Invitation with picture of Annie Zaenen

Award of an Honorary Doctorate to
Annie Zaenen

The University of Konstanz and its Department of Linguistics look forward to
awarding an honorary doctorate to Annie Zaenen on the 14th of October, 2024.

Several activities will take place to mark this occasion.

  1. A Workshop on Large Language Models (LLMs) in Linguistic Theory
  2. The formal presentation of the honorary doctorate.
  3. Activities on the weekend of October 12-13, featuring an excursion
    to the Reichenau in honor of its 1300th anniversary.





    Large Language Models (LLMs) in Linguistic Theory

    October 14, 2024

    The last few years have seen substantial progress in machine learning methods. LLMs have solved the natural language parsing problem nearly completely and made substantial progress in the area of lexical semantics and Natural Language Inferencing (NLI). But they present a conundrum: even their developers do not understand their inner workings or how they relate to older insights about linguistic structure. Figuring this out promises to yield insights not only into LLMs but also into how humans process language by showing the similarities and the differences even if at this time one has the feeling we are like the blindfolded sages exploring an elephant. This workshop proposes to spend a day exploring together and comparing approaches.

    Venue: ZT 1204 (Data Theatre)

    9:30-9:45George Walkden (Konstanz) and Miriam Butt (Konstanz)
    Introductory Remarks and Welcome
    9:45-10:30Christin Beck (Konstanz)
    GHisBERT - A language model for historical German
    10:30-10:45Coffee
    10:45-11:30 Anette Frank (Heidelberg)
    Large Language Models and Linguistic Insights
    11:30-12:15 Kyle Mahowald (Austin)
    Language Models as Linguistic Glass Boxes
    12:15-13:30Lunch
    13:30-14:15Hinrich Schütze (LMU)
    El-El-Em-Ology: Are LLMs Good for Linguistics?
    14:15-15:00Annie Zaenen (Stanford)
    Can the CMC tell us anything about how GPT4 interprets natural language?
    15:00-15:15Coffee
    15:15-16:45Round Table Discussion
    Joan Bresnan (Stanford), Annette Hautli-Janisz (Passau), Katerina Kalouli (Bundesdruckerei), Ronald Kaplan (Stanford), Ken Kahn (ToonTalk), Tracy King (Adobe).


    Presentation of the Honorary Doctorate

    Venue: ZT 1204 (Data Theatre)

    17:00 Bernd Stiegler (Dean of the Faculty of Humanities)
    Introduction and Welcome I
    17:05 Theodoros Marinis (Head of the Department of Linguistics)
    Introduction and Welcome II
    17:10 Miriam Butt (Department of Linguistics)
    Laudatio: Part I
    17:20 Kyle Wohlmut on the Celtic Harp I
    17:25 Ronald Kaplan (Co-opted by Department of Linguistics)
    Laudatio: Part II
    17:35 Katharina Holzinger (Rektor)
    Presentation of the Honorary Doctorate
    17:40 Kyle Wohlmut on the Celtic Harp II
    17:45Annie Zaenen (Stanford)
    Thanks and Final Remarks
    18:00Reception