Showing papers on "Head (linguistics) published in 1998"

Categorial feature magnetism: The endocentricity and distribution of projections

Abstract: The question addressed here is whether there is a systematic relationship between the internal structure of syntactic phrases and their distribution in the clause. To account for the internal coherence of syntactic phrases, their endocentricity, I develop the notion of 'extended projections' in two ways. First, evidence from two constructions of German and Dutch argues that in addition to lexical heads and functional heads, also semi-lexical heads must be intro- duced. The notion of categorial identity, which states that the syntactic nodes connecting the lexical and functional heads within an extended projection with the phrasal node must all be of the same category type, is shown to hold for semi-lexical heads as well. Second, the notion of 'extended projection' will be modified to accommodate the fact that prepositional elements can often be inserted within an extended projection. This exceptional status of prepositional elements is reminiscent of the fact that prepositional phrases are arguably the most flexible phrases in terms of their distribution. In earlier work, I had suggested that this fact could be expressed in terms of a constraint, the Unlike Feature Constraint, which was formulated in terms of repulsion between the positive values of the categorial features: a (+N/V) head does not tolerate a (+N/V) phrase in its immediate domain. Categorial identity is now interpreted as the mutual attraction of the positive categorial feature values: we have attraction within, but repulsion across phrasal categories. And in both cases, prepositions are the neutral element. This idea leads to a unified principle, the Law of Categorial Feature Magnetism.

Determiner Phrase in a Language without Determiners

Abstract: Serbo-Croatian (SC) is a language without articles, probably the only category of speech that has uncontroversially and crosslinguistically been argued to occupy the head of the Determiner Phrase (DP). This paper argues that even SC, a language without articles, projects a DP on top of NPs in argument positions. The strongest evidence comes from noun/pronoun asymmetries, where the pronouns precede, and nouns follow, certain intensifying adjectives. Assuming that these adjectives occupy a fixed syntactic position, the conclusion must be that pronouns occupy a structurally higher position than nouns. Since the evidence of such asymmetries is extremely sparse in the data, the children presumably cannot rely on them to conclude that there is a DP in SC. Since there are also no articles in SC, children have virtually no evidence of the existence of a DP. It must be then that the projection of DPs is a universal property, independent of the presence of the lexical item which solely occupies the head of the projection. Morphological properties of SC pronouns and adjectives actually support the existence of more than just one functional projection in the noun phrase in SC. The paper derives Greenberg's universal 43, which states that pronouns are more likely to have (gender) morphology than nouns, by arguing that pronouns move (overtly) through more functional projections than nouns, and ultimately land in D.

Processing arguments and adjuncts in isolation and context: The case of by-phrase ambiguities in passives.

Abstract: Two eye-tracking experiments examined processing of sentences like The shrubs were planted by the apprentice/greenhouse that morning, where the by phrase is locally ambiguous between an agent and a location. Experiment 1 found a preference to initially interpret the by phrase agentively in the absence of context. In Experiment 2, a context like The head gardener decided [who should]/[where to] plant the shrubs induced an expectation that either an agent or a location would subsequently be specified. After agentive contexts, locatives were harder to process than agentives. After locative contexts, both sentences were easy to process. The authors argue that the verb and interrogative words (who, where) activate thematic roles, which can be associated with corresponding phrases. Phrases that express activated roles are easy to process. Phrases that might express activated roles but are subsequently shown not to express those roles require reanalysis.

Structural and interpretive aspects of head-internal and head-external relative clauses

Abstract: This dissertation investigates the structural and interpretive aspects of the Head-Internal Relative Clause (henceforth, HIRC) construction and the HeadExternal Relative Clause (henceforth, HERC) construction within the Principles-and-Parameters Approach with reference to Japanese, English, and Basque. Specifically, wc will explore the following questions throughout this dissertation: (i) Is there really a single and uniform grammatical process of relativization involving an overt or null operator movement in natural language?; (ii) What is/are the underlying licensing mechanism(s) of each type of relativization in natural language? With respect to the question (i), the present investigation will clearly demonstrate that there is in fact no single and uniform grammatical process of relativization which employs an overt or null operator movement in natural language. Furthermore, in this connection, it will be claimed that what has been standardly called an operator movement in relativization is not an operator movement at all. As for the question (ii), wc will show the following points in this dissertation. First, the HIRC construction involves an empty argument NP [c] which functions as an Ε-Type pronoun in the sense of Evans (1977a,b; 1980) and

