics Command and Cray Laboratories. His research interests include concurrent programming languages and distributed operating systems; he is currently co-authoring (with Fred Schneider) a textbook on concurrent programming. Dr. Andrews is a member of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM). From 1980–1983 he was Secretary-Treasurer of the ACM Special Interest Group on Operating Systems. He has also been on the Board of Editors of Information Processing Letters since 1979. Ronald A. Olsson was born in Huntington, NY, in 1955. He received B.A. degrees in mathematics and computer science and the M.A. degree in mathematics from the State University of New York, College at Potsdam, in 1977. In 1979, he received the M.S. degree in computer science from Cornell University. He was a Lecturer of Computer Science at the State University of New York, College at Brockport, from 1979 to 1981. Since 1981 he has been a graduate student in computer science at the University of Arizona and will complete his Ph.D. in June 1986. His research interests include programming languages, operating systems, distributed systems, and systems software. Mr. Olsson is a student member of the Association for Computing Machinery.This work is supported by NSF under Grant DCR-8402090, and by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research under Grant AFOSR-84-0072. The U.S. Government is authorized to reproduce and distribute reprints for Governmental purposes not-withstanding any copyright notices thereon     

Beyond argumentation and comparison/contrast: Extending the Socrates CAI design principles to classroom teaching and the interpretation and production of other forms of discourse

This study compares pencil-and-paper and computer-assisted versions of a college process/model program in critical thinking and academic writing to a traditional composition program. Students in the experimental sections used more linguistic markers of argument and comparison/contrast, attempted more arguments and made stronger arguments. CAI students also did better than students in the pencil-and-paper sections on some measures. Applications of computer assisted techniques in studying meaning in poetry, teaching technical writing and in teaching practice, suggest new approaches to collaborative thinking and writing. Thomas Bacig is a Professor of Humanities at the University of Minnesota, Duluth with research i interests in: computer assisted instruction in writing, reading and thinking; science fiction; and forest history. His most recent publication is: How Computer-Assisted Instruction Informs the Design of Conventional Classroom Activities in English Composition (with D. Larmouth), Proceedings of the 19th Annual Small College Computing Symposium, 1987. Robert Evans is Associate Professor of Philosophy at the University of Minnesota, Duluth with research interests in logic, American philosophy and philosophy of law. His most recent publication is a review of Volume 11, John Dewey, The Later Works containing Dewey's major political work, Liberalism and Social Action, in Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society, 15, winter 1989.Donald Larmouth is Professor of Linguistics and Dean of Arts, Sciences and Graduate programs at the University of Wisconsin, Green Bay. He has research interests in dialect geography, computers in composition and language policy. His most recent publication is Does Linguistic Heterogenity Erode National Unity? in Thomas Tonneson's Ethnicity and Language, Institute on Race and Ethnicity of the University of Wisconsin System, 1988.Kenneth Risdon is Assistant Professor of Composition at the University of Minnesota, Duluth with research interests in writing with computers, use of computer networks, and computer analysis of text.     

Language authoring with “comet”

Conclusion From the language teacher's point of view, authoring languages and systems have always had two major drawbacks: flexibility and simplicity of use seemed to exclude each other, and features specific to language instruction were not included in the design. COMET's template collection with its variants for individual languages attempts to deal with these problems. The present package of highutility programs has proven its worth in a university context by making it possible to create-full-year language courses at relatively modest cost. Since a lesson of five exercises, containing from 10 to 20 questions each, can be input by a careful typist in one working day, the term development has once again become synonymous with the creative process of designing pedagogic material.Future work will concentrate on incorporating user suggestions for improvement and creating new, specialized patterns to enhance the methodological versatility of the system.Wolfram Burghardt, an associate professor of modern languages and literatures of the University of Western Ontario, has developed print, audio and computer-based courses.     

Historical editions in the States

A late 1990 survey found that most historical editors in the United States continue to use the computer primarily as a word processing tool to prepare texts and editorial apparatus. Among older projects, a migration from mainframe or mini-computers to PCs has been the norm. New developments in the field include the Founding Fathers CD-ROM project, the impending release of Version 2.0 of NLCindex, and a strong interest in the Text Encoding Initiative. David R. Chesnutt is a Research Professor of History at the University of South Carolina, senior editor of The Papers of Henry Laurens, and president of the Association for Documentary Editing.     

