Abstract
Concordances are not the only computer tools available to literary scholars. This article looks at two general purpose software packages, Lotus 1-2-3 and dBase III. Several suggested approaches to organizing the texts are presented. Each program allows the words to have multiple levels — something standard concordance programs lack. This encourages the researcher to view the text as texture rather than as words strung together linearly. Lotus is easier to use than dBase but lacks the ability to relate information between files. With programming skills, the researcher can develop complex queries in dBase.
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Louis Janus teaches Norwegian at St. Olaf College, Northfield, MN 55057 USA. He has helped other humanities faculty develop computer projects there. Publications include Norwegian and Scandinavian language texts. He is currently developing HyperCard course material for Norwegian and Linguistics.
Gregg Shadduck is an information management consultant with Shadduck and Sullivan in Minneapolis. He teaches at the College of St. Catherine in St. Paul, MN.
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Janus, L., Shadduck, G. Beyond the concordance Lotus and dBASE as text analysis tools. Comput Hum 23, 375–383 (1989). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02176643
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02176643