Illinois Global Institute

As the home to the area and global studies centers and thematic programs at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, the Illinois Global Institute is dedicated to fostering an environment where international perspectives are integral to teaching and research.

Center for African Studies * Center for East Asian and Pacific Studies * Center for Global Studies * Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies * Center for South Asian and Middle Eastern Studies * Center for the Study of Global Gender Equity * European Union Center * LAS Global Studies * Lemann Center for Brazilian Studies * Russian, East European, and Eurasian Center * The Program in Arms Control and Domestic and International Security

 

2026 Indian Languages and Cultures Lecture

Apr 14, 2026   6:00 - 7:30 pm  
Spurlock Museum
Lecture
Sponsor
South Asian Studies Initiative @ CSAMES
Speaker
Andrew Ollett, University of Chicago
Contact
Ragini Chakraborty
E-Mail
raginic2@illinois.edu
Views
47
Originating Calendar
South Asia General Events

Context, from 7th century India to today

Andrew Ollett, University of Chicago



An essential feature of modern language models is the ability to take context into account. A word’s meaning changes according to the words it accompanies. Although the implementation of this concept is very new, the concept itself is very old — and in fact the earliest systematic account of contextual meaning comes from India of the 7th and 8th centuries, when the philosopher Prabhākara formulated a theory he called “the expression of relational meanings” (anvitābhidhāna). This presentation will give an overview of Prabhākara’s theory, refined by the 8th/9th c. philosopher Śālikanātha, and its connections to ways of thinking about and modeling meaning in contemporary machine learning.

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