Computation for Linguists

LaTeX, Day 3

Dr. Andrew M. Byrd

2025-09-03

Plan for the Day

• Review
• Finishing up Citations
• LaTeX Packages
• Funny Symbols
• Phonological Rules

Review

• What did we talk about in Friday’s class?

Finishing up Citations

Additional Features: Citations

• Citations in LaTeX will refer to a .bib file

• Let’s create one in our “301-LaTeX-practice” project folder

• Call this .bib file “refs.bib”

Additional Features: Your First .bib

@article{smith2017,
    author = {Smith, John},
    title = {Some paper},
    year = {2017},
    journal = {Journal of Research},
    volume = {2},
    number = {1},
    pages = {1--69}
}

@book{knuth1986,
  author    = "Donald E. Knuth",
  title     = "The {TeX} Book",
  year      = "1986",
  publisher = "Addison-Wesley Professional",
  address   = "Massachusetts"
}

Additional Features: Citations

• With these two references now in the system, let’s practice citing them.

• Edit your preamble with the following text, after the documentclass command.

\documentclass{article} 
\usepackage{natbib} 
\bibliographystyle{apalike} 
\begin{document}

Additional Features: Citations

• End your document as follows:

\bibliography{refs}  
\end{document}

Additional Features: Citations

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{natbib}
\bibliographystyle{apalike}

\begin{document}
\title{My First Document}
\author{My Name}
\date{December 6, 2017}
\maketitle

\section{Introduction}
 This is the introduction.\cite{smith2017}
\section{Methods}
\subsection{Stage 1}
The first part of the methods.\nocite{knuth1986}
 \subsection{Stage 2}
The second part of the methods.\cite[p. 215]{smith2017}
 \section{Results}
 Here are my results \citep{knuth1986,smith2017}.
 
\bibliography{refs} 
\end{document}

• Copy the above code and run it in your project tex file.

To Do at Home: Zotero

• A much more user-friendly reference platform is Zotero.

• Click here to sign up for the platform or log into your account.

• Add at least one reference if you do not have one already.

• Select all of the references to export

• Click the “upwards arrow” icon

• You now have a .bib file!

LaTeX Packages

• Allow you to use LaTeX in ways beyond its base features

• “Declared” in the preamble with the command \usepackage{packagename}

• Can conflict with each other!

  • For this reason, the order in which you install the packages actually does matter.

    • But, why?

Loading a Package

• Copy and paste the following in your “301-LaTeX-practice” project tex file.
• The lipsum package generates placeholder text.

\usepackage{lipsum}
\begin{document}

The \texttt{lipsum} package generates placeholder text.

One paragraph of filler:

\lipsum[1]

Two paragraphs of filler:

\lipsum[1-2]

\end{document}

Loading a Package that’s not in Overleaf

• Let’s try a different style for our “lorem ipsum” text. What happens when you load the following code?

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{duckuments}

\begin{document}
% Duck-themed filler (like blindtext):
\blindduck[1]     % 1 paragraph
\blindduck[1-2]   % paragraphs 1–2
\end{document}

Loading a Package that’s not in Overleaf

• Download duckuments.sty.
• Upload this file into your project folder in Overleaf.
• Now run the same code as before.
  • What happens? What does this tell you about installing packages not automatically built into Overleaf?

Packages: Options & Optional Arguments

• We’ll be loading up a useful list package: enumitem
• Why not just use enumerate / itemize?
  • itemize = black dots, fixed indentation, spacing
  • enumerate = 1., 2., 3. … only
  • changing label style (a., i., A., etc.) or margins requires redefining macros, which isn’t user-friendly
  • vertical spacing is often too wide for handouts/homework.
• TLDR - your examples and lists look more professional!

Packages: Options & Optional Arguments

• Let’s load up enumitem to see how it works
• Check out the customizations - can you modify the code so that the list starts with (d)?

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{enumitem} % no options

\begin{document}

% Default enumerate
\begin{enumerate}
  \item Alpha
  \item Beta
\end{enumerate}

% Customized enumerate (full label syntax)
\begin{enumerate}[label=(\alph*), start=3, nosep, leftmargin=*]
  \item starts at (c)
  \item then (d)
\end{enumerate}

\end{document}

Packages: Options & Optional Arguments

• \begin{enumerate}[label=(\alph*), start=3, nosep, leftmargin=*]
  • We’d have to do this for all of our lists, if we wanted to modify them accordingly.
  • Is there any way we can make this less clunky?
• Yes! Invoke some options in your package declaration.

Baseline: no package options

• Let’s add the option shortlabels to the package.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage[shortlabels]{enumitem}

\begin{document}

% Same effect, shorter to type:
\begin{enumerate}[(a)] % shorthand for label=(\alph*)
  \item alpha
  \item beta
\end{enumerate}

% Start at (c) with shorthand:
\begin{enumerate}[(a), start=3, nosep, leftmargin=*]
  \item starts at (c)
  \item then (d)
\end{enumerate}

% Other shorthands:
\begin{enumerate}[A.]   % -> A., B., C.
  \item First
  \item Second
\end{enumerate}

\begin{enumerate}[i.]   % -> i., ii., iii.
  \item One
  \item Two
\end{enumerate}
\end{document}

Funny Symbols

• We’re linguists, so of course we work with lots of languages and funny scripts.
• For instance, what do we do if we’re citing French data?

