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Types of information about linguistic units

Introduction to LFG Kersti Börjars & Nigel Vincent {k.borjars, n.vincent}@man.ac.uk University of Manchester Winter school in LFG July 4-8 2004 University of Canterbury Christchurch, New Zealand.

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Types of information about linguistic units

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  1. Introduction to LFGKersti Börjars & Nigel Vincent{k.borjars, n.vincent}@man.ac.ukUniversity of ManchesterWinter school in LFGJuly 4-8 2004University of CanterburyChristchurch, New Zealand

  2. Part 1Basic building blocks and c-structure to f-structure mappingKersti BörjarsIn order to make sense of this, you will need to run the presentation, it relies on animations and a printed version will not be very clear.Feel free to use it if you find it helpful, but please give source.

  3. Types of information about linguistic units (1) The dog ate the rats. • Syntactic structure, c-structurethe dog forms a constituent in (1) • Functional information, f-structurethe dog is the subject in (1)(1) is in past tense • Argument structure, a-structureeat takes two arguments • Information structure • Phonetic structure • …

  4. Correspondence between dimensions (1) The dog ate the rats. subject dog agent Function Semanticrole object rats theme (2) The rats were eaten by the dog. subject dog agent Function Semanticrole object rats theme

  5. Non-one-to-one correspondence Parallel correspondence approach a-structure c-structure mapping relations f-structure

  6. a-structure Information relating to the thematic roles associated with a predicate (3) a. tickle < agent, patient> b. like < experiencer, theme> Arguments are represented as features. Lexical Mapping Theory maps the arguments onto f-structure.

  7. f-structure: attributes A feature value matrix: an unordered set of feature-value pair Types of attributes:

  8. f-structure:values Types of values: f-structures are reasonably invariant across languages

  9.  Functional features f-structure:examples  Semantic feature she Sw hon  Semantic feature The goal keeper smiled.  Grammatical relation Sw Målvakten log.  Functional feature

  10. c-structure Category labelled trees Cross linguistic variation Both endocentric (headed) and exocentric (non-headed) structures allowed

  11. c-structure: functional categories Functional categories are used when certain functional features are associated with positional properties Warlpiri: • (6) a. wita-jarra-rlu ka-pala wajili-pi-nyi • small-DUAL-ERGPRES-3DUSUBJ chase-NPAST • yalumpu kurdu-jarra-rlu maliki • that.ABS child-DUAL-ERG dog.ABS b. All permutations possible as long as inflectional bundle stays in second position c. IP I’ I ka-pala

  12. c-structure: functional categories English: • a. The rats will eat the dog. b. Will the rats eat the dog? • a. The rats ate the dog. b. *Ate the rats the dog? Special status of auxiliary verbs: (9) IP I’ NP I VP will

  13. c-structure: an interlude Principle of Economy of Expression: all phrase structure nodes are optional unless required by independent principles (completeness, coherence, semantic expressivity) IP (11) (10) The rats ate the dog. NP I’ The rats VP I VP V NP ate the dog

  14. c-structure: “head to head movement” Xn C-structure heads are f-structure heads: X F’ Complements of functional categories are f-structure co-heads: XP

  15. c-structure Latin: (10) a. Canis rattos devoravit. dog.NOM rat.ACC.PL eat.PERF.3SG b. all orders in possible under right information structural conditions Functional information on verb not associated with position, so no argument for a functional category. (11) S S Etc. NP NP V NP V NP

  16. IP NP I’ VP The dog V NP ate the rats S S NP NP V NP NP V canis rattos devoravit rattos canis devoravit Mapping between f-structure and c-structure Position: Spec-IP Case: nominative Case: accusative Position: sister of V

  17. (12) IP NP I’ VP D N The dog V NP ate D N the rats Mapping between f-structure and c-structure f1 f2 f3 f6 f4 f5 f7 f8 f9 f10

