Sag, Wasow & Bender (2003) — HPSG Binding Theory @cite{sag-wasow-bender-2003}

Syntactic Theory: A Formal Introduction (2nd ed.), Ch. 7.

The HPSG binding theory of @cite{sag-wasow-bender-2003} reduces the Chomskyan three-way classification (anaphor / pronoun / R-expression → Principles A/B/C) to two principles based on the MODE feature:

• Principle A: [MODE ana] must be outranked on ARG-ST by a coindexed element
• Principle B: [MODE ref] must NOT be outranked on ARG-ST by a coindexed element

Both pronouns and R-expressions are [MODE ref], so Principle B subsumes Principle C. See Theories/Syntax/HPSG/Coreference.lean for the implementation; this file verifies it against the empirical minimal-pair data in Phenomena/Anaphora/Coreference.lean via the Paradigms.AcceptabilityJudgment contract.

def SagWasowBender2003.capturesCoreferenceData (phenom : Paradigms.AcceptabilityJudgment.PhenomenonData) : Bool

Coverage of a PhenomenonData set under HPSG binding.

Equations

• SagWasowBender2003.capturesCoreferenceData phenom = Paradigms.AcceptabilityJudgment.capturesPhenomenonData HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference phenom

theorem SagWasowBender2003.captures_reflexive_coreference : capturesCoreferenceData Phenomena.Anaphora.Coreference.reflexiveCoreferenceData = true

HPSG captures reflexiveCoreferenceData.

theorem SagWasowBender2003.captures_complementary_distribution : capturesCoreferenceData Phenomena.Anaphora.Coreference.complementaryDistributionData = true

HPSG captures complementaryDistributionData.

theorem SagWasowBender2003.captures_pronominal_disjoint_reference : capturesCoreferenceData Phenomena.Anaphora.Coreference.pronominalDisjointReferenceData = true

HPSG captures pronominalDisjointReferenceData.

theorem SagWasowBender2003.reflexive_pairs_captured : (HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.john✝, SagWasowBender2003.sees✝, SagWasowBender2003.himself✝] = true ∧ HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.himself✝, SagWasowBender2003.sees✝, SagWasowBender2003.john✝] = false) ∧ (HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.mary✝, SagWasowBender2003.sees✝, SagWasowBender2003.herself✝] = true ∧ HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.herself✝, SagWasowBender2003.sees✝, SagWasowBender2003.mary✝] = false) ∧ (HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.they✝, SagWasowBender2003.see✝, SagWasowBender2003.themselves✝] = true ∧ HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.themselves✝, SagWasowBender2003.see✝, SagWasowBender2003.them✝] = false) ∧ (HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.john✝, SagWasowBender2003.sees✝, SagWasowBender2003.himself✝] = true ∧ HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.john✝, SagWasowBender2003.sees✝, SagWasowBender2003.herself✝] = false) ∧ HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.they✝, SagWasowBender2003.see✝, SagWasowBender2003.themselves✝] = true ∧ HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.they✝, SagWasowBender2003.see✝, SagWasowBender2003.himself✝] = false

Per-pair verification of reflexive binding judgments.

theorem SagWasowBender2003.reciprocal_plural_antecedent : HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.they✝, SagWasowBender2003.see✝, SagWasowBender2003.eachOther✝] = true ∧ HPSG.Coreference.grammaticalForCoreference [SagWasowBender2003.john✝, SagWasowBender2003.sees✝, SagWasowBender2003.eachOther✝] = false

Reciprocal binding: plural antecedent required, singular blocked. (Pairs 1–2 of reciprocalCoreferenceData use 5-word coordinated sentences that exceed the simple clause parser.)