Showing papers on "Rule-based machine translation published in 2023"

A Multiattribute Group Decision-Making Method With Probabilistic Linguistic Information Based on an Adaptive Consensus Reaching Model and Evidential Reasoning

Abstract: This article proposes a new multiattribute group decision-making (MAGDM) method with probabilistic linguistic information that considers the following three aspects: an allocation of ignorance information, a realization of group consensus, and an aggregation of assessments. To allocate ignorance information, an optimization model based on minimizing the distances among experts is developed. To measure the consensus degree, a consensus index that considers the information granules of linguistic terms (LTs) is defined. On this basis, a suitable optimization model is established to realize the group consensus adaptively by optimizing the allocation of information granules of LTs with the particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm. With an objective to reduce the information loss during aggregation phases, the process of generating comprehensive assessments of alternatives with the evidential reasoning (ER) algorithm is presented. Therefore, a new method is developed based on the adaptive consensus reaching (ACR) model and the ER algorithm. Finally, the applicability of the proposed method is demonstrated by solving a selection problem of a financial technology company. Comparative analyses are conducted to show the advantages of the proposed method.

Fifty years of shape grammars: A systematic mapping of its application in engineering and architecture

Abstract: Shape grammars allow a designer to explore a diverse and broad design space. Especially among architects and engineers, the opportunity to evaluate numerous alternatives in the conceptual phase facilitates creativity. Since the introduction of shape grammars 50 years ago, significant research and development have been performed: new applications, combinations with optimisation and integration in digital environments, among others. Consequently, there is a need to map the existing literature to encourage further progress in the field and a lower threshold for those interested in learning more about shape grammars. This study, therefore, presents a systematic mapping of shape grammars in architecture and engineering. Mapping is performed by identifying a query of relevant keywords used in five databases, with the results forming the basis of the mapping. Each of the included articles is then screened to filter out those that do not fit the content criteria. The remaining publications are then evaluated and organised based on the attributes’ application, research type, implementation, engineering and optimisation. The outcome is organised in explanatory illustrations and tables. The final discussion highlights the extensive work performed with shape grammars in the generation of two-dimensional floor plans, an increase in digital development in recent years and the need for further research. The findings indicate a gap between the state of the art and the necessary level of applicability for shape grammars to be an attractive design tool, especially for non-experts.

Grammar Induction for Under-Resourced Languages: The Case of Ch'ol

Abstract: We apply to the under-resourced language Ch’ol the Womb Grammar Model of grammar induction (WGM), thus called because given appropriate input it can generate grammars for different languages, much as human wombs can generate different races. The WGM is inferential, works for more than just specific tasks and needs neither a pre-specified model family, nor parallel corpora, nor any of the typical models of machine learning. It generates an understudied language’s grammar using representative and correct input sentences in that language, together with its lexicon relevant to that input, all of which is parsed with respect to the correct grammar of a well-studied language, or alternatively, of a “universal” grammar. The errors that inevitably result serve to guide the production of the desired grammar. We present the main framework describing the model and the results of our experiments, inferring Ch’ol grammar from English grammar and suggest some future lines of research in the area.

A role of functional morphemes in Korean categorial grammars

Abstract: This study discusses a role of functional morphemes in Korean categorial grammars, providing the reviews of various types of Korean categorial grammars that have never been conducted so far, notwithstanding many previous studies on them. Previous work has presented different morphological segmentation because of Korean’s agglutinative characteristics, implying that Korean words may contain a different segmentation sequence of morphemes. We focus on functional morphemes in Korean categorial grammars, which have been explored in different ways by previous work. We present detailed analyses for postpositions and verbal endings in categorial grammars, insisting that the functional morphemes in Korean should be treated as part of a word, with the result that their categories do not require to be assigned individually in a syntactic level, and also that it would be more efficient to assign the syntactic categories on the fully inflected lexical word derived by the lexical rule of the morphological processes in the lexicon.

Decision Support System Based on Complex Fractional Orthotriple Fuzzy 2-Tuple Linguistic Aggregation Operator

Abstract: In this research, we provide tools to overcome the information loss limitation resulting from the requirement to estimate the results in the discrete initial expression domain. Through the use of 2-tuples, which are made up of a linguistic term and a numerical value calculated between [0.5,0.5), the linguistic information will be expressed. This model supports continuous representation of the linguistic data within its scope, permitting it to express any information counting received through an aggregation procedure. This study provides a novel approach to develop a linguistic multi-attribute group decision-making (MAGDM) approach with complex fractional orthotriple fuzzy 2-tuple linguistic (CFOF2TL) assessment details. Initially, the concept of a complex fractional orthotriple fuzzy 2-tuple linguistic set (CFO2TLS) is proposed to convey uncertain and fuzzy information. In the meantime, simple aggregation operators, such as CFOF2TL weighted average and geometric operators, are defined. In addition, the CFOF2TL Maclaurin’s symmetric mean (CFOF2TLMSM) operators and their weighted shapes are presented, and their attractive characteristics are also discussed. A new MAGDM approach is built using the developed aggregation operators to address managing economic crises under COVID-19 with the CFOF2TL information. As a result, the effectiveness and robustness of the developed method are accompanied by an empirical example, and a comparative study is carried out by contrasting it with previous approaches.

