The M.Sc. in Language and Computation is offered by the Institute of Linguistics in collaboration with the Department of Intelligent Computer Systems and the Department of Systems and Control Engineering.
Most applications and services involving telecommunication and information processing, such as mobile telephony, social media, and artificial embodied agents (including robots) involve language, and progress in all these areas happens at a staggering pace. Some familiar examples of such applications are Google Search, Google Translate, Apple Siri and recommendation systems on Amazon. The technology that underlies these applications is based on multi-disciplinary research in language, computation and cognition, referred to by the term Human Language Technology. Specialists in HLT are much needed by major companies such as Google, Amazon and Microsoft, and publishing companies such as Elsevier are opening labs for natural language processing.
Who is the course intended for?
The course is well suited to anyone wishing to pursue further studies in an interdisciplinary area that brings together technology, language and cognition. It is particularly appropriate for students with a background in one or more of the following areas:
- language technology, computational linguistics or natural language processing
- computing, mathematics or engineering
- linguistics.
Learning outcomes
The course gives participants a thorough grounding in Human Language Technology (HLT). More specifically it provides:
- a solid background in computing and applications of ICT to the development of intelligent systems that communicate using language
- a solid background in areas of Linguistics relevant to the development of such systems
- a strongly multi-disciplinary orientation, through a focus on the overlap between the study of language and intelligent computer systems
- practical skills in programming and algorithm design, as well as training in experimental design and data analysis.
Students who enrol on this programme benefit from interaction and co-teaching with students and lecturers on our international Erasmus Mundus European Masters in Language and Communication Technology.
Please contact us for more information +356 2340 2151 or hlt.linguistics@um.edu.mt. Full details about the course are available online.