Showing papers on "Phrase published in 1996"

An Introduction to Japanese Linguistics

Abstract: List of Figures, Tables, and Maps. Preface to the Second Edition. Acknowledgments. 1. Introduction. Suggested Readings. 2. Phonetics. 1. Phonetic Inventory. 1.1. Place/Manner of Articulation and Voicing. 1.2. Phonetic Inventory of English - Consonants. 1.3. Phonetic Inventory of Japanese - Consonants. 1.4. Phonetic Inventory of English - Vowels. 1.5. Phonetic Inventory of Japanese - Vowels. Notes. Suggested Readings. Exercises. 3. Phonology. 1. Phonological Rules in Japanese. 1.1. Devoicing of High Vowels. 1.2. Nasal Assimilation. 1.3. Alveolar Alternations. 1.4. Alternations. 1.5. Digression on the Phoneme Status of. 1.6. Verbal Conjugation Rules. 1.7. Rule Ordering. 2. Sequential Voicing - "Rendaku". 3. Mora vs. Syllable. 3.1. Speech Errors. 3.2. Language Games: "Babibu" Language. 4. Accentuation in Japanese. 4.1. Stress vs. Pitch. 4.2. Accentuation in Japanese. 4.3. Mora vs. Syllable. 4.4. Accentuation of Long Nominal Compounds. 4.5. Accentuation of Short Nominal Compounds. 4.6. Accentual Variation Among Endings. 5. Mimetics. 6. Loan Words. 7. Casual Speech and Fast Speech. 8. Length Requirements. Notes. Suggested Readings. Exercises. 4. Morphology. 1. Parts of Speech Categories. 1.1. Nouns. 1.2. Verbs. 1.3. Adjectives. 1.4. Adverbs. 1.5. Postpositions. 1.6. Case Particles. 1.7. Adjectival Nouns. 1.8. Verbal Nouns. 2. Morpheme Types. 3. Word Formation. 3.1. Affixation. 3.2. Compounding. 3.3. Reduplication. 3.4. Clipping. 3.5. Borrowing. 4. Head. 5. Issues in Japanese Morphology (1): Transitive and Intransitive Verb Pairs. 6. Issues in Japanese Morphology (2): Nominalization. 7. Issues in Japanese Morphology (3): Compounding. 7.1. Background. 7.2. N-V Compounds. 7.3. V-V Compounds. Notes. Suggested Readings. Exercises. 5. Syntax. 1.Syntactic Structures. 1.1. Syntactic Constituency. 1.2. Phrase Structures. 1.3. Phrase Structure Rules. 1.4. The Notion of Head. 1.5. Subcategorization. 1.6. Structural Relations. 2. Transformational Rules. 2.1. Yes-No Question. 2.2. WH-Movement. 3. Word Order and Scrambling. 3.1. Scrambling Phenomenon. 3.2. Configurationality. 3.3. Evidence for the Movement Analysis. 3.4. Some Restrictions on Scrambling. 4. Null Anaphora. 4.1. Syntactic Representation of Null Anaphora. 4.2. Interpretation of Null Anaphora. 5. Reflexives. 5.1. Zibun. 5.2. Zibun-Zisin. 6.The Notion of Subject. 6.1. Reflexivization. 6.2. Subject Honorification. 7. Passives. 7.1. Direct Passives. 7.2. Indirect Passives (Adversative Passives). 7.3. Ni Yotte-Passives. 8. Causatives. 8.1. O-Causatives and Ni-Causatives. 8.2. The Double-O Constraint. 8.3. The Structure of Causatives. 8.4. Causative Passives. 8.5. Adversative Causatives. 8.6. Lexical Causatives. 9. Relative Clauses (Sentence Modifiers). 9.1. The Ga/No Conversion. 9.2. Relative Clauses without Gaps. 9.3. Internally Headed Relative Clauses. 10. Unaccusativity. 11. The Light Verb Construction. 12. Further Issues on Phrase Structure. 12.1. X'-Theory. 12.2. Application to Japanese. Notes. Suggested Readings. Exercises. 6. Semantics. 1. Word Meaning and Sentence Meaning. 1.1. Word/Phrase Meaning and Types of Relationships. 1.2. Sentence Meaning. 1.3. Metaphors and Idioms. 1.4. Deixis. 1.5. Mimetics. 2. Tense and Aspect. 2.1. Tense. 2.2. Aspect. 3. Verb Semantics. 3.1. Linking Regularity and Unaccusativity. 3.2. Semantic Classes of Verbs and their Syntactic Patterns. 3.3. Lexicalization. 4. Pragmatics. 4.1. Speaker's Meaning. 4.2. The Nature of Information. 4.3. Relevance of Contextual Information. Notes. Suggested Readings. Exercises. 7. Language Variation. 1.Dialectal Variation. 2. Styles and Levels of Speech. 3. Gender Differences. Notes. Suggested Readings. Exercises. 8. Language Acquisition. 1. Regularity in Language Acquisition. 1.1. Phonological Unit - Mora. 1.2. Lexicalization Pattern and Mimetics. 1.3. Tense/Aspect Marking. 2. Generalizations in Children's Errors. 2.1. Inflectional Morphology. 2.1. Case Particles. 2.3. Prenominal Modification. 3. Theoretical Approaches to Verb Acquisition. 4. Pragmatic Acquisition. Suggested Readings. Exercises. Bibliography. Index.