A Multiple Criteria Decision-Making Method With Heterogeneous Linguistic Expressions

Abstract: Due to the personalized and diversified expression habits, the evaluation information in multiple criteria decision-making (MCDM) problems, especially those with multiple experts, may appear in heterogeneous forms. Converting heterogeneous expressions to a single representation would lead to information loss. To solve this challenge, this article aims to address the MCDM problems with heterogeneous linguistic expressions by unifying the operations of heterogeneous linguistic representations. To do so, we propose to use expectation values and entropy measures to describe the meaning of linguistic evaluation information. The expectation functions of ten kinds of linguistic representations are respectively defined based on the semantics of linguistic terms. The entropy measures of these representations are developed to reflect the inherent uncertainty of evaluations. Afterward, a computation model for heterogeneous linguistic representations is presented based on their expectation values and entropy. On this basis, an MCDM framework with personalized heterogeneous linguistic information is constructed. A numerical example about selecting the best green logistics for a business-to-customer e-commerce enterprise shows the advantages of the proposed method in modeling personalized linguistic evaluations and retaining uncertain information in the computation process.

Notational Variants and Cognition: The Case of Dependency Grammar

Abstract: Abstract In recent years, dependency grammars have established themselves as valuable tools in theoretical and computational linguistics. To many linguists, dependency grammars and the more standard constituency-based formalisms are notational variants. We argue that, beyond considerations of formal equivalence, cognition may also serve as a background for a genuine comparison between these different views of syntax. In this paper, we review and evaluate some of the most common arguments and evidence employed to advocate for the cognitive or neural reality of dependency grammars in linguistics, psycholinguistics, or neurolinguistics. We then raise the possibility that the abilities to represent and track, alternatively or in parallel, constituency and dependency structures co-exist in human cognition and are constitutive of syntactic competence.

Context Matters: Adaptive Mutation for Grammars

Abstract: This work proposes Adaptive Facilitated Mutation, a self-adaptive mutation method for Structured Grammatical Evolution (SGE), biologically inspired by the theory of facilitated variation. In SGE, the genotype of individuals contains a list for each non-terminal of the grammar that defines the search space. In our proposed mutation, each individual contains an array with a different, self-adaptive mutation rate for each non-terminal. We also propose Function Grouped Grammars, a grammar design procedure, to enhance the benefits of the proposed mutation. Experiments were conducted on three symbolic regression benchmarks using Probabilistic Structured Grammatical Evolution (PSGE), a variant of SGE. Results show our approach is similar or better when compared with the standard grammar and mutation.

Fuzzy Property Grammars for Gradience in Natural Language

Abstract: This paper introduces a new grammatical framework, Fuzzy Property Grammars (FPGr). This is a model based on Property Grammars and Fuzzy Natural Logic. Such grammatical framework is constraint-based and provides a new way to formally characterize gradience by representing grammaticality degrees regarding linguistic competence (without involving speakers judgments). The paper provides a formal-logical characterization of FPGr. A test of the framework is presented by implementing an FPGr for Spanish. FPGr is a formal theory that may serve linguists, computing scientists, and mathematicians since it can capture infinite grammatical structures within the variability of a language.

Grammars for placeholders: The dynamic turn

Abstract: In verbal communication, when a speaker encounters a word-formulation problem (e.g. memory lapse), she may resort to several linguistic strategies, including the use of a placeholder (PH). A PH is a dummy item with which a speaker fills in the syntactic slot of a target form that she is unable or unwilling to produce. There is a growing body of work investigating PHs in a variety of languages, but the bulk of extant studies provide a descriptive and/or functional analysis and little attention has been paid to formal modelling. In the present article, we offer a wide range of PH examples in Japanese, French, and German, including new data on gender mismatches, and develop a formal account in Dynamic Syntax. We propose a general mechanism to process a PH time-linearly and show how it is implemented in the grammars of several languages. In this analysis, a PH-involving string is parsed incrementally, and a conceptual structure is built up progressively, during which a PH introduces a meta-variable, to be updated based on the parse of a target form on an unfixed node or a LINKed node. The account is further extended to various PH-involving dialogic phenomena in talk-in-interaction.

The Grammar of Interactives

Abstract: Abstract The concern of the book is with identifying a domain of discourse processing referred to as ‘interactive grammar’. The book rests on the analysis of grammatical descriptions of well over one hundred languages spoken in all major regions of the world. Ten types of interactives, that is, extra-clausal expressions of linguistic discourse, are distinguished, namely attention signals, directives, discourse markers, evaluatives, ideophones, interjections, response elicitors, response signals, social formulae, and vocatives. The main message of the book is that speakers dispose of two contrasting modes for structuring their discourses. One mode, represented by sentence grammar, organized in a propositional format and having an analytic organization, focuses on conceptual communication about the world. The second mode, represented by interactive grammar, has a holophrastic organization and a focus on social communication. Both kinds of grammar have an argument structure, but whereas that of sentence grammar is shaped by the propositional format of sentences, that of interactive grammar is shaped by the indexical nature of the situation of discourse. The distinction between two grammars exhibits, on the one hand, correlations with observations made in neurolinguistic studies on differential activity in the two hemispheres of the human brain. On the other hand, there are also noteworthy parallels to a similar distinction made in social psychology between two types or systems of reasoning and judgment. The conclusion drawn in the book is that the two grammars have complementary functions and both are needed for successful communication.

On Total-Order HTN Plan Verification with Method Preconditions – An Extension of the CYK Parsing Algorithm

Abstract: In this paper, we consider the plan verification problem for totally ordered (TO) HTN planning. The problem is proved to be solvable in polynomial time by recognizing its connection to the membership decision problem for context-free grammars. Currently, most HTN plan verification approaches do not have special treatments for the TO configuration, and the only one features such an optimization still relies on an exhaustive search. Hence, we will develop a new TOHTN plan verification approach in this paper by extending the standard CYK parsing algorithm which acts as the best decision procedure in general.

