text: what does "extant corpus" mean?   existing writings  note to jen (below)   when i first read it, it appeared to mean "existing body."  so, i looked it up.  corpus:  noun [c] plural corpuses or corpora the collection of a single writer's work or of writing about a particular subject, or a large amount of written and sometimes spoken material collected to show the state of a language  http://dictionary.cambridge.org/define.asp?key=17271&dict=cald  don't ask me how "corpus" came to mean "body of writings" but that's what cambridge claims it means. and, they're much smarter than me.