CAIS Seminar Abstract:

One of the best and most engaging methods of learning about history, and particularly implications for future behavior, is direct conversation with those who can give a first person account. The USC Institute for Creative Technologies (ICT)  has developed “time-offset interaction” technology to allow interactive conversations with recordings of an eyewitness to history, so that much of this experience can be had without the synchronous participation of the subject. I will describe and demo the use of this technology in the New Dimensions in Testimony project - a collaboration with the USC Shoah Foundation and Conscience Display, in which people can interact with Holocaust survivors in this manner. Time permitting, I will also present its use in a similar project to increase awareness of the consequences of sexual assault in the military.

*This lecture satisfies requirements for CSCI 591: Research Colloquium.*

Speaker:

David Traum is the Director for Natural Language Research at the USC Institute for Creative Technologies and a research faculty member of the Department of Computer Science at USC. He leads the Natural Language Dialogue Group at ICT; his research focus is on interactive dialogue between humans and machines.