System and method for linking streams of multimedia data to reference material for display

Abstract: A system for indexing displayed elements that is useful for accessing and understanding new or difficult materials, in which a user highlights unknown words or characters or other displayed elements encountered while viewing displayed materials. In a language learning application, the system displays the meaning of a word in context; and the user may include the word in a personal vocabulary to build a database of words and phrases. In a Japanese language application, one or more Japanese language books are read on an electronic display. Readings (‘yomi’) for all words are readily viewable for any selected word or phrase, as well as an English reference to the selected word or phrase. Extensive notes are provided for difficult phrases and words not normally found in a dictionary. A unique indexing scheme allows word-by-word access to any of several external multi-media references.

Prosodic structure in young children's language production

Abstract: Research in prosodic phonology, as well as experiments on adult speech production, suggest that segmental and suprasegmental processes in language are not governed directly by syntactic structure. Rather these processes reflect an independent prosodic structure, which includes prosodic categories such as metrical foot, prosodic word, and phonological phrase. Five experiments examined English-speaking two-year-olds' omissions of object articles in different prosodic structures. The data indicate that children omit unfooted syllables and that foot boundaries, in turn, are influenced by prosodic word and phonological phrase boundaries. Thus, it appears that children create prosodic structures remarkably similar to those proposed in theories of prosodic phonology.*

Method for optimizing entries for searching an index

Abstract: A computerized method optimizes an index of information stored as records of a database in response to queries made to the index. The index is generated by storing index entries in a memory. Each index entry includes a word entry immediately followed by one or more location entries. The word entry encodes a unique portion of information of the records, and the location entries encode occurrences of the unique portion of information in the records. A query phrase is processed, the phrase corresponds to a concatenation of adjacent portions of indexed information. A measure of the amount of time required to process the phrase is recorded in a journal. Periodically, the journal is processed and new index entries are generated for the phrases if the processing of the phrase exceeds some predetermined threshold time.

Acoustic Cues to Grammatical Structure in Infant‐Directed Speech: Cross‐Linguistic Evidence

Abstract: Several theorists have suggested that infants use prosodic cues such as pauses, final lengthening, and pitch changes to identify linguistic units in speech. One potential difficulty with this proposal, however, is that the acoustic shape of an utterance is affected by many factors other than its syntax, including its phonetic, lexical, and discourse structure. This has raised questions about how the infant could use timing and pitch as cues to any aspect of linguistic structure without simultaneously factoring out other effects. Acoustic analyses of connected samples of spontaneous speech addressed to 13.5-14-month-old infants by American English- and by Japanese-speaking mothers revealed that both utterance- and phrase-level acoustic regularities were large enough to be detected in spontaneous speech without correcting for other influences on the same acoustic features. (1) Utterance-final vowels were lengthened and underwent exaggerated pitch changes in both languages, and (2) local acoustic changes in duration (English) or pitch (Japanese) were reliably associated with some phrase boundaries within utterances. These findings suggest that a naive listener could estimate a rough prosodic template for each language based on robust acoustic patterns in observed sentences. We discuss ways in which the learner could combine acoustic and distributional analyses across utterances to acquire language-specific variations in prosodic bracketing cues and to obtain indirect perceptual evidence for the internal structure of utterances.

Method for standardizing phrasing in a document

Abstract: A method for standardizing phrases in a document includes the steps of identifying phrases of a document to create a preliminary list of standard phrases; filtering the preliminary list of standard phrases to create a final list of standard phrases; identifying candidate phrases of the document which are similar to the standard phrases; confirming whether a candidate phrase of the document is sufficiently proximate to the standard phrase to constitute an approximate phrase; and computing a phrase substitution to determine the appropriate conformation of standard phrase to the approximate phrase or the approximate phrase to the standard. Further this invention relates to a computer system for standardizing a document.

