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September 19, 2007. 11-721: Grammars and Lexicons Lori Levin. Roles of Noun Phrases. Semantic Roles Grammatical Relations Pragmatic Relations . Grammatical Relations. Subject Sam interviewed Sue. Sue was interviewed by Sam. Object Sam interviewed Sue. Sam gave Sue a book.
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September 19, 2007 11-721: Grammars and Lexicons Lori Levin
Roles of Noun Phrases • Semantic Roles • Grammatical Relations • Pragmatic Relations
Grammatical Relations • Subject • Sam interviewed Sue. • Sue was interviewed by Sam. • Object • Sam interviewed Sue. • Sam gave Sue a book. • Oblique • Sam talked with Sue. • Sam presented a book to Sue. • Sam walked along the river. • Second object • Same gave Sue a book. • Think of this as an “unemployed” object. • Perlmutter and Postal, Relational Grammar
Indirect Object Not a grammatical Relation? Sam (agent, subject) gave Sue (recipient, object) a book (theme, second object) Sam (agent, subject) gave a book (theme, object) to Sue (recipient, oblique)
Grammatical Relations • Coding Properties • Behavioral Properties
VP VP V NP V PP OBJ OBL How to understand an English Sentence [s [np Sam] [vp interviewed [np Sue ]]] constituent structure SUBJ PRED OBJ grammatical rlns. agent interview patient semantic roles interview< agent patient > lexical mapping SUBJ OBJ Encoding of Gml. Rlns. For English!!! S NP SUBJ
VP VP V NP V PP OBJ OBL How to understand an English Sentence [s [np Sue] [vp was interviewed [np by Sam ]]] constituent str. SUBJ PRED OBL grammatical rlns. patient interview agent semantic roles interview< agent patient > lexical mapping OBL SUBJ Encoding of Gml. Rlns. For English!!! S NP SUBJ
English: Grammatical relations encoded by word order The cat chases the dogs. The cats chase the dog. What does this mean? *The cats chases the dog.
Italian: grammatical relations encoded by verb agreement Il gatto insegue i cani. I gatti inseguono il cane. cat-sg chase-3sg dog-pl cat-pl chase-3pl dog-sg Insegue il gatto i cani. Il cane inseguono i gatti. What does this mean? Il gatto inseguono i cani.
Encoding of Grammatical Relations • Brian MacWhinney: Competition Model • Word order and agreement compete for encoding of grammatical relations. • Word order is stronger in English • Agreement is stronger in Italian.
Coding Properties of Grammatical Relations • Agreement • Word order • Case marking • See handout from Van Valin, Chapter 2
Ergative, Absolutive, Nominative, and Accusative The man planted the seeds. A = subject of A 0 transitive verb O = object of The man eats meat. transitive verb A 0 The man sleeps. S = single argument S of intransitive verb The man yawns. S
Nominative and Accusative • He planted the seeds. Nominative: • Heeats meat. A and S • He sleeps. have the same • He yawns. form. • Sam saw him. Accusative: O is different from A and S.
Ergative and Absolutive Burushaski, (isolate -- not related to any other known languages, Pakistan), from Manning, Ergativity Ne hír-e phaló bók-i. the.MASC man-ERG seed.PL.ABS sow-3SG.MASC.S The man planted the seeds. Ne hír yált-i. the.MASC man.ABS yawn.PRET-3SG.MASC.S The man yawned. Ergative: -e, on A only Absolutive: no suffix on S and O
Ergative and Absolutive Greenlandic Eskimo, (Manning, Ergativity) Oli-p neqi neri-vaa Oli-ERG meat.ABS eat-IND.TR.3SG.3SG Oli eats meat. Oli sinippoq Oli.ABS sleep-IND.INTR.3SG Oli sleeps. Ergative: -p, on A only Absolutive: no suffix on S and O
Unmarked Cases • Nominative (A, S) and Absolutive (S, O) are unmarked in many languages. • There is no suffix, prefix, particle, etc. • Why are some cases unmarked? • If you need to tell the difference between two things (A and O), you only need to mark one of them. • Accusative: O is marked. • Ergative: A is marked. • If there is only an S, it doesn’t need to be marked because it doesn’t need to be distinguished from anything.
Behavioral properties of grammatical relations • Behavioral property 1: Reflexive Pronouns • Reflexive pronouns: • Myself, yourself, himself, herself, itself, ourselves, yourselves, themselves • Regular pronouns: • I, me, you, he, she, him, her, it, we, us, they, them • Antecedent: The noun phrase that the pronoun refers to. • Sue thinks that Sam saw her.
Reflexive Pronouns in English • James(i) saw himself(i). • Antecedent is subject. • James(i) told Miriam(j) about himself(i). • Antecedent is subject. • James(i) told Miriam(j) about herself(j). • Antecedent is direct object. • Miriam(j) talked to/with Sam(i) about himself(i). • Antecedent is oblique (prepositional phrase).
Reflexive Pronouns in Norwegian • Reflexive pronoun #1: • Jon(i) fortalte meg om seg selv(i). John told me about himself. (Antecedent is subject.) • *Vi fortalte Jon(i) om seg selv(i). We told John about himself. Antecedent must be the subject.
Reflexive Pronouns in Norwegian • Reflexive pronoun #2: • *Jon(i) snakker om ham selv(i). John talks about himself. (Antecedent is subject.) • Vi fortalte Jon(i) om ham selv(i). We told John about himself. Antecedent cannot be the subject.