Using Context-Free Grammars to Scaffold and Automate Feedback in Precise Mathematical Writing

Abstract: In technical writing, certain statements must be written very carefully in order to clearly and precisely communicate an idea. Students are often asked to write these statements in response to an open-ended prompt, making them difficult to autograde with traditional methods. We present what we believe to be a novel approach for autograding these statements by restricting students' submissions to a pre-defined context-free grammar (configured by the instructor). In addition, our tool provides instantaneous feedback that helps students improve their writing, and it scaffolds the process of constructing a statement by reducing the number of choices students have to make compared to free-form writing. We evaluated our tool by deploying it on an assignment in an undergraduate algorithms course. The assignment contained five questions that used the tool, preceded by a pre-test and followed by a post-test. We observed a statistically significant improvement from the pre-test to the post-test, with the mean score increasing from 7.2/12 to 9.2/12.

Linguistic Variation and Grammatical Complexity in Child Heritage Speakers

Abstract: This exploratory study addresses variation along the animacy scale in the bilingual first language acquisition of Spanish Differential Object Marking (DOM). Through the analysis of elicited narratives by child heritage speakers (HSs) and monolingual children, we report evidence that both groups distinguishbetween human and nonhuman animate direct objects (DOs) based on their DOM use. The results, albeit tentative given the data examined, suggest that variable contexts can offer new insight into the complex nature of HS grammars in order to test hypotheses of structural simplification.

Programming complex 3D meshes. A generative approach based on shape grammars.

Abstract: This article summarizes the results of art based research developed thanks to a grant of the PUCP University of Lima in 2021 2022. It will be described an open source generative solution, based on generative grammars to create very complex and programmable 3D meshes. Analyzing hundreds of models generated with these algorithms, it was found a solution based on the idea of “intelligent meshes”, which change their behavior during the modeling process. This is done using tags, or vertices identifiers, that, like genes, describe the topological characteristics of each vertex and i ts generative development during the process. Tags can be pr ogrammed interactively editing its data with tools provided by the interface or using generative grammars that allow an incredible variety of complex forms and stimulate the user creativity. The research findings also elucidate some important conceptual issues, like the importance of original technology development to defend cultural identity.

Romance grammars in context and contact

Abstract: This Special Issue brings together ten articles authored by the participants and invited speakers of the Romance Grammars, Context and Contact (RGCC2021) workshop. This introductory article provides an overview of the workshop and summarizes the articles in the present collection.

Group decision-making method based on advanced aggregation operators with entropy and divergence measures under 2-tuple linguistic Pythagorean fuzzy environment

Abstract: 2-tuple linguistic Pythagorean fuzzy values (2TLPFVs) are flexible and more efficient tools to represent fuzzy linguistic information in complex real-world situations than 2-tuple linguistic values (2TLVs) and 2-tuple linguistic intuitionistic fuzzy values (2TLIFVs). This paper introduces a new score value function for 2TLPFVs and discusses its major properties. Two new aggregation operators (AOs) are presented, namely, the advanced 2-tuple linguistic Pythagorean fuzzy weighted average (Adv-2TLPFWA) operator and the advanced 2-tuple linguistic Pythagorean fuzzy weighted geometric (Adv-2TLPFWG) operator, which aggregate 2-tuple linguistic Pythagorean fuzzy information based on novel operational laws of 2TLPFVs. The work also exhibits several properties of these AOs in detail. Furthermore, the article discusses entropy and divergence measures under the 2-tuple linguistic Pythagorean fuzzy information environment. Finally, a new multiple attribute group decision-making (MAGDM) method is constructed to solve group decision-making problems in the 2-tuple linguistic Pythagorean fuzzy context. A real-life group decision-making problem of selecting the best green supplier for fruits and vegetables is investigated to verify the applicability and validity of the proposed approach. The sensitivity investigation and comparative analysis are conducted to illustrate the advantages of the proposed method.

LingFN: A Framenet for the Linguistic Domain

Abstract: AbstractFrame semantics is a theory of meaning in natural language, which defines the structure of the lexical semantic resources known as framenets. Both framenets and frame semantics have proved useful for a number of natural language processing (NLP) tasks. However, in this connection framenets have often been criticized for their limited coverage. A proposed reasonable-effort solution to this problem is to develop domain-specific (sublanguage) framenets to complement the corresponding general-language framenets for particular NLP tasks, and in the literature we find such initiatives covering domains such as medicine, soccer, and tourism. In this paper, we report on building a framenet to cover the terms and concepts encountered in descriptive linguistic grammars (written in English) i.e. a framenet for the linguistic domain (LingFN) to complement the general-language BFN.KeywordsFrame semanticsFramenetsSemantics

Merging Two Hierarchies of External Contextual Grammars with Subregular Selection

Abstract: In this paper, we continue the research on the power of contextual grammars with selection languages from subfamilies of the family of regular languages. In the past, two independent hierarchies have been obtained for external and internal contextual grammars, one based on selection languages defined by structural properties (finite, monoidal, nilpotent, combinational, definite, ordered, non-counting, power-separating, suffix-closed, commutative, circular, or union-free languages), the other one based on selection languages defined by resources (number of non-terminal symbols, production rules, or states needed for generating or accepting them). In the present paper, we compare the language families of these hierarchies for external contextual grammars and merge the hierarchies.

