Tools and Training offered by QLVL

Corpus tools

Abundantia Verborum was developed by Dirk Speelman as a computer tool facilitating corpus analysis. Technological mechanisms from various fields (text retrieval, database management and querying, statistical analysis, graphical representation) are innovatively combined into an all-round tool for corpus analysis.

Abundantia has proven its efficiency in quite a number of PhDs and MA theses produced at the Department of Linguistics of the University of Leuven. For more information, please write to Dirk Speelman.

Corpora

The QLVL group not only uses existing corpora (like the CGN corpus of spoken Dutch), we also compile our own corpora. In particular, the ConDiv corpus is a 40 million token corpus of Dutch, ranging over the period 1958-1998, and comprising different stylistic levels. It was specifically designed to study the convergence or divergence (hence the name) between Netherlandic Dutch and Belgian Dutch.

If you are interested in consulting the ConDiv corpus, please send your requests to Dirk Speelman.

Introduction to statistics

In the course of the project "Convergence and Divergence in the Vocabulary of Dutch", QLVL also developed the website 'Introduction to Practical Statistics for Linguistic Applications' (in Dutch), which can be found here.

Courses

The QLVL group offers a number of courses on corpus linguistics and lexicology in the context of the Advanced MA in Linguistics organized in Leuven. The program may also include an apprenticeship in the QLVL group.

The Advanced MA program is a one-year program aimed at students who have already acquired a good background in linguistics or language-related fields of study. Although the program is formally an inter-university one in which the main Flemish universities participate, the courses offered in Leuven have a specific profile: they constitute an MA programme in Cognitive and Functional Linguistics.

A more detailed description of the program may be downloaded here. For more information, write to Dirk Geeraerts.

Scholarships

Advanced PhD students who intend to finish their PhD at the university of Leuven may apply for a scholarship for advanced doctoral students. For a specific set of countries and universities, the University of Leuven also offers grants for starting PhD students: see the doctoral studies page for an overview.

In addition, a number of fellowships is available for young postdoctoral researchers who wish to work with a Leuven research group.

If you are interested in any of these possibilities, or if you would like to join forces in any other way with the QLVL group, please write to Dirk Geeraerts.