150x Filetype PDF File size 0.62 MB Source: files.eric.ed.gov
DOCUMENT RESUME ED 055 472 FL 002 344 AUTHOR Simmons, R. F. English TITLE Some Semantic Structures for Representing Meanings. INSTITUTION Texas Univ., Austin. SPONS AGENCY National Science Foundation, Washington, D.C. REPORT NO TR-NL-1 PUB DATE Nov 70 NOTE 45p. EDRS PRICE MF-$0.65 HC-$3.29 Computer DESCRIPTORS Case (Grammar); *Computational Linguistics; Assisted Instruction; Deep Structure; *English; *Language Research; Morphology (Languages); Phonology; *Semantics; Sentences; Structural Analysis; Surface Structure; *Syntax; Transformation Generative Grammar; Transformations (Languaue) ABSTRACT This paper defines the structure of a semantic network for use in representing discourse and lexical meanings. The structure is designed to represent underlying semantic meanings that, with a lexicon and a grammar, can generate natural-language sentences in a linguistically justi_fiable manner. The semantics of natural English can be defined as a system of conditions and transformations applied to syntactic coastituents to map them into semantic structures. A semantic structure for a statement is definz,d as a system of unambiguous representations of meaning interconnected by defined logical relatioas. The author feels that a semantic representation should probably be completely free of its natural-language representation. The correspondence between semantic structure and natural-language representation should reside wholly in the grammar and the lexicon. Specific details and examples of the semantic network operation are described. Illustrations of lexical structures are provided, and references are included. For additional information, see FL 002 345. (Author/VM) (NJ U.S. DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH. EDUCATION & WELFARE OFFICE OF EDUCATION THIS DOCUMENT HAS BEEN REPRODUCED Lon EXACTLY AS RECEIVED FRO M THE PERSON OR OR-iANIZATION ORIGINATING IT. POINTS OF VIEW OR OPINIONS STATED DO NOT NECES- SARILY REPRESENT OFFICIAL OFFICE OF EDU- CD CATION POSITION OR POLICY. SOME SEMANTIC STRUCTURES FOR REPRESENTING ENGLISH MEANINGS TECHNICAL REPORT NO. NL-1 R. F. Simmons November 1970 NATURAL LANGUAGE RESEARCH FOR COMPUTER-ASSISTED INSTRUCTION Supported By: THE NATIONAL SCIENCE FOUNDATION Grant GJ 509 X Department of Computer Sciences and Computer-Assisted Instruction Laboratory The University of Texas Austin, Texas ABSTRACT A structure for semantic representation of English discourse and lexicon is described with some examples of semantic content repre- sentation for word, phrase, and discourse meanings. The semantic net- works used are derived from those suggested earlier by Quinian, while the conventions for representing content are based partly on Fillmore's ideas of deep case structure. Attribute-value lists are shown to be a suitable linear notation for computational representation of networks. It is argued that the semantic network representation is a more con- venient form for representing discourse meanings than the predicate calculus. ACKNOWLEDGWENTS I am gratefill to Marianne Celce, for helping mo to understand better various forms of deep semantic structure, and to numerous other colleagues and students who continually tutor me in the finer points of the several disciplines of linguistics, psychology, logic, mathematics, and computer science, all of which seem to be deeply involved in compu- tational linguistics. RFS SOME SEMANTIC STRUCTURES FOR REPRESENTING ENGLISH MEANINGS R. F. Simmons I. Introduction The spoken or written representation of a discourse in English haE the explicit structure of a string. That is, the discourse is a sequence of spoken or written symbols -- each symbol is followed by another symbol (including stops). Underlyiug this simple string structure however, there is a considerable depth of phonetic, morphological, syntactic, semantic and pragmatic structure that is implied by the sequence of choices of symbols. More than half a century of linguistic study has developed a fair understanding of how to derive and represent phonemic, morphemic and syntactic structures implied by strings of natural language symbols -- not that there is complete agreement in the choice of any one system. It is only in recent years, however, that the semantic structures of natural langusses have become an tmportant topic of linguistic consideration. Definitions of semantic structly2es and means for deriving and representing them had a limited place in Chomsky's (1965) transformrAtional'theory, while in newer versions of the theory, (see Lakoff 1969) the underlying semantic structures of langUage became a basic component.
no reviews yet
Please Login to review.