Documentation

Studies.Sag2010

Sag (2010): English Filler-Gap Constructions #

This file formalizes the paper's account of the five English filler-gap clauses, topicalized, wh-exclamative, nonsubject wh-interrogative, wh-relative and the-clauses, as constructions of Sign-Based Construction Grammar. The clauses share the filler-head construction, which binds a nonverbal filler to a gap in a verbal head daughter, and each cross-classifies with a clausal type that fixes its semantic type; what remains to each is a short list of constraints, from which the paper's parameters of variation follow: which distinguished element the filler must contain, which categories the filler and head daughters may have, whether the head may or must be inverted or infinitival, whether the clause is an island, and whether it must be independent.

The constructions are those of the paper's appendix, stated in RSRL over the construct hierarchy of Syntax/HPSG/Construction. A row of the paper's examples describes a construct, the categories of its daughters and the inversion, independence and finiteness of its head, and the row is acceptable exactly when that construct is a model of the grammar (judgments). The parameters of variation hold in every model of the grammar: the filler is nonverbal (satisfies_filler_nonverbal), the head of every clause but the the-clause is a projection of a verb, since only a verb is inverted or uninverted (satisfies_head_verb), and the head's inversion, finiteness and independence follow from the constructions, a wh-relative's through its mother (satisfies_head_uninverted, satisfies_head_fin, satisfies_head_ic). A clause is an absolute island when every construct of its sort, in every model of the grammar, has a mother with an empty GAP list (FGClause.IsIsland). Topicalized clauses, wh-exclamatives and the-clauses are islands, since their constructions give the head daughter a single gap, which the filler discharges (isIsland_iff). The distinguished element is lexical: the wh-word inventory is read off the paper's judgment triples (occurs), and no wh-form of any category occurs in all three wh-constructions (no_universal_wh_word).

Implementation notes #

The WH, REL and VAL features are not in the RSRL signature, so the distinguished element is checked against the wh-word inventory rather than by the model theory, and S and VP, both projections of a verb, are not told apart. Independence is identified with the absence of embedding, so the embedded topicalizations the paper licenses under predicates that admit main-clause phenomena are not among the rows. The inventory is derived from the judgment triples rather than transcribed from the paper's table of wh-words, which prints two cells differently: bare what in exclamatives and determiner which in relatives are marked as accepted by some speakers in the table but starred in the triples. The island rows are checked in one direction, since the paper attributes the graded degradation of extraction from finite wh-interrogatives to processing. The-clauses come out as islands because the the-clause construction gives the head daughter a single gap, as the topicalization and wh-exclamative constructions do. The text discusses islandhood only for the latter two, and no row tests a the-clause.

TODO #

References #

The five constructions #

The five English filler-gap clauses.

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    def Sag2010.instReprFGClause.repr :
    FGClause → ℕ → Std.Format
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      Constructs #

      inductive Sag2010.Cat :

      The syntactic categories of filler and head daughters.

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        instance Sag2010.instDecidableEqCat :
        DecidableEq Cat
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        @[instance_reducible]
        instance Sag2010.instReprCat :
        Repr Cat
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        def Sag2010.instReprCat.repr :
        Cat → ℕ → Std.Format
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          instance Sag2010.instFintypeCat :
          Fintype Cat
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          inductive Sag2010.Ent :

          The entities of a worked construct are the construct, its mother, head daughter and filler daughter, their categories, two list cells and the empty list, two gaps with their indices and the second gap's category, the mother's semantic object, and the values of the head's features.

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            instance Sag2010.instDecidableEqEnt :
            DecidableEq Ent
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            @[instance_reducible]
            instance Sag2010.instFintypeEnt :
            Fintype Ent
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            def Sag2010.instReprEnt.repr :
            Ent → ℕ → Std.Format
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              @[instance_reducible]
              instance Sag2010.instReprEnt :
              Repr Ent
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              @[reducible]

              The construct of sort σ whose filler and head daughters have the categories filler and head, whose head has the inversion, independence and verb-form values inv, ic and vform, whose mother has the semantic type semSort, and whose mother's GAP list is rest, either the empty list nil or the list g2 of a second gap. The filler shares its category and index with the first gap, and the mother its category with the head daughter. As the signature requires, only a verb has an inversion value and only a verbal category an independence value and a verb form.

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                The construct sort of a clause whose head has the verb form vform. A wh-relative is finite or infinitival.

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                  A finite construct of the clause with a noun phrase filler and a sentential head, whose mother has semantic type semSort and GAP list rest. Its head is inverted and independent in a wh-interrogative, uninverted and embedded in a wh-relative, and uninverted and independent otherwise.

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                    A construct of the clause's sort satisfies the grammar exactly when its mother has the clause's semantic type.

                    The constructs of each clause, with one gap or two, are well-typed, so the grammar's verdict on them is a verdict of its constructions and not of the appropriateness conditions.

                    Islands #

                    A clause is an absolute island when, in every model of the grammar, every construct of its sort has a mother with an empty GAP list, so that no gap inside the clause is bound outside it.

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                      In a model of the grammar, the head daughter of a topicalized clause, a wh-exclamative or a the-clause has a single gap.

                      Exactly topicalized clauses, wh-exclamatives and the-clauses are absolute islands. Their constructions give the head daughter a single gap, which the filler discharges, while a wh-interrogative or a wh-relative construct may pass a second gap to its mother.

