Literature, Philosophy, Arts, Sciences...
In 1957 the French government initiated the creation of a new dictionary of the French language, the Trésor de la Langue Française. In order to provide access to a large body of word samples, it was decided to transcribe an extensive selection of French texts for use with a computer. Twenty years later, a corpus totaling some 150 million words had been created, representing a broad range of written French -- from novels and poetry to biology and mathematics -- stretching from the seventeenth to the twentieth centuries.
It soon became apparent that this corpus of French texts was an important resource not only for lexicographers, but also for many other types of humanists and social scientists engaged in French studies - on both sides of the Atlantic. The result of this realization was American and French Research on the Treasury of the French Language (ARTFL) -- a cooperative project established in 1981 by the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique and the University of Chicago.
The ARTFL project has focused on three objectives over the past eight years:
In implementing the World Wide Web, the ARTFL project has sought to keep two goals in mind:
With the introduction of ARTFL on the Web, researchers have a new and easier way to access the database. This system is available to all subscribers who have access to the Internet. The WWW provides a user-friendly environment that eliminates the need to memorize special commands and addresses. Instead, users simply click the mouse button on the appropriate icon or word in order to proceed from one step to the next in their search of the ARTFL database. In addition, the ARTFL home page presents a variety of other options that were not previously available on the PhiloLogic system. Now users can read newsletters, consult FAQ sheets, and skim the ARTFL bibliography on-line.
Users familiar with our original system will have continued access to the ARTFL database through the PhiloLogic System. This is a second tool for ARTFL research which provides a menu driven system featuring a sophisticated help program that can be accessed at any time. Users can log-on to PhiloLogic by using a standard microcomputer or terminal and modem. PhiloLogic does not require previous computer experience -- in fact, this system provides an excellent opportunity to become acquainted with the possibilities of computer-assisted research and teaching. The ARTFL Project has written full documentation for PhiloLogic, including tutorials demonstrating the system from logging-on to printing of results.
Both WWW and PhiloLogic provide serveral ways for users to select the texts they wish to analyze. Users may search a single text, texts by a single author, texts from a particular time period, texts with a particular word in the title, or all the texts in the database. For example, one might wish to work with all the texts of Balzac in the database, or all the texts published between 1750 and 1789. A single command will select these texts for further analysis.
Access to the database is organized through a consortium of user institutions, in most cases universities and colleges, each of which pay an annual subscription fee. In 1995, this fee is $500 (US) for PhD granting institutions and $250 (US) for other universities and colleges. All scholars and students at affiliated institutions have access to the database. Each individual user of the PhiloLogic system is issued an account on the ARTFL computer upon registering with ARTFL. There is no charge to users for storage of texts, computer time or electronic delivery of texts. Users pay only for printing done at the University of Chicago and telephone charges.
The systems described here are designed to deal with most of the requests made by individual researchers who perform the work themselves. WWW and PhiloLogic are flexible enough to allow for other possibilities. A scholar, for example, may want to have specialized research performed by an ARTFL research assistant (there is a charge for this service). The database may also be used for pedagogical purposes using computer accounts open to an entire class of students. ARTFL staff will consult closely with researchers to tailor the system to their needs.
Both the CNRS and the University of Chicago are committed to the future growth of the ARTFL Project. These activities include expansion of the size of the database, correction of texts already in the database, and continued development of access and analysis software. Recent additions to the ARTFL database include the collected works of Beckett, and texts by Montaigne and Maupassant. Other texts now available to users include a French translation of the Bible by Louis Segond and the Trésor de la langue française dictionary (1606). ARTFL has also made increased efforts in the area of imaging. We are currently in the process of scanning various texts and images into the ARTFL database, including the Encyclopédie, French revolutionary pamphlets and illuminated manuscripts, as well as the Divine Comedy of Dante. The Project has obtained many important texts from other scholars and welcomes new contributions and proposals for collecting more texts. ARTFL expects to continue improving its research systems and plans to develop new analytical tools as well. We welcome joint projects with other institutions and invite you to contact us to discuss possible collaborations. Users at member universities will continue to play an important role in providing direction to the future development of the ARTFL Project.
The ARTFL Project is supported by a full-time staff at the University of Chicago. We encourage you to write or call us with any questions you may have about the project, such as the availability of texts, operation of the system, or the costs of using the database.
The ARTFL Project American and French Research on the Treasury of the French Language Department of Romance Languages and Literatures University of Chicago 1050 East 59th Street Chicago Illinois 60637 (773) 702-8488 electronic mail: mark@barkov.uchicago.edu WWW: http://humanities.uchicago.edu/ARTFL/ARTFL.html gopher: gopher://gopher.uchicago.edu/11ucholarly/artfl