Feature distribution in Swedish noun phrases

Abstract: 1. Introduction. 2. Determiners and Modifiers. 2.1. Previous Studies of Prenominal Elements. 2.2. The Determiner Field. 2.3. The Descriptive Field. 2.4. The Determiner Field vs. the Descriptive Field. 2.5. Conclusions. 3. Definite Feature or Definite Article. 3.1. Previous Analyses. 3.2. What is a Clitic?. 3.3. DEF as a Syntactic Element. 3.4. A Comparison with the Possessive --s in Swedish. 3.5. A Comparison with a Enclitic Articlesa in Other Languages. 3.6. Conclusions About the Status of the a Enclitic Articlea . 4. The Head of the Noun Phrase. 4.1. Introduction. 4.2. The Zwicky--Hudson Criteria. 4.3. Arguments for D as the Head of a Noun Phrase. 4.4. Arguments Against D as the Head of the Noun Phrase. 4.5. Conclusions. 5. Features in Definite Noun Phrases. 5.1. Introduction. 5.2. Nouns Without Syntactic Determiners. 5.3. Nouns with Syntactic Determiners. 5.4. Nouns with Adjectives and Determiners. 5.5. Some Residual Issues. 5.6. Conclusions. 6. Features in Indefinite Noun Phrases. 6.1. Introduction. 6.2. Nouns with Determiners. 6.3. Nouns without Determiners. 6.4. Conclusions. 7. Conclusion.

Adjuncts and Arguments in VP-Focus in Hungarian

Abstract: It has been well-known since Hohle (1982), and in particular since Selkirk (1984), that the prosody of focusing is sensitive to the difference between adjuncts and heads or arguments. In Selkirk's proposal, when some item receives focus or pitch accent, an entire phrase can be interpreted as focused if the item is its head or an argument of the head. If, on the other hand, it is an adjunct of the phrase, only the adjunct, but not the dominating phrase node, can be taken to constitute semantic focus. Whereas in English there is no formal distinction between exclusive (or contrasive, operator) and nonexclusive (or information) focus, Hungarian appears to distinguish the two by syntactic means. Not all answers to (focused) wh-questions display a contrastively focused structure. The data surveyed in this paper serve to show that in contrast with a widespread view (cf. E. Kiss 1981; 1987; 1994) the VP is a true constituent of the Hungarian sentence and that it, too, can be focused. But the VP cannot be focused in the same way as other constituents. Firstly, VP-foci do not have to be understood as contrastive. Secondly, VP-focus is expressed by placing the verb, one of its argument, or referential adjuncts into the designated focus position. Thirdly, ex situ VP-focus is possible only in case of activity verbs; VPs of verbs of achievement or accomplishment can be focused only by placing the verb in the focus slot. The fact that arguments can be used to focus the VP is consonant with the general properties of focusing. Since arguments are ultimately projected by the head, they are in a grammatical sense representative of it. This is shown to be the case even in case of idioms, which can be focused much like other predicates, although idiom chunks are not focusable as such. Adjuncts, and in particular non-referential adjuncts, have no role in the projection of categories and are therefore incapable of 'transferring' their focus properties onto the category they are adjoined to whenever they are focused. Nonreferential adjuncts, e.g. manner adverbials, have limited contrastibility, though exclusive focus in such adjuncts is not impossible in the semantic domains they determine.

