GPSG, HPSG, LFG

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GPSG, HPSG, LFG

• Jack Hoeksema

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Syntax in the 1970s

• Rapid growth of transformations
• Movement Wh-movement, relativisation,
  topicalization, V2, Subject-Aux inversion,
  Extraposition, Passivization, Raising to Subject,
  Raising to Object, Verb Raising,Quantifier
  Raising, clitic movement, etc.
• Deletion Gapping, RNR, conjunction reduction,
  VP-deletion, have/be deletion, complementizer
  deletion, Equi-NP deletion

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Leading to

• Complex derivations, reaching their apex in
  generative semantics, with extremely abstract
  underlying structures related to surface forms by
  a multitude of transformations

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E.g. Postal 1970 On the surface verb remind

• me PERCEIVE Larry SIMILAR Winston Churchill gt
• Larry reminds me of Winston Churchill

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Emonds 1970 and 1976

• Limit the possibilities of transformations
• Structure-preserving transformations only
• So no tree-pruning, nor tree-building by means
  of transformations

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Brame 1976 Conjectures and Refutations in Syntax
and Semantics

• Chain of mutually dependent transformations
  Equi-NP deletion, passive, raising to object
• If one falls, so will the others
• Making the transformational theory a house of
  cards

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Bresnan 1978 Realistic syntax

• Problem with 1960s transformational syntax was
  lack of psycholinguistic support
• The theory of derivational complexity had fallen
  apart it does not predict order of acquisition,
  nor ease of computation
• A more realistic theory would not use
  transformations in a model of online production

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• Cf. Joan Bresnan, 1978, A Realistic
  Transformational Grammar, in Morris Halle, Joan
  Bresnan, and George A.Miller, eds., Linguistic
  Theory and Psychological Reality, The MIT Press,
  (pp. 1-59).

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Local transformations or base structure?

• John was rescued by Mary
• lt Mary rescued John (transformation)
• John was rumoured to be gay
• (they rumour John to be gay)
• A Toyota was had by John
• (lt John had a Toyota)
• Alternative two base structures

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Like so
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and so
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The main problem

• Long distance movement
• Could not be done away by nontransformational
  means in the same way as the local
  transformations

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Gazdar 1979 (1981)

• Long-distance dependencies without movement by
  recursive feature-passing

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Introducing slash features
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And so on
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GPSG Generalized Phrase Structure Grammar

• Let G be a context-free grammar
• For each rule A -gt B C add new rules
• A/D -gt B C/D and A/D -gt B/D C (metarule)
• And as well as X/X -gt e (for all X) (slash
  termination)
• And S -gt XP S/XP (slash introduction)

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Bonus

• Coordinate Structure Constraint for free
• No need for Across-the-Board convention
• Beans, I like but Mary despises.
• Beans, I like salad but Mary despises.

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Recursive feature passing needed elsewhere in the
grammar

• E.g. rel
• The boy who stole the bike
• The boy whose brother stole the bike
• The boy whose brothers girlfriend stole the bike
• All bikes the colour of the handlebars of which
  is blue
• The boy about whose brother we are speaking

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A sample tree with feature passing
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Similarities with slash

• The boy whose brother and whose sister were
  abducted
• The boy whose brother and Jim were abducted

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Properties of GPSG

• Heavy use of features
• Metarules, next to regular PS rules
• Later stages separation of Immediate Dominance
  from Linear Precedence
• General feature passing mechanisms
• Head Feature Convention and Foot Feature
  Principle

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Separating ID from LP

• PP -gt P NP (in the car)
• PP -gt P PP (from behind the car)
• VP -gt V NP (drive the car)
• VP -gt V PP (drive into the garage)
• Or
• XP -gt X, YP (ID) and X lt YP (LP)

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OUT
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And out
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Note

• Not all features count for coordination, only
  foot features do
• Masculine feminine is OK (la femme et lhomme
  sont venus)
• Singular plural is OK (the boy and the girls
  are in the yard)
• First and second person is OK (Me and you, we are
  a good team)

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Later developments

• HPSG Head-driven phrase structure grammar (1984
  2005), deriving from the dissertation of Carl
  Pollard
• Adopts the idea from categorial grammar that
  PS-rules can be discarded because the selection
  information of lexical heads predicts phrase
  structure
• Is used frequently in computational linguistics

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LFG Lexical Functional Grammar

• Joan Bresnan
• 1980-2005

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Properties

• Two levels of structure
• C-structure (tree)
• F-structure (representation of grammatical
  functions)
• Mappings between C-structure and F-structure