Syntax-Semantics Mapping Rajat Kumar Mohanty CFILT

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Outline Conceptual constituents Lexical categories and phrasal categories Syntax and conceptual structure Internal structure of arguments Syntactic and ontological category Mapping

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Conceptual Constituents The semantic structure of a sentence is built up from a hierarchical arrangement of conceptual constituents. Each of them belongs to a major ontological category or semantic part of speech: Thing, Place, Path, Event, State, Manner, and Property They are realized syntactically by means of major phrasal constituents (such as, NP, S, PP, AP, AdvP)

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Example Bill ran into the room Syntactic Structure: [ S [ NP Bill] [ VP ran [ PP into [ NP the room]]] ] Conceptual Structure: Event GO ([ Thing Bill ], [ Path TO [ Place IN [ Thing the room] ] ])

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Unmarked realization Thing : NP Place and Path : PP Property : AP Manner : AdvP Event and State : S

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Lexical Categories and Phrasal Categories Corresponding to each lexical category (e.g., N, V, A, P, etc) there is a major phrasal category (e.g., NP, VP, AP, PP, etc.). Each phrasal category contains a head–plus a variety of possible modifiers (typically other phrasal categories) The phrasal category maximizes the possible modifiers of the lexical category. E.g., [ NP the enemy’s destruction of the city ]

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Syntax and Conceptual Structure Every major phrasal constituent in the syntax of a sentence corresponds to a conceptual constituent (such as, THING, EVENT, PLACE, etc.). The lexical head X of a major phrasal constituent corresponds to a function in conceptual structure. E.g., [ S [ NP The man] [ VP put [ NP the book] [ PP on the table] ]]

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Example The verb put : head of the S Subcategorizes A subject NP A direct object NP A PP Expresses a semantic function that maps three arguments into an [EVENT]. Two [THING]s and a [PLACE]. EVENT PUT ( THINGPLACE THE MAN THING, THE BOOK, ON THE TABLE )

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Internal Structure of Arguments The first two arguments: Man and book Subcategorize nothing Have no internal functional structure Are treated as zero-place functions that map into [THING] The head of the third argument: on Subcategorizes an NP Has internal functional structure Expresses a one-place function that maps a [THING] into [PLACE]

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Complete Functional Structure EVENT PUT ( THING PLACE THE MAN THING, THE BOOK ON (, THING THE MAN ) ) This sentence is regarded as a three-place relation between two [THING]s and a [PLACE], mediated by the verb put.

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Syntactic and Ontological Category Mapping The semantics of the head of the major phrasal constituent decides the ontological category. The relationship between syntactic and ontological category is not one-to-one. Examples Put maps into [EVENT] Know, believe, be map into [STATE] Table, house map into [THING] Destruction map into [EVENT] Adjectives map into [PROPERTY] Prepositions map into [PLACE] and [PATH]

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Mapping a Thing into a Path The preposition into is a function that maps a thing – the reference object – into a Path. To satisfy the well-formedness conditions on the use of into, its sister phrase must be an NP (the syntactic condition) and must express a concept of a category Thing (the semantic condition). PATH TO ( THING THE ROOM ) PLACE IN ()

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Thematic Roles The case of open (Are these sentences underlying related?) John opened the door with a key. The door was opened by John with a key. The key opened the door. Thematic Roles are part of the level of conceptual structure, not part of syntax.

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Thematic Roles Agent: The instigator of an event Patient: A patient is directly affected by an action Theme: the object in motion or being located Source: the object from which motion proceeds usually appears structurally as the argument of the PATH-function FROM Goal: the object to which motion proceeds The argument of the PATH-function of TO

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Place- and Path-function PLACE PATH Place Path PLACE-FUNCTION ( [THING] ) (e.g., in the room) (e.g., to the station) TO FROM TOWARD VIA ( [THING] )

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Examples John passed the house EVENT PASS ( THING PATH JOHN VIA ( THING THE HOUSE ) ),

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Example John entered the room EVENT ENTER ( THING PATH JOHN TO ( PLACE IN ( ) ), THING THE ROOM )

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT A few examples for discussion (in the context of UNL) John hit Bill (theme, goal) John threw the ball (source, theme) Bill entered the room (theme, goal) Bill received a letter (goal, theme) John gave a book to Mary (source, theme, goal) John got a book from Mary (goal, theme, source) John promised Mary to give a book (source, goal, theme) John order Mary to leave the place (source, goal, theme)

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Patient The affected entity Test frame: What happened to NP was… What Y did to NP was… Examples: John hit Mary. (patient/ goal) The car hit the tree. (patient/ goal) Mary hit the ball into the field. (patient/ theme) The NPs being patients do not eliminate their other roles.

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Actor and other thematic roles Actor test frame: What the NP did was… It is necessary to specify what moves where under whose agency Examples: The sun radiates heat. (Actor/ source) John ran down the hill. (Actor/ theme) The sponge absorbed the water. (Actor/ goal)

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT The Tier Theory Conceptual roles fall into two tiers: Thematic tier (dealing with motion and location) Action tier (dealing with Actor-Patient relationship)

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Informal Annotation (two tiers) John hit Bill theme goal ActorPatient John threw the ball source theme Actor Patient Bill entered the room Themegoal Actor--- (no sense of a patient)

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Informal Annotation (two tiers) Bill received a letter goaltheme--- John gave a book to Mary sourcethemegoal ActorPatient John got a book from Mary goalthemesource ActorPatient

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Informal Annotation (two tiers) Bill rolled down the hill ThemeGoal Actor/Patient What Bill did was… What happened to Bill was.. The wind rolled the ball down the hill ---themegoal ActorPatient Agent: Extrinsic instigator of an action Volitional actor

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Role of Instrument It plays the role in the means by which the Actor accomplishes the action. (with NP can be paraphrased as by means of) The Actor acts on the instrument The instrument acts on the Patient Examples: John opened the door with a key. The door was opened by John with a key. The key opened the door.

Friday, June 03, 2005 CFILT Sources & further Readings Jackendoff, R Semantic Structures. The MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. Jackendoff, R Semantics and Cognition. The MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass. Talmy, L Force Dynamics in Language and Thought. Cognitive Science 12. Cullicover, P. and W. Wilkins Control, PRO and the Projection Principle. Language 62.