The goal of computational linguistics is to enable computers to deal with human language. Computational linguists are interested in building machines that solve problems such as

• automatic speech recognition - converting spoken utterance into written sequence of words
• text-to-speech synthesis - converting written sequence of words into spoken utterance
• information retrieval - searching documents, the World Wide Web for relevant information
• machine translation - translating sentences from one language to another

As the example problems suggest, the field is highly interdisciplinary, drawing upon research in linguistics, computer science, electrical engineering, mathematics, statistics, psychology, and philosophy.

In addition, the field is very practical and the Bay Area is full of companies developing systems related to computational linguistics. Many students and graduates from the department of linguistics and language development, especially those with a background in computational linguistics, have pursued internships with Silicon Valley companies. These afford valuable work experience, as well as extra money to support oneself during one's study, and in some cases develop into full-time positions after graduation. In recent years our students have interned at, or worked full time at local companies such as Bosch, InQuira, Nuance, Ordinate, Sehda, Spanlink, SRI International, TellMe, and Yahoo!.

As an organized research unit at San Jose State University, the mission of the Center for Human Language Technology is to 

• support the study of computational linguistics,
• act as a resource for Silicon Valley technology industries,
• explore applications of human language technology in industry, education, and society at large.

For questions or inquiries about the center, please contact Dr. Hahn Koo. 

Contact Information

Linguistics & Language Development

San José State University
One Washington Square
San José, CA 95192-0093

Tel: (408) 924-4413
Fax: (408) 924-4703