A Head-Driven and Constraint-Based Analysis of Korean Relative Clause Constructions

Abstract: Relative clause constructions have been notorious for their complexity in terms of syntax and semantics. This paper develops a treatment of the syntactic and semantic properties of Korean relative clause constructions, differing in several key respects from those of English. This treatment, developed within the tradition of a constraint-based framework, Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar theory, adapts Sag's (1997) approach to grammatical constructions in English relatives. As in Sag's analysis, our analysis is 'head-driven' and 'constraint-based' in the sense that the head of a lexical (relative-clause) head and declarative constraints on well-defined constructions play a crucial role in the formation of relative clauses. This system enables us to eliminate the invisible element (e.g., trace or empty operator) from the analysis of Korean relative clauses and further to express cross-cutting generalizations among grammatical constructions thru the mechanism of hierarchical inheritance of type constraints. One of the main consequences of this analysis is to provide a straightforward account for local as well as non-local relative clause constructions which have been known as violating the firm syntactic island constraints such as the Complex Noun Phrase Constraints (CNPC) but for which no plausible and comprehensive analysis has been provided yet.

Fully Lexicalized Head-Driven Syntactic Generation

Abstract: We describe a new approach to syntactic generation with Head-Driven Phrase Structure Grammars (HPSG) that uses an extensive off–line preprocessing step. Direct generation algorithms apply the phrase-structure rules (schemata) of the grammar on–line which is an computationally expensive step. Instead, we collect off-line for every lexical type of the HPSG grammar all minimally complete projections (called elementary trees) that can be derived with the schemata. This process is known as ‘compiling HPSG to TAG’ and derives a Lexicalized Tree-Adjoining Grammar (LTAG). The representation as an LTAG is ‘fully lexicalized’ in the sense that all grammatical information is directly encoded with the lexical item (as a set of elementary trees) and the combination operations are reduced from schema applications to the TAG primitives of adjunction and substitution. Given this LTAG, the generation task has a very different search space that can be traversed very efficiently, avoiding the costly on–line applications of HPSG unification. The entire generation task from a semantic representation to a surface string is split into two tasks, a microplanner and a syntactic realizer. This paper discusses the syntactic generator and the preprocessing steps as implemented in the Verbmobil system. 1 Generation in a Speech–to–Speech System The syntactic generation algorithm and the preprocessing steps presented in this paper are integrated into the Verbmobil system (see [Wahlster 1993, Bub, Wahlster, and Waibel 1997]). It is a system for speech–to–speech dialog translation. The input for the generation module VM–GECO is generated by a semantic–based transfer component (see [Dorna and Emele 1996]). The interface language chosen comprises the encoding of target language–specific semantic information in a combination of Underspecified Discourse Representation Theory and Minimal Recursion Semantics (see [Bos et al. 1996] and [Copestake, Flickinger, and Sag 1997]). The internal architecture of the generation module is modularized: it is separated into two phases, a microplanner and a syntactic generator. Throughout the system, we emphasize declarativity, which is also a necessary precondition for a comprehensive off–line preprocessing of external knowledge bases–in particular the preprocessing of the underlying Head–Driven Phrase Structure Grammar (HPSG, see [Pollard and Sag 1994]) which has been developed at CSLI, reflecting the latest developments in the linguistic theory and with a fairly wide coverage and also covering phenomena of spoken language. 1 VerbMobil GEneration COmponents 2 Microplanning and Syntactic Generation Starting from the semantic representation, the microplanning component generates an annotated dependency structure which is used by the syntactic generation component to realize a surface string. The microplanner also carries out word–choice. One goal of this modularization is a stepwise constraining of the search–space of alternative linguistic realizations, using different views in the different modules. In each step, only an abstraction of the multitude of information contained in an alternative needs to be considered. Another aspect of this architecture is the separation into a kernel system, i.e., the language independent core algorithms (a constraint-solver for microplanning and the search and combination algorithms for syntactic generation described in section 5) and declarative knowledge bases, e.g., the language specific word-choice constraints in microplanning and the TAG grammars used in syntactic realization. This separation allows for an easy adaptation of the system to other languages and domains (see [Becker et al. 1998]). 