Paraphrasing van Rijsbergen [37], the time is ripe for another attempt at using natural language processing (NLP) for information retrieval (IR). This paper introduces my dissertation study, which will explore methods for integrating modern NLP with state-of-the-art IR techniques. In addition to text, I will also apply retrieval to conversational speech data, which poses a unique set of considerations in comparison to text. Greater use of NLP has potential to improve both text and speech retrieval. Categories and Subject Descriptors H.3.3 Information Search and Retrieval [Information Search and Retrieval]: Retrieval models General Terms Experimentation