                      The parameters of variation #

                      The constructions fix the parameters of variation (6) in every model of the grammar, not only in the worked constructs.

                      The filler daughter of each of the five clauses is nonverbal, a noun phrase, prepositional phrase, adjective phrase or adverb phrase (25). A wh-relative's is nominal or prepositional, according as it is finite or infinitival.

                      The head daughter of a topicalized clause, wh-exclamative, wh-interrogative or wh-relative is a projection of a verb (27). Except in the topicalized clause, which states it, this follows from the head's inversion value, which only a verb has; a wh-relative's comes from the relative construction on its mother.

                      The head daughter of a topicalized clause, wh-exclamative or wh-relative is uninverted (28). A wh-relative inherits this from the relative construction on its mother.

                      The head daughter of a topicalized clause, wh-exclamative, the-clause or finite wh-relative is finite (29). In a finite wh-relative the construction makes the mother finite, and the head daughter shares the mother's category.

                      The head daughter of a topicalized clause is independent and that of a wh-relative is not. A wh-relative inherits this from the relative construction on its mother.

                      The distinguished element #

                      inductive Sag2010.Marker :

                      The distinguished element that a construction requires in its filler daughter. Topicalization requires none, a the-clause requires the definite degree marker, and the other constructions require a wh-word of their own kind.

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                        def Sag2010.instReprMarker.repr :
                        Marker → ℕ → Std.Format
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                          inductive Sag2010.WhForm :

                          The wh-forms of the inventory.

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                            def Sag2010.instReprWhForm.repr :
                            WhForm → ℕ → Std.Format
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                              The categories a wh-form bears.

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                                def Sag2010.instReprWhCategory.repr :
                                WhCategory → ℕ → Std.Format
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                                  The paper's examples #

                                  The parameters of variation the rows probe, and the wh-word inventory.

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                                    def Sag2010.instReprParameter.repr :
                                    Parameter → ℕ → Std.Format
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                                      def Sag2010.parameters :
                                      List (String × Parameter)
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                                        def Sag2010.clauses :
                                        List (String × FGClause)
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                                          def Sag2010.cats :
                                          List (String × Cat)
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                                            def Sag2010.bools :
                                            List (String × Bool)
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                                              def Sag2010.whForms :
                                              List (String × WhForm)
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                                                def Sag2010.whCategories :
                                                List (String × WhCategory)
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                                                  The rows probing a parameter.

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                                                    def Sag2010.clause? (x : Datum) :
                                                    Option FGClause

                                                    The clause a row instantiates.

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                                                      def Sag2010.inversions :
                                                      List (String × Ent)

                                                      The inversion values that rows record.

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                                                        def Sag2010.embeddings :
                                                        List (String × Ent)

                                                        The independence values of embedded and matrix clauses.

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                                                          def Sag2010.verbForms :
                                                          List (String × Ent)

                                                          The verb forms of finite and infinitival clauses.

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                                                            The construct of the clause c that a row describes, with its filler and head categories and the inversion, embedding and finiteness of its head. The filler is an NP and the head an uninverted, finite, matrix S unless the row records otherwise.

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                                                              def Sag2010.whWord? (x : Datum) :
                                                              Option (WhForm × WhCategory)

                                                              The wh-form and category of a row's filler, if it contains a wh-word.

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                                                                def Sag2010.occurs (f : WhForm) (cat : WhCategory) (c : FGClause) :
                                                                Option Judgment

                                                                The judgment the inventory records for a wh-form of a category in a wh-construction.

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                                                                  theorem Sag2010.no_universal_wh_word (x : Datum) :
                                                                  x ∈ probing Parameter.inventory → ∀ w ∈ whWord? x, ∃ c ∈ whClauses, occurs w.1 w.2 c ≠ some Judgment.acceptable

                                                                  No wh-form of any category occurs in all three wh-constructions: there is no unitary category of English wh-expression.

                                                                  def Sag2010.markers (f : WhForm) (cat : WhCategory) :
                                                                  List Marker

                                                                  The markers a filler containing a wh-form of a category can bear: those of the wh-constructions in which the inventory records it as acceptable.

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                                                                    The markers that a row's filler can bear. They are those of its wh-word if it contains one, the definite degree marker if it contains comparative the, and none otherwise.

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                                                                      theorem Sag2010.distinguished (x : Datum) :
                                                                      x ∈ probing Parameter.distinguished → ∀ (c : FGClause), clause? x = some c → (x.judgment = Judgment.acceptable ↔ c.marker ∈ fillerMarkers x)

                                                                      The rows probing the distinguished element are acceptable exactly when the filler can bear the construction's marker.

                                                                      The rows probing the categories of the daughters and the inversion, finiteness and independence of the head are acceptable exactly when the construct they describe is a model of the grammar.

                                                                      The constructs that the rows describe are well-typed, so each verdict of judgments is one of the constructions.

                                                                      theorem Sag2010.island_rows (x : Datum) :
                                                                      x ∈ probing Parameter.island → ∀ (c : FGClause), clause? x = some c → x.judgment = Judgment.acceptable → ¬c.IsIsland

                                                                      The rows extracting a second gap from a clause are acceptable only when the clause is not an island.