3 Declarativity in the Syntactic Generator All modules of the generator utilize external, declarative knowledge bases. For the syntactic generator, extensive off-line preprocessing of the highly declarative HPSG grammar for English is applied. The grammar has not even been written exclusively as a generation grammar. It is specialized, however, in that it covers phenomena of spoken language. The high level of abstraction which is achieved in the hierarchically organized grammar description (see [Flickinger 1987]) allows for easy maintenance as well as off-line preprocessing. The off-line preprocessing steps described in the next section keep the declarative nature of the grammar intact, i.e. they retain explicitly the phrase structures and syntactic features as defined by the HPSG grammar. In general, declarative knowledge bases allow for an easier adaptation of the system to other domains and languages. This is a huge benefit in the current second phase of the Verbmobil project [Becker et al. 1996] where the generator is extended to cover German, English and Japanese as well as additional and extended domains with a considerably larger vocabulary. 4 Off–Line Preprocessing: HPSG to TAG Compilation The subtasks in a direct syntactic generator based on an HPSG grammar will always include the application of schemata (the HPSG equivalent of phrase structure rules) such that all syntactic constraints introduced by a lexical item (especially its SUBCAT list) are fulfilled. This results in a constant repetition of, e.g., building up the projection of a verb in a declarative sentence. In preprocessing the HPSG grammar we aim at computing all possible partial phrase structures which can be derived from the information in a lexicon entry. Given such sets of possible syntactic realization together with a set of selected lexicon entries for an utterance and finally their dependencies, the task of a syntactic generator is simplified considerably. Instead of exploring all The HPSG grammar is being developed at CSLI, Stanford University. Development is carried out on a grammar development platform which is based on TDL [Krieger and Schäfer 1994]. In fact, most of the testing during grammar development depends on the use of a parser. possible, computationally expensive applications of HPSG schemata, it merely has to find suitable precomputed syntactic structures for each lexical item and combine them appropriately. For this preprocessing of the HPSG grammar, we adapted the ‘HPSG to TAG compilation’ process described in [Kasper et al. 1995]. The basis for the compilation is an identification of syntactically relevant selector features which express subcategorization requirements of a lexical item, e.g. the VALENCE features. In general, a phrase structure is complete when these selector features are empty. Starting from the feature structure for a lexical item, HPSG schemata are applied such that the current structure is unified with a daughter feature of the schema. The resulting structure is again subject to this process. This compilation process stops when certain termination criteria are met, e.g., when all selector features are empty. Thus, all projections from the lexical item are collected as a set of minimally complete phrase structures which can also be interpreted as elementary trees of a Tree–Adjoining Grammar (TAG). Instead of actually applying this compilation process to all lexical items, certain abstractions over the lexical entries are specified in the HPSG grammar. In fact, the needs of the compilation process have led to a clear–cut separation of lexical types and lexical entries as shown in Figure 1. A typical lexical entry is shown in Figure 2 and demonstrates that only three kinds of information are stored: the lexical type MV NP TRANS LE, the semantic contribution (the relation SUIT REL) and morphological information (the stem and potentially irregular forms). By expanding the lexical type, the full feature structure can be obtained. Schemata Phrase Structure Lexicon Hierarchy Lexical Instance Morphological Information Lexical Type Types Semantic Syntactic Types HPSG Principles