Tracking the emergence of a pitch hierarchy using an artificial grammar requires extended exposure

Abstract: Introduction The tonal hierarchy is a perceived musical structure implicitly learned through exposure. Previous studies have demonstrated that new grammars, for example based on the Bohlen-Pierce scale, can be learned in as little as 20 minutes. Methods In this study, we created two grammars derived from the Bohlen-Pierce scale similar in complexity to the western tonal hierarchy. Participants rated the goodness-of-fit of all Bohlen-Pierce scale notes in a probe tone paradigm before and after 30 minutes of exposure to one of the two grammars. Participants were then asked about their experience in a short interview. Results Results do not support the learning of the artificial grammar: correlations between goodness-of-fit ratings and pitch frequency distribution of a grammar were no different before and after exposure to a grammar. Interviews suggest that participants are bad at identifying the strategy they used to complete the task. Testing the strategies reported on the data revealed that ratings decreased with increasing distance of the probe tone from the tonic. Discussion This is consistent with early brain responses to chromatic pitches of the tonal hierarchy. We suggest that longer exposure time is necessary to learn more complex grammars.

Machine Translation Based on Syntactic Structure

Abstract: Machine translation refers to the process of translating source language sentences into semantically equivalent target language sentences through computers, and is an important research direction in the field of natural language processing. Neural machine translation only needs to use neural networks to achieve end-to-end translation from source language to target language, which has become the mainstream direction of machine translation research. There are also some problems such as fluent but not faithful translation, difficulty in processing rare words, poor performance of low-resource languages, poor cross-domain adaptability, and low utilization of prior knowledge. Inspired by the research of statistical machine translation, it has become a hot topic in the field of neural machine translation to integrate linguistic information into the neural machine translation model and utilize the existing linguistic knowledge to alleviate the inherent difficulties faced by neural machine translation and improve the translation quality. According to the classification system of grammatical units, researches in this field can be divided into three categories: neural machine translation (NMT) integrating word structure information, neural machine translation integrating phrase structure information and neural machine translation integrating syntactic structure information. Current researches also focus on these three aspects. Firstly, the challenges and causes of neural machine translation are described, and then the research status and main results of neural machine translation based on language knowledge are introduced. At last, the questions in existing research are summarized, and the future research direction is prospected.

Syntactic Generation of Research Thesis Sketches Across Disciplines Using Formal Grammars

Abstract: A part of the prerequisites for granting a degree in higher education institutions, students at postgraduate levels normally carry out research, which they do report in the form of theses or dissertations. Study has shown that students tend to go through difficulties in writing research thesis across all disciplines because they do not fully comprehend what constitutes a research thesis. This project proposes the syntactic generation of research thesis sketches across disciplines using formal grammars. Sketching is a synthesis technique which enables users to deliver high-level intuitions into a synthesis snag while leaving low-level details to synthesis tools. This work extends sketching to document generation for research thesis documents. Context-free grammar rules were designed and implemented for this task. A link to 10,000 generated thesis sketches was presented.

Teaching & learning guide for: Structured variation in child heritage speakers' grammars

