Oracle 11g case-insensitive searching

Hello, all,

I am using Oracle 11g, do not have admin access or authority to make any changes to configuration, and would like to have case-insensitive searches of varchar2 and CLOB columns.

I have tried putting the following before my SELECT query:

ALTER SESSION SET NLS_SORT = BINARY_CI;
ALTER SESSION SET NLS_COMP = LINGUISTIC;

This results in an error message: ORA-00922; missing or invalid option.

Also, the method I'm using for searching the CLOB is case-sensitive:

SELECT * /* I don't use * in production, I'm using it here for brevity */
FROM table1
WHERE dbms_lob.instr(columnA,'searchWord') >= 1

Any advice appreciated.

V/r,

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