Hey! I'm currently a software engineer for #waywire. I play with JavaScript all day and I love it.
Before that, I spent an awesome three months writing code as part of the fall 2012 batch of Hacker School. It was amazing. I love how code is, for me, the perfect combination of logic and creativity.
In May 2012, I received an Sc.B in Cognitive Science at Brown, during which I completed my honors thesis in Professor Laura Kertz's Sentence and Discourse Processing Lab, investigating the nature of lexical access and lexical ambiguity resolution in dual-context sentences. In other words, I did my thesis on puns.
I like thinking about the structure of the mental lexicon, the mental dictionary, and I'd like to learn more about distributed processing models of cognition, computational modeling, human computer interaction, user experience and usability, data mining, natural language processing, and data visualization. I also enjoy playing Ultimate Frisbee, cooking, making mashups, DJing, and drinking coffee.
Hi there! You can email me at jenna.zeigen [AT] gmail.com.
I have two blogs:
- Linkguistics: Here I explore language, computers, code, minds, brains, and the like
- Jenna vs. Market Share: This is my summer food blog in which I chronicle my struggle against vegetables
Education
Brown University - Sc.B. in Cognitive Science, with honors (3.89 GPA) Providence, RI • 2008 - 2012
- Relevant course experience includes Cognition, HCI, and Visual Analysis; Creating Modern Web Applications; Introduction to Probability and Computing; Introduction to Algorithms and Data Structures; and Language Processing
- Honors Thesis: “What’s so funny?: Investigating the time-course of lexical access in the processing of puns”
Council Rock High School - South - Valedictorian (4.0 GPA)Holland, PA • Graduated 2007
Work and Project Experience
Hacker School - ParticipantBrooklyn, NY • October 2012 - December 2012
- Programming novel, in-depth projects exploring various programming languages, technologies, and techniques
- Creating full-stack web applications, and NLP, image processing, and web scraping scripts in JavaScript and Python
- Discussing and reviewing projects with and providing feedback to other participants and facilitators
Sentence and Discourse Processing Lab - Research AssistantProvidence, RI • June 2011 - August 2012
- Worked with Professor Laura Kertz in Brown University’s Department of Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences
- Performed independent human subjects research towards an honors thesis on lexical access and lexical ambiguity
- Conceptualized, designed and executed novel experiments about simultaneous activation of homograph meanings
- Collaborated with Professor Kertz in developing experiments investigating language processing and information structure
- Analyzed and formatted large data sets using MATLAB and Python scripts
Parse.ly - Front-End and Visualization Designer (Class Project)Providence, RI • February - May 2012
- Implemented a web application that allows users to explore trending topics from media sources across the Internet
- Harnessed d3.js to receive and process JSON, and create interactive real-time visualizations of semantic and meta-data
Instructional and Leadership Experience
Dept. of Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences - Course Developer and TAProvidence, RI • June 2011 - May 2012
- Designed a curriculum of tutorials to teach programming skills in MATLAB
- Served as TA for Prof. Thomas Serre’s Computational Vision (Fall) and Computational Cognitive Science (Spring) courses
- Wrote and conducted lectures and labs and developed demos, sample code, and documentation
- Conducted bi-weekly office hours to guide students individually through code implementation and program design
Habonim Dror North America - Regional Chapter Founder, CoordinatorBoston, MA • June 2007 - May 2012
- Established and coordinated regional informal education program for ages 8-16 (February 2009 - Dec. 2011)
- Planned activities educating about social justice and actualization (February 2009 - May 2012)
- Volunteered teaching English in Israel during gap year program (January - May 2008)
Brown/RISD Hillel Foundation - Various Board PositionsProvidence, RI • Nov. 2008 - May 2012
- Co-founded and served on executive board of campus Pro-Israel, Pro-Palestine, Pro-Peace org. (Nov. 2008 - May 2012)
- Chaired Israel Committee of the Programming Board (September 2009 - May 2010)
- Directed the 2010 Israeli Film Festival on College Hill (September 2009 - February 2010)
Awards and Honors
New Frontiers Undergraduate Teaching and Research AwardProvidence, RI • June - August 2011
- Worked closely with Professor Laura Kertz on independent research leading to honors thesis
Astounding New Initiatives Award from Brown/RISD Hillel FoundationProvidence, RI • April 2009
- Received for 2008-2009 school year for founding Pro-Israel, Pro-Palestine, Pro-Peace organization
Skills and Interests
Programming Languages: JavaScript, Python, Java, MATLAB
Other Technical Skills: HTML/CSS
Interests: Playing guitar, cooking, making mashups, DJing, ultimate frisbee, coffee, puns, networks, patterns, words
Code Portfolio
All of my code can be found on my Github. Here are some highlights.
Synesthesia
Technologies Used: Python, Python Imaging Library, PyGame, BeautifulSoup, JavaScript, jQuery, Flask, EC2
Web app that takes in an image and gives you back an image in which the colors are replaced with words that are semantically related with that color.
For instance a patch of red might be replaced with the words "strawberry," "cherry," "balloon," etc.
The project has modules that generate its own semantically related words, simplify the image into specified colors, and then make the image into the word picture, the first two of which are autonomous.
App Code Blog PostCaffeine
Technologies Used: JavaScript, jQuery, d3.js
Javascript profiler that times and graphs the runtimes of an object's methods in real-time. It graphs methods either independently ("flat") or such that the run-time of a method is graphed inside the method that called it ("nested").
CodeExpensieve
Technologies Used: JavaScript, jQuery, node.js, express.js, backbone.js, MongoDB
Tool for splitting expenses, bills, or costs with people.
CodeTetrjs
Technologies Used: JavaScript, jQuery, HTML5 canvas
HTML5 Canvas-based tetris implementation. Uses object-oriented JavaScript.
App CodeBrickbreaker
Technologies Used: JavaScript, jQuery, HTML5 canvas
HTML5 Canvas-based brickbreaker implementation. Uses object-oriented JavaScript.
App Blog Post
Language Processing Research
In April 2012, I completed my honors thesis on how we process puns in Laura Kertz's Sentence and Discourse Processing Lab in Brown's Department of Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences. I'm currently working to expand this research though more studies, and hopefully publish my findings. I have also done work investigating what motivates the existence of a linguistic phenomenon called 'extraction islands.'
In Summer 2011, I was honored to present at Brown's Summer Research Symposium, at which I presented this poster.
While you're here, take a look at what I drew Hacker School to answer a question on their application that was something like "Explain something you know well as deeply as you can." I wrote about how we understand the intended meaning(s) of words with multiple meanings, a key thing in understanding puns
Music
I make mashups. Here's my latest one: "Eternal Bromance"
Listen to more of my music on SoundCloud.