SKBP 1023 LECTURE 1

INTRODUCTION TO

ANTCONC

OBJECTIVE Learning the Introduction of Antconc is

to introduce the fastest and easiest way of word and language analysis.

This software would be an advantage or asset to university students

especially those in English major program.

INTRODUCTION Antconc is a freeware, multi-platform

and multi-purpose corpus analysis toolkit. Antconc includes :

-Concordance –Word and Keyword Frequency

Generators – Tools for Cluster and Lexical Bundle

Analysis – A Word Distribution Plot

BACKGROUNDS

THE COURSE WAS INITIALLY TAUGHT IN A LINUX BASED CALL LABORATORY BEFORE BEING MOVED TO A WINDOWS BASED

CALL LABORATORY

USING THE PERL/TK 8.0 TOOLKIT, IT WAS THEN DEVELOPED THE

GRAPHICAL USER INTERFACE (GUI)

FIRST RELEASED IN 2002. KNOWN AS

KWIC (KEYWORD IN CONTEXT)

CONCORDANCER PROGRAM

DESIGNED AND USED BY 700 STUDENTS OF OSAKA UNIVERSITY GRADUATE SCHOOL OF ENGINEERING

THIS ENABLED THE PROGRAM TO BE

EASILY PORTED TO A LINUX/ UNIX

ENVIRONMENT THAT IS NECESSARY

DEVELOPED IN A WINDOWS

ENVIRONMENT OF PERL 5.8

PROGRAMMING LANGUAGE

TOOLS AND FEATURES IN ANTCONC

POWERFUL SEARCH FEATURES HTML/XML TAG HANDLING

MULTIPLE-LEVEL SORTING UNICODE SUPPORT & MULTI PLATFORM

EXTENSIVE SET OF TEXT ANALYSIS TOOLS

SMALL MEMORY REQUIREMENT &

FREEWARE LICENSE

EASY TO USE ; INTUITIVE GUI

CONCORDANCER TOOLS

• The central tool used in most corpus analysis software

• According to a research, new vocabulary can only be acquired through meeting words in diverse natural contexts and in varied situations.

• Concordance program can find and display a huge number of examples varied contexts and situations quickly and efficiently using a reasonably large corpus.

• The concordance tool of Antconc has a wide range of features that make it an effective tool not only for learners, but also teachers and researchers.

SEARCH TERM VIEW FILES TOOL :DISTRIBUTION PLOT :

MAIN PURPOSE IS TO SHOW HOW A SEARCH IS USED IN A TARGET CORPUS.

OFFERS SAME FUNCTIONALITY AS THE CONCORDANCER TOOL IN TERMS OF SEARCH OPTIONS BUT RESULTS ARE SHOWN IN A DIFFERENT WAY

>AN EFFECTIVE AID> IT IS USED TO DETERMINE WHERE A PARTICULAR PHRASE IS USED IN THE CORPUS OR TEXT.

USED IN ORDER TO DISPLAY THE SEARCH TERM IN THE ORIGINAL

FILE

USED INDEPENDENTLY TO SEARCH FOR ANY SUBSTRING, WORD, PHRASE OR REGULAR EXPRESSION IN A TARGET FILE

RESULTS ARE DISPLAYED IN A USER-DEFINEABLE HIGHLIGHT

COLORS, BUTTONS AND KEYBOARD SHORCUTS CAN BE USED TO JUMP TO A SPECIFIED

HIT ANYWHERE IN THE FILEKWIK LINES BASED ON THE TERM

ARE AUTOMATICALLY SHOWN USING THE CONCORDANCER

TOOL IF THE USERS CLICK ON THE HIGHLIGHTED TERMS

WORD LIST/KEYWORD LIST TOOL

LEXICAL BUNDLE:CALCULATING ALL THE LECICAL

BUNDLES FOR PARTICULAR SET OF CRITERIAS MAY TAKE SOME TIME. IT CAN BE HALTED BY CLICKING ‘STOP’ BUTTON ANYTIME. IT ALLOWS USERS TO LEARN IDIOMS,PHRASES OR MULTI WORDS AND COLLOCATION DESPITE

OF KNOWING ONLY ONE PART OR CATEGORY OF WORD.

WORD LIST TOOL LIST WORDS ACCORDING TO ALPHABET AND FREQUENCY SO THAT IT’S EASY TO HIGHLIGHT PROBLEM AREA IN A CORPUS BEING FOCUSED

ON

KEYWORD LISTS TOOL HELP IN FINDING WORDS THAT

UNUSUALLY APPEAR FREQUENTLY IN A CORPUS

WHICH FIRSTLY SPECIFIED BY THE USER.

WORD LIST/KEYWORD LIST TOOL

CONCLUSION :

• WE CAN SAY THAT ANTCONC IS VERY USEFUL AND HELPFUL ESPECIALLY TO THOSE STUDENTS WHO MAJORED IN LANGUAGE STUDIES. IT MAKES WORK EASIER AND USER-FRIENDLY AS THE STUDENTS CAN USE IF FOR LEARNING PURPOSES.