Course goals: Mathematical methods are essential for understanding and working in theoretical and computational linguistics. This course introduces the key concepts from the areas of set theory, algebra and logic, which belong to the basic repertoire of linguistic methods. The main goal of the course is to provide the students with sufficient competence in basic notations, terminology and concepts of discrete mathematics for their studies in theoretical and computational linguistics. Familiarity with concepts such as sets, functions and propositions, and the ability to work with simple proof techniques are a crucial prerequisite for subsequent courses.

Instructors:

• Damir Markota
  • Office: Room 1.25, Blochbau (Wilhelmstr. 19)
  • Email: dmarkota@sfs.uni-tuebingen.de
  • Office hours: Thursdays 11:00–12:00
• Detmar Meurers
  • Office: Room 1.28, Blochbau (Wilhelmstr. 19)
  • Email: dm@sfs.uni-tuebingen.de
  • Office hours: Tuesdays 14:00–15:00

Course meets:

• Mondays, 14ct-16, Computerlabor 2.26, Blochbau (Wilhelmstr. 19)
• Tuesdays, 16ct-18, Seminarraum 1.13, Blochbau (Wilhelmstr. 19)
• Thursdays, 16ct-18, Seminarraum 1.13, Blochbau (Wilhelmstr. 19)

Online materials: We will be using the new department Moodle for the course, which is accessible at http://courses.sfs.uni-tuebingen.de. You will access it to

• locate the updated syllabus, slides, handouts, pointers to reading material, etc.
• completing the weekly on-line quizzes (from anywhere)
• completing the midterm and final exams (in class)

The first time you visit the department Moodle, you will need to create an account. To do so, select “Create new account” and enter your department user id as id, pick a new password, (do not use the same password for Moodle as for your department account) and enter your department email address (i.e. YOUR-ID@sfs.uni-tuebingen.de) as your email address. If you do not yet have a department account, please contact us asap.

For questions concerning the department accounts and computer system, you can contact the system administrator Jochen Saile. His office hours are: Thursdays 9–11 in room 2.25, Blochbau (Wilhelmstr. 19), email: saile@sfs.uni-tuebingen.de, phone: 29-78487.

Relatedly, we will at times send you email related to our class. Please be sure to read email sent to your department account at least once a day. You can ask Jochen Saile to forward your department email to another account that you read regularly.

Course readings: Part of this course will be based on the excellent book Barbara H. Partee, Alice ter Meulen, Robert E. Wall (1990): Mathematical Methods in Linguistics. Kluwer Academic Publishers and we will assign regular readings from it. Please get ahold of a copy of the book – you will need to have a copy by the end of week 2 of the semester. The book covers essential material that you’ll need to refer to throughout your studies and the book is cheap, so buying a copy for yourself generally is the best idea. We also ordered ten copies of the book book for the Lehrbuchsammlung of the main university library, where you can find them under the signature Lili A 900.

We will also make our slides and lecture notes available on our Moodle course site. They are only a skeleton of the material covered and definitely cannot replace actually being in class and doing the assigned readings. In our experience, students who actively participate in class enjoy the course more and do much better on the exams than those who don’t—very surprising, isn’t it? ;-)

Course requirements: The basic requirement is regular attendance in class and active participation. If you cannot attend class for an important reason, please contact us by email before the class you will miss. Following the official rules of the college, students who, without notifying us in advance, miss more than two meetings will automatically fail the class.

There will be one online quiz per week, to step by step ensure the material covered in class is mastered. The contents of the quiz is discussed in the Monday sessions, for which attendance is obligatory. The midterm exam will consist of the material covered in the first half of the class, and the final exam will cover the contents covered in the second half of the class.

Grading: Grades will be based on participation in classroom discussion, quizzes, homeworks, a midterm exam, and the final examination, using the following scheme:

• Quizzes are administered on-line through our department Moodle (http://courses.sfs.uni-tuebingen.de). You can do these from any computer with internet access and a web browser and you generally have a week to complete a quiz, so do not put it off to the last minute! You can save partial results and return to the quiz any time before the deadline, which always is on Monday morning, 8am. The quizzes naturally are open book, so view them as an opportunity for reviewing the material covered, after doing the assigned readings.

  Note: We will not remind you when you have a quiz due. It is your responsibility to keep up with the syllabus/calendar of the course.

  The midterm and the final exam will be administered on-line as well, but you will be in the department lab when you take them. So you will want to do the quizzes in a way that best prepares you for doing the midterm and the final by yourself.

• The following grading scheme is used to map percentages to grades:

  B+/1.7

  87–89

  C+/2.7

  77–79

  D+/3.7

  67–69

  A/1

  93–100

  B/2

  83–86

  C/3

  73–76

  D/4

  60–66

  A−/1.3

  90–92

  B−/2.3

  80–82

  C−/3.3

  70–72

Make-up Policy: If you know you won’t be able to make a deadline or exam, please definitely let us know before you miss the deadline or exam. If you miss the midterm or final, you will have to provide extensive written documentation for your excuse. As you generally will have a week to take them, there are no make-ups for the quizzes.

Academic Misconduct: To state the obvious, academic dishonesty is unacceptable. Cheating on tests or on other assignments will be handled according to the university guidelines. The most common form of misconduct is copying or plagiarism. Remember that any time you use the ideas or the materials of another person, you must acknowledge that you have done so in a citation. This includes material that you have found on the Web or given to you by another student by email, telephone or in person.

Class etiquette: Please do not read or work on materials for other classes in class. When in the computer lab, only use the computers when you are asked to do a specific activity – do not read email or browse the web. Please come to class on time and do not pack up early. All portable electronic devices such as cell phones should be switched off for the length of the flight, oops, class. If for some reason, you must leave early or you have an important call coming in, notify us before class.

Schedule: The latest version of the schedule is always available on Moodle. After the lectures, the handouts and lecture notes are available from the Moodle web site.

This document was translated from L^AT_EX by H^EV^EA.