Abstract: Shin (2022) argues that research on heritage language development in children can profit greatly by incorporating insights from Variationist Sociolinguistics. In particular, attention should be paid to structured variation so as to advance our understanding of heritage language development, which in turn can help us move beyond a deficit view of bilingualism. This teaching and learning guide accompanies Shin's (2022) article, and includes an annotated bibliography consisting of 10 relevant articles, a description of four websites to consult, and five sample lesson plans with student learning outcomes and activities to implement with students. Shin, Naomi & Karen Miller. 2022. Children's acquisition of morphosyntactic variation. Language Learning and Development, 18(2), 125–150. https://doi.org/10.1080/15475441.2021.1941031 In this theoretical keynote article, Shin and Miller outline propose a 4-step developmental pathway for children's acquisition of morphosyntactic variation. The article reviews the concept of structured variation and considers factors related to the input children receive as well as child-internal learning tendencies that shape how children learn variation. The keynote article is accompanied by seven commentaries by scholars of child language acquisition and a response by Shin and Miller. Smith, Jennifer & Mercedes Durham. 2019. Sociolinguistic variation in children's language. Acquiring community norms. Cambridge University Press. This book covers extensive empirical research on 29 children and their caregivers in Buckie, Scotland. The children's ages ranged from ages 2;10 to 4;2. The book covers lexical, lexical-phonological, phonetic, and morphosyntactic variation. Chapter 8 provides a synthesis of the main findings. For example, they note that in cases where caregivers were aware of the variation, they tended to use more standard forms with children than when speaking to other adults; for many variables, the children closely matched the caregivers' patterns; and some variable forms were acquired sequentially, while others were acquired simultaneously. Requena, Pablo. 2022. Variation versus deviation: Early bilingual acquisition of Spanish differential object marking. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism. https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.21001.req Requena's empirical study of bilingual children's Spanish differential object marking takes into account variation related to animacy (human vs. animal). He finds, contra previous research, that bilingual children's (including child heritage speakers) rates of differential object marking are in fact similar to those of monolingual children. Shin, Naomi, Pablo Requena & Anita Kemp. 2017. Bilingual and monolingual children's patterns of syntactic variation: Variable clitic placement in Spanish. In A. Auza & R. Schwartz (Eds.), Language development and disorders in Spanish-speaking children (pp. 63–88). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-53646-0 In this empirical study, Shin et al. analyse variable clitic placement (la quiero ver ∼ quiero verla) in the speech of Spanish-speaking children and adults in the U.S. and in Mexico. By taking into account the finite verb lexeme, they find that the usage patterns are similar across children and adults and across monolingual and bilingual communities. Shin, Naomi. 2022. Está abriendo, la abrió: Lexical knowledge, verb type and grammatical aspect shape child heritage speakers' direct object omission in Spanish. International Journal of Bilingualism. https://doi.org/10.1177/13670069221124475 Available via Open Access. While previous research has shown that bilingual children omit more direct objects than monolingual children, this empirical study reveals important systematicities in Spanish-English bilingual children's omission patterns. Studying child heritage speakers' grammars in their own right paves the way for a deeper understanding of the systematic nature of the developing heritage grammar. In particular, Shin analyses 61 child heritage speakers' direct object omission in responses to an elicited production task, and finds that the children's omission patterns are guided by progressive aspect and verb type, thus revealing an intricate and nuanced developmental pathway. Shin, Naomi, Alejandro Cuza & Liliana Sánchez. 2023. Structured variation, language experience, and crosslinguistic influence shape child heritage speakers' Spanish direct objects. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 26(2), 317–329. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1366728922000694. Available via Open Access. This empirical study investigates the direct objects produced by 40 child heritage speakers of Spanish in the U.S. and 24 monolingual children in Mexico. The study focuses on the effects of structured variation, in particular the influence of animacy on direct object type and direct object clitic gender, and finds that animacy shapes direct object usage among both groups of speakers. This is particularly relevant since it addresses the tendency to overestimate differences between heritage and monolingual speakers. In addition, the study uncovers some interesting usage patterns that would go unnoticed without careful attention to structured variation. Giancaspro, David, Silvia Pérez-Cortes, S., & Josh Higdon, J. (2022). (Ir)regular mood swings: Lexical variability in heritage speakers' oral production of subjunctive mood. Language Learning, 72(2), 456–496. https://doi.org/10.1111/lang.12489 This article presents an empirical study in which the authors find that morphological regularity mediates heritage speakers' production of the Spanish subjunctive and indicative verb forms. The authors argue that increased attention to intra-speaker variation is crucial for our understanding of heritage languages. Otheguy, Ricardo. 2016. The linguistic competence of second-generation bilinguals. A critique of “incomplete acquisition”. In C. Tortora, M. den Dikken, I. Montoya, & T. O'Neill (Eds.), Romance linguistics 2013. Selected papers from the 43rd linguistic symposium on Romance languages (LSRL) (pp. 301–319). John Benjamins. In this overview article Otheguy argues that the grammars of second-generation bilinguals (often called heritage speakers) should not be viewed as incomplete but instead as intact grammars that diverge from their input due to normal intergenerational language transmission in situations of language contact. The author criticises the use of monolingual controls for analyses of bilingual grammars as well as the very notion of incomplete acquisition. De Houwer, Annick. 2022. The danger of bilingual–monolingual comparisons in applied psycholinguistic research. Applied Psycholinguistics doi: 10.1017/S014271642200042X This overview article, published shortly after Shin's article in Language and Linguistics Compass was published, is an excellent accompaniment to Otheguy's (2016) article. De Houwer argues that relying on monolingual children as a comparison group for research on bilingual children's language development promotes a deficit view of bilingualism and threatens the well-being of bilingual children. She argues that studying bilingual children's grammars in their own right can help ‘inform educators, policy makers, and language and speech professionals’ and ‘will hopefully contribute to the well-being’ of bilingual children. Forrest, Aster. 2022. Rethinking difference: How bilingualism research helps us combat linguistic bias. Soleado Newsletter (pp. 1, 8–9). Dual Language Education of New Mexico. Access here: https://lobolanguage.unm.edu/publications/rethinkingdifference_sept2022_soleado.pdf This article, written for teachers, reviews how research on bilingual children's grammars can help us move beyond the monolingual bias that pervades our educational systems and ultimately combat the deficit view of bilingualism. The article reviews common myths about bilingualism and language variation and explains how particular language varieties become stigmatised in societies. The article then focuses on research on child heritage speakers of Spanish in the U.S. and discusses how input shapes grammatical development. And while the research shows that bilingual children's grammars may differ from those of monolingual children, the author stresses that difference is not the same as delay. This site, produced by the Lobo Language Acquisition Lab at the University of New Mexico, aims to promote bilingualism and minority language acquisition in New Mexico. The site includes resources, information about events, and a link to an online linguistic bias training module (https://bilingualism.unm.edu/resources/linguistic-bias-training.html). This site of the Harmonious Bilingualism Network aims to support research on bilingual development and to make sure that findings are disseminated to both researchers and communities. The site includes links to findings from scientific research as well as resources for families. The Bilingualism Matters site includes resources and information about bilingualism for researchers and communities. Bilingualism Matters has branches in the U.S., numerous European countries, and Israel. The National Heritage Language Resource Center, housed in UCLA, provides information and resources about research and teaching heritage languages. Student learning outcomes: Students will define structured variation and will provide examples of structured variation that are not described in detail in Shin (2022). The following questions can be given as homework or in-class work to be completed in groups or by individuals. 