Computer systems, method and program for constructing statements by dragging and dropping iconic representations of subcomponent statements onto a phrase template

Abstract: The system, method, and program of this invention enables construction of statements, including queries, programs, and commands, by using drag and drop templates. A predefined phrase template, which is generated and displayed to a user, imposes syntactic and semantic constraints in constructing the statement. Objects representing entities and objects representing subphrases can be dragged and dropped onto phrase receptacles within the phrase and subphrase templates. Complex statements can be constructed from a nesting of subphrases using the drag and drop technique. The constructed statement is displayed to the user along with the subphrase structure of the statement through nested panels.

Women, men, and type of talk: What makes the difference?

Abstract: In a study of dyadic conversations between four female and four male pairs of friends, the use of the phrase you know and questions are examined within three types of discourse. Women and men are found to use these features with equal frequency; and all speakers, regardless of sex or gender, use them in comparable ways. Although these particular discourse features have been previously associated with a female speech style, the results of this study show that it is the particular requirements associated with the three types of talk that motivate their use, and not the sex or gender of the individual speaker. The problems of generalizing about the characteristics of female or male speech, outside of a particular conversational context, are discussed; and it is shown that a gendered style cannot be adequately defined by counting individual speech variables removed from the specifics of the talk context. (Gender, questions, tag questions, discourse analysis, conversation analysis)

A phrasing structure for the narrative display of findings

Abstract: A method for generating sentences of text for selected medical findings in an electronic medical diagnostic system is disclosed. First, a descriptive phrase for each medical finding is created. Each descriptive phrase is then analyzed to determine possible truncation points for modifying the descriptive phrase of one medical finding if another medical finding is also selected. A code at each possible truncation point is then entered into the phrase. Language to be inserted at each of the truncation points is then created and the descriptive phrase and modifying language are stored. Finally, the stored descriptive phrases and modifying language are then combined to form a readable text for the medical findings selected from the database.

Partial agreement and coordination

Abstract: In some languages a subject consisting of a Conjunction Phrase agrees only partially with the verb. Aoun, Benmamoun, and Sportiche (1994) have presented an analysis for Arabic in which the conjuncts are clauses rather than Noun Phrases. This article argues that partial agreement is a subclass of a more general, and widespread, phenomenon : unbalanced coordination (Johannessen 1993b). An analysis is presented in which conjuncts can be NPs as well as other categories. The central idea is that the conjunction heads a Conjunction Phrase and that unbalanced coordination is a possible consequence of specifier-head agreement. This explains a correlation between the order of conjuncts that have different grammatical features and the order of head and complement in these languages

Automated natural language processing

Abstract: An automated natural language translation system takes source natural language text (preferably in Japanese) and translates them into a target natural language (preferably English). The system also allows an operator to re-translate automatically selected portions of the source text. The system includes an improvement directed to transforming kanas in the source text into alphabetic letters of the target language which allows the presence of a word or phrase boundary to be recognized in the middle of a kana. The system also includes an improvement involving performing concurrently on the source text both a morphological analysis and a syntactic analysis.

Medieval Reading: Grammar, Rhetoric and the Classical Text

Abstract: 1. Introduction Part I. Contents for reading: 2. Learning to read: the classics and the curriculum 3. Reading and the trivium arts Part II. Reading Practice: 4. Origins and mythologies: the invention of language and meaning 5. Reading word by word (1): the role of the vernacular 6. Reading word by word (2): grammatical and rhetorical approaches 7. From words to the phrase: the problem of syntax 8. Government: the theory and practice of a grammatical concept 9. Rival orders of syntax: vernacular, natural and artificial 10. From the phrase to the text: grammatical and rhetorical approaches again 11. Naked intention: satire and a new kind of literal reading 12. Literacy: a new model for the classical text in the middle ages? Bibliography.

Mathematical notation in formal specification: too difficult for the masses?

Abstract: The phrase "not much mathematics required" can imply a variety of skill levels. When this phrase is applied to computer scientists, software engineers, and clients in the area of formal specification, the word "much" can be widely misinterpreted with disastrous consequences. A small experiment in reading specifications revealed that students already trained in discrete mathematics and the specification notation performed very poorly; much worse than could reasonably be expected if formal methods proponents are to be believed.

