Along with Université de Franche-Comté (France), Universidade do Algarve (Portugal) and Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona (Spain), the University of Wolverhampton delivers the two year Erasmus Mundus International Masters course during which students attend two or three of the four universities. Students who successfully complete the course are awarded a multiple Masters degree by the universities they study at; i.e. a degree from each university they attend, which together constitute the International Masters in Natural Language Processing and Human Language Technology degree.
This Masters combines the study of linguistics, computer science and mathematics for computational linguistics and for each student, classes are delivered in two or three languages. The course aims to produce bilingual or trilingual specialists in natural language processing (NLP) to meet the need of organisations and enterprises which seek NLP specialists who are competent in several languages. Students are taught in the national language of the universities they attend, so they have the opportunity to achieve fluency in two or three European languages and gain a qualification in the countries chosen. The mobility within the course also allows students flexibility in their choice of modules and their specialism within the broader field, as well as a wide experience of teaching and assessment methodologies. On successful completion of the Masters, graduates will be well-placed for employment within the translating and language technology industries, as well as in academia, for example, continuing their studies by enrolling for a PhD
There are no similar Masters courses in NLP and human language technology in the UK which strike such a necessary balance between linguistics and computer science for computational linguistics, and offer complementary modules in a number of different universities and languages different languages.
More information about the programme, how to apply and courses taught by partner universities can be found on the coordinator's Erasmus Mundus Masters web page.
- Research Centre in Linguistics and Natural language Processing Lucien Tesnière, Université de Franche-Comté, Besançon, France
- Laboratorio de Fonética, Lexicología y Semántica (fLexSem), Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, España
- Spoken Language Laboratory (L2F), INESC-ID Lisboa, Centro de Linguística da UNL (CLUNL) and Onset - Centro de Estudos da Linguagem, Universidade do Algarve, Faro, Portugal
- Research Institute for Information and Language Processing, University of Wolverhampton, Wolverhampton, UK
Machine Translation and Other NLP applications (20 ECTS)
Module leader: Dr Lucia Specia
The module will explore the main theoretical and practical aspects of
the use of computers in translation, an area often referred to as
'Machine Translation', as well as other language technologies such as
Question Answering, Information Extraction, Text Summarisation, Text
Retrieval. The students will familiarise themselves with popular
language processing software, will look at available web-translation
opportunities and will learn where and when not computers should be used
in translation.
Computational Linguistics (20 ECTS)
Module leader: Dr Lucia Specia
The module will introduce the students to the foundations of
Computational Linguistics and Natural Language Processing. Natural
language will be regarded from the point of view of how it could be
understood and produced (and in generally processed) by computers and
its rich diversity (and complexity) will be shown.
Programming for Corpus Linguists (10 ECTS)
Module leader: Dr Constantin Orasan
The module will introduce the students to basic concepts of computer
science and programming. Its special focus will be on NLP applications:
the students will acquire skills to solve programming problems related
to language processing, from basic string processing to manipulation of
complex structures such as parse trees.
Translation tools for professional translators (10 ECTS)
Module Leader: Prof Gloria Corpas
The module will cover theoretical and practical issues in the use of
computer-aided translation technology by professional translators.
Special emphasis will be laid on the Translation Memory technology,
corpus-based translation tools, and e-resources for translators.
Students will be given opportunities to experiment with and evaluate
actual translation software (Deja Vu, Trados, WordFast).
Recent advances in Natural Language Processing (10 ECTS)
Module leader: Dr Laura Hasler
Students will participate in the Reading Group on Computational
Linguistics that is being run by PhD students at the Research Institute
for Information and Language Processing. The students will be expected
to familiarise themselves with recent publications in different areas of
NLP and make presentations about these papers.
LN4035 Research Project 1 (30 ECTS)
Module leader: Dr. Laura Hasler
You will carry out a research project on a topic of your choice under the supervision of LSSC/RIILP staff and members of staff at partner institutions. A list of topics and names of supervisors will be provided at the beginning of the academic year. The topics will, as far as possible, be pertinent to research projects currently carried out in RIILP. This module covers the first year of the research project, including the project plan and literature review. LN4035 is for students taking their first year at Wolverhampton. CP4063 Research Methods and Study Skills is a co-requisite of this module.
LN4036 Research Project 2 (30 ECTS)
Module leader: Dr. Laura Hasler
This module allows you to complete your individual research project started in the first year under the guidance of experienced members of staff. Although the research project is completed individually, there will be ample opportunity to consult staff to discuss ideas and obtain feedback throughout the module. This module covers the second year of the research project, including the final research project (approximately 25,000 words). LN4036 is for students taking their second year at Wolverhampton. A pre-requisite of this module is a research methods module from your university/universities attended in the first year.
CP4063 Research Methods and Study Skills (7.5 ECTS)
Module leader: Mr. Jasbir Uppal
The primary aim of this module is to develop knowledge and experience of research methods and techniques in the field of computing and information systems. In particular, it will develop professionalism in the acquisition and deployment of appropriate research skills in areas such as ethics, data collection, documentation, and presentation. This module is a co-requisite of the module LN4035 Research Project 1 for students studying in their first year at Wolverhampton.
Those applicants who plan to study at the University of Wolverhampton are advised to consult the website of the International Office for alternative ways to fund your studies at the University.
Please also consult a guide on budgeting your studies at UoW.
For more information about the masters programme please contact Erin Phillips.