1a.1 Subject-level factor: __________ 1a.2 Verb-level factor: ___________ 1a.3 Discourse-level factor: _____________ Example 1 from Shin (2022) …primero vino aquí mi hermano…y, y luego yo porque yo nací hasta el último. Ø Tengo dos hermanos. ‘…first my brother came here…and, and later I because I was born last. (I) have two brothers’. Me gustan [las películas] un chorro y me interesa más que nada el cine alternativo, o sea, el cine experimental, filmes independientes y …. quiero llevar a mi novio! Porque él es muy Hollywood Production. O sea, sí Ø es bueno porque Ø escoge muy buenas películas, Ø tiene buen gusto. I like the movies a lot and alternative film interests me especially, I mean, experimental film, independent films and… (I) want to bring my boyfriend! Because he is very Hollywood Production. I mean, (he) is good because (he) chooses very good films, (he) has good taste. 1d. How does Shin 2022 define structured variation? Why is the word ‘structured’ important here? 1e. True or false: There has been more research on structured variation in child language than in adult language. 1f. True or false: There has been more research on structured variation in monolingual child language than in bilingual child language. 1g. Insert the correct term for each example Slide 1—introduce the phenomenon with examples Slide 2—present the authors and article title selected Slide 3—brief overview of a few methodological points: Where do the data come from? Were there any contexts that were considered categorical rather than variable and thus excluded? If so, list one or two such exclusions. Slide 4: List 2-3 factors that the authors coded with examples illustrating the coding. Slide 5: Present the results for these 2-3 factors (which ones promoted variant x? variant y?). Slide 6: Conclusions—how does the phenomenon illustrate the concept of structured variation? Expression versus omission of complementiser that. Consult Torres Cacoullos & Walker (2009) On the persistence of grammar in discourse formulas: a variationist study of that. Linguistics 47–1 (2009), 1–43 DOI 10.1515/LING.2009.001 Variation between 'is' and 'are' with plural subjects. Consult Smith, J., & Durham, M. (2019). Sociolinguistic variation in children's language. Acquiring community norms. Cambridge University Press. Dequeísmo in Spanish. Consult Potowski & Shin (2019); Schwenter, S. 1999. Evidentiality in Spanish Morphosyntax: A Reanalysis of (de)queísmo. In M.J. Serrano (ed). Estudios de la variación sintáctica. Madrid: Vervuert/Iberoamericana, 65–87. Kanwit, M. 2015. The Role of Discourse Topic in Evidentiality Marking: Variable (De)queísmo in Caracas. eHumanista/IVITRA 8: 446–470. 'Se lo' versus 'se los' to refer to singular direct objects in Spanish. Consult Schwenter & Hoff. 2021. Variable constraints on se lo(s) in Mexican Spanish. In M. Díaz-Campos & S. Sessarego (Eds.), Aspects of Latin American Dialectology. In honor of Terrell A. Morgan, 47–68. John Benjamins. Student learning outcomes: Students will explore definitions of heritage speakers and discuss language attitudes and language ideologies and how these relate to perceptions of heritage speakers' language abilities. https://www.cal.org/heritage/pdfs/Who-is-a-Heritage-Language-Learner.pdf Sanchez-Munoz, Ana. (2016). Heritage language healing? Learners' attitudes and damage control in a heritage language classroom. 10.1075/sibil.49.11san. Tseng, A. (2021). ‘Qué barbaridad, son latinos y deberían saber español primero’: Language ideology, agency, and heritage language insecurity across immigrant generations. Applied Linguistics, 42(1), 113–135. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/amaa004 What are some defining characteristics of heritage speakers? Are you a heritage speaker? Do you know any heritage speakers? What are some examples of heritage speakers? How do their experiences compare to each other? How do they differ? How do heritage speakers feel about their heritage language abilities? What factors contribute to how they feel about their language abilities? How are heritage speakers' language abilities viewed by society? What factors shape those views? Shin writes that ‘a deficit view [of child heritage speakers' grammars] can lead to children being told that the way they talk is wrong, which in turn can lead to linguistic insecurity and ultimately an unwillingness to speak the heritage language’. Do you agree? Do you know of any examples that illustrate this phenomenon? Student learning outcomes: Students will present summaries of empirical research that compares monolingual and bilingual children's grammars. Students will debate whether the findings show that the two groups are similar or different, and will discuss how structured variation plays a role in conclusions reached. Shin reviews research on bilingual Spanish-speaking children's differential object marking, variable clitic placement and subject pronoun expression to demonstrate that investigating structured variation helps us to avoid overestimations of differences between monolingual children and child heritage speakers. Divide the class into two groups in order to compare conclusions reached when structured variation is an important focus of the research versus when it is not. Then hold a debate between the two groups answering the question: ‘Do child heritage speakers differ from monolingual children in their production of x feature?’ There are various ways to do this. One option is to focus on one structure only (e.g., differential object marking). Another option is to focus on multiple structures all in one debate. Slide 1: Name of article and author (include author's picture if found on the Internet) Slide 2: Example of linguistic structure examined (e.g., example of differential object marking) Slide 3: Participants in study Slide 4: Methods (experiment? Naturalistic data?) Slide 5: Main findings from study Slide 6: Conclusion Group 1—Difference. Read: Ticio, E. 2015. Differential object marking in Spanish-English early bilinguals. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 5(1), 62–90. https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.5.1.03tic Group 2—No difference. Read Requena 2022. Variation versus deviation: Early bilingual acquisition of Spanish differential object marking. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism. https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.21001.req Group 1—Difference. Read Pérez-Leroux, A. T., Cuza, A., & Thomas, D. (2011). Clitic placement in Spanish–English bilingual children. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 14(2), 221–232. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1366728910000234 Group 2—No difference. Read Shin, N., Requena, P., & Kemp, A. (2017). Bilingual and monolingual children's patterns of syntactic variation: Variable clitic placement in Spanish. In A. Auza & R. Schwartz (Eds.), Language development and disorders in Spanish-speaking children (pp. 63–88). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-53646-0 Group 1—Difference. Montrul, S., & Sánchez-Walker, N. (2015). Subject expression in bilingual school-age children in the United States. In A. M. Carvalho, R. Orozco, & N. Shin (Eds.), Spanish subject pronoun expression in Spanish: A cross-dialectical perspective (pp. 231–247). Georgetown University Press. Group 2—No difference. Shin, N., & Van Buren, J. (2016). Maintenance of Spanish subject pronoun expression patterns among bilingual children of farmworkers in Washington/Montana. Spanish in Context, 13(2), 173–194. https://doi.org/10.1075/sic.13.2.01shi Slide 1: Introduction to differential object marking Slide 2: brief review of study of differential object marking (participants, method, results) Slide 3: Introduction to variable clitic placement Slide 4: brief review of study of variable clitic placement (participants, method, results) Slide 5: Introduction to subject pronoun expression Slide 6: brief review of study of subject pronoun expression (participants, method, results) Slide 7: conclusion Differential object marking: Ticio, E. (2015). Differential object marking in Spanish-English early bilinguals. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism, 5(1), 62–90. https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.5.1.03tic Variable clitic placement: Pérez-Leroux, A. T., Cuza, A., & Thomas, D. (2011). Clitic placement in Spanish–English bilingual children. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 14(2), 221–232. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1366728910000234 Subject pronoun expression: Montrul, S., & Sánchez-Walker, N. (2015). Subject expression in bilingual school-age children in the United States. In A. M. Carvalho, R. Orozco, & N. Shin (Eds.), Spanish subject pronoun expression in Spanish: A cross-dialectical perspective (pp. 231–247). Georgetown University Press. Differential object marking: Requena 2022. Variation versus deviation: Early bilingual acquisition of Spanish differential object marking. Linguistic Approaches to Bilingualism. https://doi.org/10.1075/lab.21001.req Variable clitic placement: choose between Shin, N., Requena, P., & Kemp, A. (2017). Bilingual and monolingual children's patterns of syntactic variation: Variable clitic placement in Spanish. In A. Auza & R. Schwartz (Eds.), Language development and disorders in Spanish-speaking children (pp. 63–88). Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-53646-0 Subject pronoun expression: Shin, N., & Van Buren, J. (2016). Maintenance of Spanish subject pronoun expression patterns among bilingual children of farmworkers in Washington/Montana. Spanish in Context, 13(2), 173–194. https://doi.org/10.1075/sic.13.2.01shi After initial presentations, groups meet to discuss questions they want to pose to the other team. They should consider any weaknesses in the research and can ask for follow-up information including more specific information about participants, methods, etc. The lesson can culminate with a whole-group discussion about the strengths and weaknesses of the various studies and ideas for future research. Individual work rather than group work (e.g. for an online course). Students write an essay discussing whether child heritage speakers differ from monolingual children for the structures listed above. They are asked to draw on the articles listed above. Online discussion board. Students are asked to write about whether child heritage speakers differ from monolingual children. There can be different threads for each structure. Points are given for responses that draw on the articles listed above. Students must respond to at least 2 classmates' posts. Student learning outcomes: Students will identify factors that contribute to direct object omission and direct object clitic gender matching in Spanish. Students will discuss how analyses of structured variation advance our understanding of child heritage speakers' developing grammars. Shin argues that studying patterns of structured variation helps reveal the systematicities. She focuses on direct object omission and direct object clitic gender in Spanish to make this point. At the end of this lesson students should show a clear understanding of the grammatical patterns discussed and how they illustrate complexities in the children's grammars. In pairs, ask each other to rate the following sentences and then discuss whether/why some sound better than others. What did Ana do with the window? She closed. What is Ana doing with the window? She is closing. What did Ana do with the cereal? She ate. What is Ana doing with the cereal? She's eating. Shin found that child heritage speakers of Spanish omitted more direct objects with verbs that sometimes occur without direct objects among Spanish-speaking adults. This means that the children were likelier to omit with which verb: ‘to close’ or ‘to eat’? Shin found that child heritage speakers of Spanish omitted more direct objects with verbs in the progressive form. This means that the children were likelier to omit in the a or b contexts from question 4.1A above? Why do the children omit more often with progressive forms? Consult the following article to find out what Shin proposes as an explanation and summarise the explanation in 2-4 sentences Shin, Naomi. 2022. Está abriendo, la abrió: Lexical knowledge, verb type and grammatical aspect shape child heritage speakers' direct object omission in Spanish. International Journal of Bilingualism. https://doi.org/10.1177/13670069221124475 Available via Open Access. How does the impact of the progressive illustrate the importance of examining structured variation in child heritage speakers' grammars? Shin et al. argue that bilingual children's gender mismatches are not random; they occur more in certain contexts. What are those contexts? Shin et al. found that some children produce unique patterns, such as matching the clitic gender to the subject rather than the direct object. How might children create these unique patterns? What kind of evidence would children need to extract a generalisation that is unique but systematic? Do you think these can occur in monolingual settings, too? Why/why not? How does Shin et al.’s study illustrate the importance of examining structured variation in child heritage speakers' grammars? Student learning outcomes: Students will consider the applications of research on structured variation for families, children, teachers, and policymakers. Collins, B. A., Toppelberg, C. O., Suárez-Orozco, C., O'Connor, E., & Nieto-Castañón, A. (2011). Cross-sectional associations of Spanish and English competence and wellbeing in Latino children of immigrants in kindergarten. International Journal of Sociology of Language, 208, 5–24. De Houwer, Annick. 2022. The danger of bilingual–monolingual comparisons in applied psycholinguistic research. Applied Psycholinguistics doi:10.1017/S014271642200042X Forrest, Aster. 2022. Rethinking difference: How bilingualism research helps us combat linguistic bias. Soleado Newsletter (pp. 1, 8–9). Dual Language Education of New Mexico. Available here: https://lobolanguage.unm.edu/publications/rethinkingdifference_sept2022_soleado.pdf Genesee, F. (2017). The home language: An English language learner's most valuable resource. Access here: http://www.colorincolorado.org/article/home-language-english-language-learners-most-valuable-resource Otheguy, Ricardo. 2016. The linguistic competence of second-generation bilinguals. A critique of “incomplete acquisition”. In C. Tortora, M. den Dikken, I. Montoya, & T. O'Neill (Eds.), Romance linguistics 2013. Selected papers from the 43rd linguistic symposium on Romance languages (LSRL) (pp. 301–319). John Benjamins Scholars argue that there is a widespread deficit view of bilingualism and a monolingual bias in many societies. What are some examples of this bias and how it affects society and educational settings? What are some of the benefits of bilingualism? Do you believe that research can help us move beyond monolingual biases and a deficit view of bilingualism? Do you agree with Shin that ‘examining patterns of variation …[can] help us move beyond a deficit view of heritage grammars’. Why? Why not? In order to make research beneficial to families, children, teachers, and policymakers, we must ensure that relevant research findings are shared with people outside academia. Consult the websites listed in the online materials section above as well as Genesee (2017) and Forrest (2022) and describe how some researchers are trying to reach audiences beyond academia. What are some other ways we can accomplish this? Naomi Shin is Professor in the Department of Linguistics and the Department of Spanish & Portuguese at the University of New Mexico. She co-directs UNM's Lobo Language Acquisition Lab, which is engaged in research on children's acquisition of minority languages and community outreach efforts promoting bilingualism in New Mexico. Shin's primary interests include child language acquisition, bilingualism, and sociolinguistics. Her research focuses on patterns of morphosyntactic variation, examining how these patterns are acquired during childhood and how they change in situations of language contact. She has also developed a sociolinguistic approach to teaching Spanish grammar, which culminated in the textbook Gramática Española: Variación Social (with K. Potowski).