Electronic word puzzle game

Abstract: An electronic word puzzle game, the game playable on a game computer having a processor for executing at least one program from associated memory, a display and an I/O interface, comprising: at least one puzzle phrase in the associated memory; a game program in the associated memory executable by the processor for randomly or determininistically choosing a solution phrase from the associated memory, the solution phrase comprising at least one of letters, spaces and punctuation marks; the I/O interface adapted for enabling the player to select at least one of letters, spaces and punctuation marks from a selection of entry keys associated with the I/O interface; the game computer generating and displaying a plurality of solution phrase constituent display areas, wherein each of said solution phrase constituent display areas corresponds to each letter, blank space, and punctuation mark of the solution phrase, on the display screen; the game program executable by the processor for comparing the at least one selected letter to the letters in the solution phrase and displaying on the display screen the selected letter in each grid box corresponding to a letter of the solution phrase for each player selected letter found in the solution phrase; and the game computer displaying in the corresponding grid box at least one of blank spaces and punctuation marks of the solution phrase adjacent to a selected letter found in the solution phrase. In an alternative embodiment, the electronic word puzzle game capable of being played at a user terminal over a data network in accordance with the invention.

Method and system for correcting misrecognized spoken words or phrases

Abstract: A method and system for editing words that have been misrecognized. The system allows a speaker to specify a number of alternative words to be displayed in a correction window by resizing the correction window. The system also displays the words in the correction window in alphabetical order. A preferred system eliminates the possibility, when a misrecognized word is respoken, that the respoken utterance will be again recognized as the same misrecognized word. This elimination occurs based on the probabilities of alternative words associated with both the misrecognized utterance and the respoken utterance. The system, when operating with a word processor, allows the speaker to specify the amount of speech that is buffered before transferring to the word processor. The system also uses a word correction metaphor or a phrase correction metaphor.

Cue Phrase Classification Using Machine Learning

Abstract: Cue phrases may be used in a discourse sense to explicitly signal discourse structure, but also in a sentential sense to convey semantic rather than structural information. Correctly classifying cue phrases as discourse or sentential is critical in natural language processing systems that exploit discourse structure, e.g., for performing tasks such as anaphora resolution and plan recognition. This paper explores the use of machine learning for classifying cue phrases as discourse or sentential. Two machine learning programs (Cgrendel and C4.5) are used to induce classification models from sets of pre-classified cue phrases and their features in text and speech. Machine learning is shown to be an effective technique for not only automating the generation of classification models, but also for improving upon previous results. When compared to manually derived classification models already in the literature, the learned models often perform with higher accuracy and contain new linguistic insights into the data. In addition, the ability to automatically construct classification models makes it easier to comparatively analyze the utility of alternative feature representations of the data. Finally, the ease of retraining makes the learning approach more scalable and flexible than manual methods.

Method and apparatus employing audio and video data from an individual for authentication purposes

Abstract: A method and apparatus is provided for determining the authenticity of an individual. In accordance with the method, audio and video data of the individual speaking at least one selected phrase is obtained. Identifying audio features and video features are then extracted from the audio data and the video data, respectively. A feature vector is formed which incorporates both the audio features and the video features. The feature vector is compared to a stored feature vector of a validated user speaking the same selected phrase. The individual is authenticated if the feature vector and the stored feature vector form a match within a prescribed threshold.

Evaluation of syntactic phrase indexing : CLARIT NLP track report

Abstract: The CLARIT NLP track effort is focused on evaluating the usefulness of syntactic phrases for document indexing. AA. are inclined to propose the following two hypotheses : 1) the use of lexical atoms, such as hot dog, to replace single words for indexing would increase both precision and recall; 2) the use of syntactic phrases, such as junior college to supplement single words would increase precision without hurting recall and using more such phrases results in greater improvement in precision

Cue phrase classification using machine learning

Abstract: Cue phrases may be used in a discourse sense to explicitly signal discourse structure, but also in a sentential sense to convey semantic rather than structural information. Correctly classifying cue phrases as discourse or sentential is critical in natural language processing systems that exploit discourse structure, e.g., for performing tasks such as anaphora resolution and plan recognition. This paper explores the use of machine learning for classifying cue phrases as discourse or sentential. Two machine learning programs (cgrendel and C4.5) are used to induce classification models from sets of pre-classified cue phrases and their features in text and speech. Machine learning is shown to be an effective technique for not only automating the generation of classification models, but also for improving upon previous results. When compared to manually derived classification models already in the literature, the learned models often perform with higher accuracy and contain new linguistic insights into the data. In addition, the ability to automatically construct classification models makes it easier to comparatively analyze the utility of alternative feature representations of the data. Finally, the ease of retraining makes the learning approach more scalable and flexible than manual methods.