CAI in engineering education and training

A computer-based economy implies a computer-based education. Learning and teaching are optimized for the student, as well as for the professor, if instructional redundancy is captured for reuse.     

A fast,scalable mutual exclusion algorithm

Summary This paper is concerned with synchornization under read/write atomicity in shared memory multi-processors. We present a new algorithm forN-process mutual exclusion that requires only read and write operations and that hasO(logN) time complexity, where time is measured by counting remote memory references. The time complexity of this algorithm is better than that of all prior solutions to the mutual exclusion problem that are based upon atomic read and write instructions; in fact, the time complexity of most prior solutions is unbounded. Performance studies are presented that show that our mutual exclusion algorithm exhibits scalable performance under heavy contention. In fact, its performance rivals that of the fastest queue-based spin locks based on strong primitives such as compare-and-swap and fetch-and-add. We also present a modified version of our algorithm that generates onlyO(1) memory references in the absence of contention. Jae-Heon Yang received the B.S. and M. S. degrees in Computer Engineering from Seoul National University in 1985 and 1987, respectively, and the Ph.D. degree in Computer Science from the University of Maryland at College Park in 1994. Since June 1994, he has been an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Mills College in Oakland, California. From 1987 to 1989, he was a junior researcher at the Korea Telecommunication Authority Research Center. His research interests include distributed computing and operating systems. James H. Anderson received the M. S. degree in Computer Science from Michigan State University in 1982, the M.S. degree in Computer Science from Purdue University in 1983, and the Ph.D. degree in Computer Sciences from the University of Texas at Austin in 1990. Since August 1993, he has been an Assistant Professor of Computer Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Prior to joining the University of North Carolina, he was an Assistant Professor of Computer Science for three years at the University of Maryland at College Park Professor Anderson's main research interests are within the area of coneurrent and distributed computing. His current interests include wait-free algorithms, scalabde synchronization mechanisms for shared-memory systems, and object-sharing strategies for hard real-time applications.Preliminary version was presented at the Twelfth Annual ACM Symposium on Principles of Distributed Computing Ithaca, New York, August 1993 [15]. Work supported, in part, by NSF Contracts CCR-9109497 and CCR-9216421 and by the Center for Excellence in Space Data and Information Sciences (CESDIS)     

What's all this hype about hypertext?: Teaching literature with George P. Landow's The Dickens Web

The essay describes the use of George P. Landow's hypertext, The Dickens Web, in an advanced undergraduate literature class and analyzes its practical and theoretical implications. Hypertext is shown to encourage active student engagement, especially with contextual material; to lead to more focused research topics; and to facilitate student collaboration. Some of Landow's claims about the ease with which this occurs, however, are questioned. The difficulty of teaching students how to follow and construct conceptual hypertextual links is examined, and the instructor's role in relation to student contributions to the Web is presented as much more problematic than Landow allows.Jonathan Smith is Assistant Professor of English at the University of Michigan-Dearborn. His research interests include Victorian literature and science, hypertext, and modern works of scientific popularization. He is the author of Fact and Feeling: Baconian Science and the Nineteenth-Century Literary Imagination (Wisconsin, 1994) and such articles as the forthcoming Heat and Modem Thought: The Forces of Nature in Our Mutual Friend in Victorian Literature and Culture.     

Can CAL link the theory and practice of instruction?

Typically instructional decisions reflect experience more than theory, and learning theory falls short of successful practice. Successful teaching is dynamic. It requires instructional planning skill and ability to adapt to changes in student's capability. Good teachers monitor effects of instructional decisions on students and modify their lesson plans to improve instruction. Such feedback-controlled instructional design can link theory and practice but is a difficult skill to acquire without classroom trial-and-error.EDSIM is a CAL facility which provides practice in feedback-controlled instructional planning. It also may be used for research on instructional design. EDSIM can compress considerable teaching experience into a short period so that users can acquire the requisite flexibility in lesson planning. EDSIM simulates a class of 30 students. The users, as teacher, plans lessons which are submitted to the computer model. It updates submodels for each student and presents educational assessments after each simulated lesson. Users develop competence in instructional planning and an appreciation of CAL. Researchers can study effects of different factors.