Chapter 9: Natural Language Processing

In the previous chapter, we discussed using deep learning to not only address structured data in the form of tables but also sequence-based data where the order of the elements matters. In this chapter, we will be discussing another form of sequence-based data – text, within a field known as Natural Language Processing (NLP). We can define NLP as a subset of artificial intelligence that overlaps with both the realms of machine learning and deep learning, specifically when it comes to interactions between the areas of linguistics and computer science.

There are many well-known and well-documented applications and success stories of using NLP for various tasks. Products ranging from spam detectors all the way to document analyzers involve NLP to some extent. Throughout this chapter, we will explore several different areas and applications involving NLP.

As we have observed with many other areas of data science we have explored thus...