Children’s processing of prosodic cues for phrasal interpretation

Abstract: Using synthetic speech, word duration and fundamental frequency (F0) contours were parametrically manipulated to examine processes of phrasal interpretation by adult and child (5 and 7 years old) listeners. From an adult male voice, versions of the phrase ‘‘pink and green and white’’ were resynthesized to produce stimuli suggesting two possible interpretations: [(pink and green) and white] and [pink and (green and white)]. For each stimulus, listeners pointed to a picture to indicate which interpretation was intended. All subjects used duration and (to a lesser extent) intonation as perceptually salient cues for phrasal interpretation. The manner in which subjects processed this information was evaluated by comparing subjects’ performance with the predictions of three different information processing models: a nonindependent cue‐evaluation model, and two independent cue‐evaluation models (an additive model, and the multiplicative, fuzzy logical model). Performance was best described by the fuzzy logical model, which assumes independent cue evaluation and generates a classification function characterized by cue trading relations. The results suggest that, similar to adults, children as young as 5 years of age rely on acoustic‐prosodic information for syntactic phrase interpretation, and they process this information in an adultlike manner.

Speech recognition employing a permissive recognition criterion for a repeated phrase utterance

Abstract: The invention relates to a method and apparatus for speech recognition, the speech to be recognized including one or more words. Recognition is based on an analysis of a first and a second utterance. In accordance with the invention, the first utterance is compared to one or more models of speech to determine a similarity metric for each such comparison. The model of speech which most closely matches the first utterance is determined based on the one or more similarity metrics. The similarity metric corresponding to the most closely matching model of speech is analyzed to determine whether the similarity metric satisfies a first recognition criterion. The second utterance is compared to one or more models of speech associated with the most closely matching model (which may include the most closely matching model) to determine a second utterance similarity metric for each such comparison. The one or more second utterance similarity metrics are analyzed to determine whether the one or more metrics satisfies a second recognition criteria. The second utterance is recognized has the phrase corresponding to the most closely matching model of speech when the first and second recognition criteria are satisfied. The present invention has application to many problems in speech recognition including isolated word recognition and command spotting. An illustrative embodiment of the invention in the context of a cellular telephone is provided. Other embodiments are also discussed.

The Acquisition of Relative Clauses: Movement or No Movement?.

Abstract: French-speaking children age 3;0 to 6;0 (and older) produce relative clauses without moving lexical relative phrases to a clause-initial position, even where adult grammar requires it. This article contrasts three accounts of this face (a) there is wh-movement of an abstract element; (b) the relative clauses are produced without syntactic wh-movement, by generating an abstraction operator in clause-initial position (Labelle (1990)); and (c) there is raising of a phrase from within the relative clause to the antecedent position (Guasti and Shlonsky (1995)). It is shown that the second analysis provides the best account of this phenomenon.

Spontaneous language production and aging: sex and educational effects

Abstract: Sex and educational level effects on spontaneous language production at different ages were analyzed in a 180-normal subject sample taken from the general population. Subjects were divided into groups according to three variables: (1) age (16–30, 31–50, and 51–65 years), (2) educational level (3–7, 8–12 and more than 12 years of formal educational), and (3) sex (males and females) with 10 subjects in each cell. The oral description of the Plate # 1 (“The Cookie Theft”)from the Boston Diagnostic Aphasia Examination (Goodglass & Kaplan, 1972) was selected. Number of nouns, verbs, adjectives, and grammatical connectors were scored for each subject picture description. It was concluded that: (1) the ratio among different phrase elements was very uniform across age, educational level and sex groups; (2) the total number of words used to describe the “The Cookie Theft” picture significantly increased with the subject's educational level; (3) the amount of spontaneous language in general decreased with age; howe...

Frequency Importance Functions for Words, Sentences, and Continuous Discourse

Abstract: This research determined frequency importance functions (FIFs) for words, sentences, and continuous discourse under comparable conditions so that contextual effects of speech could be isolated. A m...

Key-phrase detection and verification for flexible speech understanding

Abstract: A novel framework of robust speech understanding is presented. It is based on a detection and verification strategy. It extracts the semantically significant parts and rejects the irrelevant parts rather than decoding the whole utterances. There are two key features in the strategy. Firstly, the discriminative verifier is integrated to suppress false alarms. It uses anti-subword models specifically trained to verify the recognition results. The second feature is the use of a key-phrase network as the detection unit. It embeds a stochastic constraint of keyword and key-phrase connections to improve the coverage and detection rates. The automatic generation of the key-phrase network structure is also addressed. This top-down variable-length language model can be trained with a small corpus and ported to different tasks. This property coupled with the vocabulary-independent detector and verifier enhances the portability of the framework.