\'{a}, \`{a}, \^{a}, \c{c} --> á, à, â, ç 

• Or German?

\"{a}, \ss --> ä, ß 

• Note: modifying diacritics work for any symbol:

\'{h}, \"{p}, \^{g}, \c{\%}

Funny Symbols: IPA

• We’re going to use this idea with IPA
• But we’ve of course got to load a package for this: tipa
  • To see full instructions, download the TIPA manual
• Let’s load it up.

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tipa}

Funny Symbols: IPA

• There are two ways you can use TIPA:

  1. With individual characters:

  \textprimstress h\textepsilon.\textltilde\t{o\textupsilon}

  2. Within a \textipa environment

  \textprimstress\textipa{hE.\textltilde\t{oU}}

• To find the symbols, check out the TIPA manual

IPA Activity

• In LaTeX, type out “your first name” using the TIPA package.

Funny Symbols: IPA & Other Scripts

• But what about Japanese? It’s easier than you think…
• What happens when you run this code?

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{fontspec} % lets you pick system fonts

\setmainfont{Noto Serif CJK JP} % or another Japanese-capable font

\begin{document}

日本語の文を書いています。  % “I am writing a sentence in Japanese.”

\end{document}

Funny Symbols: XeLaTeX

• Click “Menu” –> “Compiler” –> “XeLaTeX”

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{fontspec} % lets you pick system fonts

\setmainfont{Noto Serif CJK JP} % or another Japanese-capable font

\begin{document}

日本語の文を書いています。  % “I am writing a sentence in Japanese.”

\end{document}

Funny Symbols: XeLaTeX and IPA

• Wait a minute… does this mean that we can use XeLaTeX with IPA symbols? See for yourself…

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{fontspec}

\setmainfont{Doulos SIL} % a font with good IPA coverage

\begin{document}

ˈkʰæn ju ˈkɑpi ən ˈpeɪst ðɪs ˈsɛntəns ˈɪntu ˈoʊvɚˌlif

\end{document}

Phonological Rules

• In Linguistics, we invoke sounds in talking about how they are used in language
• And frequently, this means talking about phonological rules, which looks like:

Phonological Rules in LaTeX

• To create phonological rules we’ll be using the phonrule package

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{phonrule} #phonological rule package
\usepackage{tipa}

\begin{document}
\begin{enumerate} 
\item \phonb{s}{z}{V}{V} (\textbackslash phonb) 
\item \phonl{k}{c}{i} (\textbackslash phonl) 
\item \phonr{t}{ts}{u} (\textbackslash phonr) 
\item \phon{\textturnw}{w} (\textbackslash phon) 
\item \phonb{\phonfeat{+stop \\ +consonant \\ +alveolar}}{[\textfishhookr]}{ \phonfeat{+vowel \\ +stressed}}{\phonfeat{+vowel \\ +stressed}} 
\end{enumerate}
\end{document}

Phonology Activity

• Now it’s your turn! Let’s analyze this small sample of invented data together, and then render a phonological rule in LaTeX that describes the alternation.

1sg	2sg	3sg
pagis	pagat	pak
tabis	tabat	tap
zobis	zobat	zop
bagis	bagat	bag
zudis	zudat	zud

An Aside: Doing Optimality Theory (OT) in LaTeX

OT Tableaux

http://meluhha.com/tableau/

OT Tableaux

\documentclass{article}
\usepackage{tipa}    %for ipa
\usepackage[table]{xcolor}    %for shading*
\usepackage{pifont}    %for pointing hand
\usepackage{arydshln}    %for dashed lines
\usepackage{rotating}    %for angled text

\begin{document}

\begin{table}[h]
  \centering
  \renewcommand{\arraystretch}{1.2}
  \setlength{\tabcolsep}{6pt}

  \begin{tabular}{|rrl||*{3}{c|}}
    \hline
    \multicolumn{3}{|c||}{\textipa{/tup/}} &
      \rotatebox{45}{NoCoda} &
      \rotatebox{45}{Dep-V}  &
      \rotatebox{45}{Max-C}  \\
    \hline\hline
    a. &        & \textipa{tup}  & $\ast$! & \cellcolor{lightgray} & \cellcolor{lightgray} \\
    \hline
    b. & \ding{43} & \textipa{tu}   &         &                       & \cellcolor{lightgray}$\ast$ \\
    \hline
    c. &        & \textipa{tupi} &         & $\ast$!               & \cellcolor{lightgray} \\
    \hline
  \end{tabular}

  \renewcommand{\arraystretch}{1}
\end{table}

\end{document}