  18. Basic lexical entries the dog ate rats

  19. (12) IP f1 NP f2 I’ f3 f6 VP f4 N f5 D dog The f7 NP V f8 ate D f9 N f10 the rats Mapping between f-structure and c-structure f1 SUBJ = f2 f4 DEF = + f1 = f3 f4 PERS = 3 f3 = f6 f5 PRED = ‘dog’ f6 = f7 f5 NUM = sg f7 PRED = ‘eat <SUBJ OBJ>’ f6 OBJ = f8 f2 = f4 f7 TENSE = past f2 = f5 f9 DEF = + f8 = f9 f9 PERS = 3 f8 = f10 f10 PRED = ‘rat’ f10 NUM = pl

  20. f1 SUBJ = f2 f4 DEF = + f1 = f3 f5 PRED = ‘dog’ f2 = f4 f5 NUM = sg f2 = f5 f7 PRED = ‘eat <SUBJ OBJ>’ f3 = f6 f7 TENSE = past f6 = f7 f9 DEF = + f6 OBJ = f8 f10 PRED = ‘rat’ f8 = f9 f10 NUM = pl f9 = f10 Mapping between f-structure and c-structure f2 f4 f5 f8 f9 f10 f7 f1 f3 f6

  21. Well-formedness conditions on f-structure Completeness condition: (i) all argument functions specified in the value of the PRED feature must be present in the local f-structure, (ii) all arguments so specified must have a PRED value. Coherence condition: (i) all argument functions in an f-structure must be specified by their local PRED, (ii) all functions which have a PRED value must be arguments of the element which specifies them. Functional uniqueness: Any attribute has only one value

  22. Well-formedness conditions on f-structure (14) a. *Oscar tickled. Incomplete b. *Oscar tickled Sarah the dog’s tummy. Incoherent c. *The sky rained. Incoherent

  23. Well-formedness conditions on f-structure (14) d. *Tickles her. e. tickles f. Coherent? Yes Complete? No, cf (ii), no PRED value for SUBJ

  24. Well-formedness conditions on f-structure (14) g. *They tickles her. h. tickles i. they j. f. Functional uniqueness violated

  25. c-structure: back to Latin (10) a. Canis rattos devoravit. dog.NOM rat.ACC.PL eat.PERF.3SG b. all orders in possible under right information structural conditions (11) S S Etc. NP NP V NP V NP Morphology builds f-structure: (15) a. b.

  26. c-structure: back to Latin S (16) NP NP V canis rattos devoravit (15) a. b.

  27. More on functions

  28. More on functions

  29. Discourse functions (17) a. Beans, I like. FOCUS b. In Spec-CP Functional uncertainty c. Incomplete? Complete

  30. COMP function (18) a. Oscar claimed that he liked LFG. b. claim c. VP V CP claimed that he liked LFG

  31. OBJ and OBL  functions Both OBJ and OBL are argument functions which can occur in the PRED feature of a verb. In English, an OBL is always a PP, whereas an OBJ is an NP. A function subscripted with a  is restricted to a certain thematic role. (19) a. Oscar gave Sarah a book. b. Oscar gave a book to Sarah. In (19a), a book is OBJ restricted to the role of theme, hence it is an OBJTHEME. The PP to Sarah in (19b), isrestricted to having a recipient role, hence it is an OBLRECIP.

  32. OBJ function (19) The teacher bought Sarah a book. Sarah is OBJ a book is OBJ • Provide the lexical entry for bought and the other words; • Provide the phrase structure rule that is required (remember that it does not have to be binary branching); • Add annotations to the phrase structure rule; • Draw the tree using the new rule and the ones we have used in the class; • Add numbered f-structure variables to each node (f1, f2, etc); • Write down the equations and solve them to give you the correct f-structure.

  33. Reading The main reading for this part comes from: Falk, Yehuda 2001. Lexical-Functional Grammar. An introduction to parallel constraint-based syntax. Stanford, Ca: CSLI Publications. Chapters 1-3 If you want to have some additional reading, try: Bresnan, Joan (2001) Lexical Functional Syntax. Oxford: Blackwell. Chapters 1-4 Dalrymple, Mary (2001) Lexical Functional Grammar. [Syntax and Semantics 34]. New York: Academic Press. Chapters 1-5.

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