A User Experience and Usability Test on Creating Games Specified as Graph Grammars

Abstract: GrameStation is a game engine based on Graph Grammar that allows creating and playing games modeled with this language. Graph Grammar is an intuitive formal language, but people who do not have previous experience with it may have difficulty understanding/specifying games in this way. Therefore, we propose an experiment to analyze the support provided by GrameStation during the creation of games modeled as Graph Grammars in order to facilitate this task. We analyzed three groups of people with different levels of knowledge about Graph Grammar. They created a game following provided instructions and answered a questionnaire. It is concluded that GrameStation is suitable for those who have experience with it, but presents gaps for people without experience. These results will guide the implementation of pedagogical agents in the tool.

Improving English-Assamese Neural Machine Translation Using Transliteration-Based Approach

Abstract: Natural language translation is a well-defined task of linguistic technology that minimizes communication gap among people of diverse linguistic backgrounds. Although neural machine translation attains remarkable translational performance, it requires adequate amount of train data, which is a challenging task for low-resource language pair translation. Also, neural machine translation handles rare word problems, i.e., low-frequency words translation at the subword level, but it shows weakness for highly inflected language translation. In this work, we have explored neural machine translation on low-resource English-Assamese language pair with a proposed transliteration approach in the data preprocessing step. In the transliteration approach, the source language is transliterated into target language script that leverages a smaller subword vocabulary for the source-target languages. Moreover, the pre-trained embeddings on the monolingual data of transliterated source and target languages are used in the training process. With our approach, the neural machine translation significantly improves translational performance for English-to-Assamese and Assamese-to-English translation and obtain state-of-the-art results.

Neural Machine Translation by Fusing Key Information of Text

Abstract: When the Transformer proposed by Google in 2017, it was first used for machine translation tasks and achieved the state of the art at that time. Although the current neural machine translation model can generate high quality translation results, there are still mistranslations and omissions in the translation of key information of long sentences. On the other hand, the most important part in traditional translation tasks is the translation of key information. In the translation results, as long as the key information is translated accurately and completely, even if other parts of the results are translated incorrect, the final translation results’ quality can still be guaranteed. In order to solve the problem of mistranslation and missed translation effectively, and improve the accuracy and completeness of long sentence translation in machine translation, this paper proposes a key information fused neural machine translation model based on Transformer. The model proposed in this paper extracts the keywords of the source language text separately as the input of the encoder. After the same encoding as the source language text, it is fused with the output of the source language text encoded by the encoder, then the key information is processed and input into the decoder. With incorporating keyword information from the source language sentence, the model’s performance in the task of translating long sentences is very reliable. In order to verify the effectiveness of the method of fusion of key information proposed in this paper, a series of experiments were carried out on the verification set. The experimental results show that the Bilingual Evaluation Understudy (BLEU) score of the model proposed in this paper on the Workshop on Machine Translation (WMT) 2017 test dataset is higher than the BLEU score of Transformer proposed by Google on the WMT2017 test dataset. The experimental results show the advantages of the model proposed in this paper.