Waveform reproducing device

Abstract: PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To switch a waveform, reproducing position by simple operation without impairing the sense of rhythm by reproducing waveform data from that on position indicated by an optional selected mark when musical timing is generated after selecting the optional mark. SOLUTION: One of phrase data stored in a phrase data ROM 4 is selected by using a phrase selection button 51. When note ON information is received from a MIDI keyboard connected to a MIDI interface 6, data are reproduced from the head (head syllable 1) of the selected phrase, the phrase is continuously reproduced during the depression of the depressed key (note ON), and when note OFF information is received from the keyboard, reproduction is immediately stopped. When a certain key is continuously depressed for time more than one phrase, data reproduction is returned to the head of the phrase again after reproducing the phrase up to the end (phrase end) and reproduction is repeated from the head syllable.

Running head: CHILDREN'S KNOWLEDGE ABOUT LETTERS IN THEIR NAMES What's in a name? Children's knowledge about the letters in their own names

Abstract: Two studies were performed to determine whether children's experiences with their own names boost their knowledge about the components of the name, the letters. The children in Study One showed a significant superiority for the initial letter of their own first name in tests of letter-name, but not letter-sound, knowledge. This pattern was found for Australian first graders (mean age 5 years, 5 months), U.S. kindergartners (mean age 5 years, 8 months), and U.S. preschoolers (mean age 4 years, 10 months). Study Two, with U.S. preschoolers (mean age 4 years, 11 months), again revealed an advantage for the initial letter of a child's first name in knowledge of letter names but not knowledge of letter sounds. Moreover, the children were better at printing the initial letter of their own first name than other letters. The results show that different factors are involved in the learning of letter names and letter sounds. They further suggest that children use letter-based strategies with their own names at a time when they are often considered to be "logographic" readers.

Über die optimale Position von ge

Abstract: In this paper, I offer a new description of the prosodic restrictions for the German prefix ge-, based on the assumption that the prefix has to precede a specific foot, namely the head foot of a prosodic word

The marking of grammatical relations in Swahili

Abstract: This paper investigates the place of Swahili within a typological classification based on the morphological marking of grammatical relations as proposed by Nichols [1986]. Within Nichols' classification, Bantu languages are considered to be "split-marked" because the grammatical marking of a member of a clausal constituent is on the head while, in a phrase, the marking is on the dependent member. Although select clauses and phrases from Swahili support Nichols' claim, a closer examination of the data reveals an interesting variety of morphosyntactic marking in Swahili as well as in two other Bantu languages, Kikuyu and Chewa. Function words playa key role in marking genitive, instrumental, and locative relations in these languages. Function words also regularly occur as markers of object noun phrases with animate referents. Moreover, instrumental, locative, applicative, and some accusative relations in Swahili show considerable flexibility with respect to head- and non-head-marking.

On subject-orientation in English - ly adverbs

Abstract: This paper challenges the view that subject-orientation in English de-adjectival -ly adverbs is a syntactic attribute, and favours the hypothesis that orientation is, rather, a lexico-semantic feature. An important part of the evidence supporting this hypothesis derives from the examination of constructions in which an -ly adverb modifies an adjectival head (as in his genially informal manner) and displays a (potential) orientation to a co-occurring noun. The discussion is based on examples from the LOB Corpus.

Possessive Constructions in the Dialects of Asturian. A Micro-Parametric Approach

Abstract: In this paper I analyze the properties of two different kinds of possessive constructions in the dialects of Asturian. The first one has been called the "periphrastic (or analytic) possessive construction" and its surface appearance is "QP+de+Possessive Pronoun", as in tres vaques de so 'three cows of his'. This construction exists in Western and Central Asturian, but not in the Eastern dialect. The second one is the "ordinary (or non periphrastic) possessive construction", which shows in Asturian the surface order "Art+Possessive Pronoun+QP", as in les mis tres vaques 'my three cows'. When the possessive pronoun refers to a single possessor, the pronoun and the noun head agree in gender and number features in Western Asturian, but in the Central and Eastern dialects they only agree in number or do not agree at all. I try to derive all these divergences from minimal differences in the lexicons of the corresponding dialects.

Machine translating method/device and machine-readable medium to record program

Abstract: PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To permit a user to easily judge what a head word means even if the head word is not registered in a machine translation device. SOLUTION: A head word recognition part 4 recognizes a head word appearing in an input sentence being a translation object. An original word retrieval part 5 retrieves the word of a full spelling, which corresponds to the head word, from the input sentence, sets the retrieved word of the full spelling and the head word as a group and stores it in a retrieval result storage part 6. A translation part 2 not only translates the word of the full spelling which corresponds to the head word in the input sentence, but inserts the spelling of the word of the full spelling into a translated sentence by associating the word with its translation. COPYRIGHT: (C)1999,JPO

Machine translation device and computer-readable recording medium where machine translation processing program is recorded

Abstract: PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To correctly translate a compound word, which starts with a proper noun, by equipping a translation sentence generation part with a means, which rewrites the initials of equivalents to other common nouns into uppercase letters wren the word at the head of a compound word is a proper noun. SOLUTION: A syntax conversion part 54 performs syntax conversion and according to the result of an analysis taken by a constitution analysis part 53, equivalents and information accompanying them are given to respective words while a translation dictionary 57 and a user dictionary 61 are referred to. Then, a syntax generation part 55 converts them into a tree structure, which is correct as to English according to an English sentence generation rule and gives information needed to generate English words to the nodes of the tree to obtain a tree structure for generating an English sentence. At this time, if there is a word constituting the compound word among words to be processed, the initials of equivalents to words whose CAPITALIZE is F among common nouns constituting the compound word are rewritten into uppercase letters. Then, a morpheme generation part 56 performs morpheme generation and makes adjustments such as inflection and declension.

Reconstructing Masculinity in the Postcolonial World of Bessie Head

Abstract: A x X M A J O R C O N C E R N IN both of Bessie Head's short story collections—The Collector of Treasures and Other Botswana Village Tales ( 1977) and the posthumously published Tales of Tenderness and Power (1990)—is the reconstructing of masculinity in the postcolonial context of her adopted home, Botswana. This concern with reconstructing paradigms of African manhood is, of course, not unique to Head's short fiction. In her appealingly optimistic first novel When Rain Clouds Gather ( î g b g ) , Head offers one portrait of the new African male in Makhaya. In addition, the eponymous hero of Maru (1971), along with Maru's rival in love, Moleka, extends Head's gallery of new Africans. Finally, what can reasonably be termed a preoccupation with revisioning the masculine occurs outside her fiction in her study Serowe: Village of Rain Wind ( 1981 ). In contrast to many other feminists who believe that women will never achieve total liberation until they separate themselves from their oppressors, Head was intent upon directing her fiction toward the reimagining of the masculine as a first step toward developing a new vision of relationships between women and men. She was committed to a mode of fiction that might transmit a new construction of the African male, or what occasionally seems a reconstruction of an older mode of masculinity. For Head the development of this new vision had a particular urgency for Botswana in 1966 because her adoptive homeland had just became an independent nation. As she surveyed the impact of generations of colonial domination on African men and the opportunism licensed by the postcolonial atmosphere in Botswana in the years following its independence, she was struck

Japanese hyphenation processing method and document processor

Abstract: PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To produce an easy-to-read and decent-looking document by calculating the character pitches to decide to perform the 'run-on' or 'run-off' processing. SOLUTION: At a preprocessing part (S1 to S4), a range of character pitches to be set in a Japanese hyphenation processing mode is decided. Then the length of character display width of a Japanese hyphenation object line is stored together with the total width of characters covering the first one through the final one within the line and the number of characters included in the line respectively. At a retrieval part (S5 to S8), the punctuation and the part of speech of the word that includes the final character are retrieved. If the final character shows a noun, the next part of speech is retrieved. If this part of speech is a postpositional word functioning as an auxiliary to a main word, 'a noun + the postpositional word' is recognized as a word. At a Japanese hyphenation processing part (S9 to S10), it's decided whether a word is divided at the end of a line or at the head of the next line. If the word is divided, the Japanese. hyphenation processing is carried out to correct the character pitches and to display these characters. If the word is not divided, the relevant processing ends.

Première Partie: Traitement de la coordination à l’intérieur des groupes nominaux

Abstract: Coordination within noun phrases is a very general phenomenon in technical corpora. These noun phrases are composed of a noun head followed by one or more modifiers, and the coordination can affect either of the elements. The purpose is to make the noun phrases complete on both sides of the coordination, in order to improve recall in automatic interrogation. The tools are provided by intex: dictionaries, dictionaries of compounds, the software for writing transducers. First, coordinated noun-phrases are classified according to a typology. Then we present rewrite rules to handle the agreement of the modifier, the use of the possessive determiner, the repetition of the noun head within the modifier, the determiner or preposition zeroing in the right part of the coordination; and the construction symmetry within the noun phrases. Finally, we apply two rules and show the results. Not all the rules have yet been tested, but provisional conclusions can be drawn from this demonstration.