English Grammar - User contributions [en]

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:40:32Z

Gert: /* Object control: persuade */

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:40:07Z

Gert: /* Guiding ideas */

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:39:34Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:39:08Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:33:30Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:24:45Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:24:25Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

Practical Grammar 15

2026-07-21T11:22:53Z

Gert: /* Raising and control */

= Raising and control misc=

==''expect(Object raising verb)''==

''expect'' is an object raising verb.

Exercise 9.4 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations below:

(5) Ingrid expected Fred to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 1000px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]
[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

4. The most complex task is to encode the control behavior of the different verbs. We need statements to the effect that the subject (or object) of the higher verb controls (= is identical) to the subject of the XCOMP. For that, we need to add special equations to the lexical entries of control verbs, which are of the general form:

(↑ GF) = (↑ XCOMP SUBJ);

where GF is either SUBJ or OBJ. In the first case we get:

(↑ SUBJ) = (↑ XCOMP SUBJ);

This means, informally: my subject is identical to my XCOMP's SUBJ. In other words, this encodes subject control. Object control works the same. Remember to use the arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitive complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://147.210.117.56 and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 

6. Parse and make sure that all 6 sentences come out as grammatical.

* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].
* Create a new project and copy your previous grammar into your new project.
* On the basis of pages 102-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following o

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentence below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]] 

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives



Extended Coherence Condition [non-final version] (p. 138)
* All governable functions present in an f-structure must occur in the value of a local PRED feature.
* All functions that have a PRED value must have a theta role.
-->

 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 15

2026-07-21T11:22:32Z

Gert: /* expect(Object raising verb) */

= Raising and control =

==''expect(Object raising verb)''==

''expect'' is an object raising verb.

Exercise 9.4 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations below:

(5) Ingrid expected Fred to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 1000px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]
[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

4. The most complex task is to encode the control behavior of the different verbs. We need statements to the effect that the subject (or object) of the higher verb controls (= is identical) to the subject of the XCOMP. For that, we need to add special equations to the lexical entries of control verbs, which are of the general form:

(↑ GF) = (↑ XCOMP SUBJ);

where GF is either SUBJ or OBJ. In the first case we get:

(↑ SUBJ) = (↑ XCOMP SUBJ);

This means, informally: my subject is identical to my XCOMP's SUBJ. In other words, this encodes subject control. Object control works the same. Remember to use the arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitive complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://147.210.117.56 and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 

6. Parse and make sure that all 6 sentences come out as grammatical.

* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].
* Create a new project and copy your previous grammar into your new project.
* On the basis of pages 102-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following o

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentence below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]] 

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives



Extended Coherence Condition [non-final version] (p. 138)
* All governable functions present in an f-structure must occur in the value of a local PRED feature.
* All functions that have a PRED value must have a theta role.
-->

 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:21:38Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:21:07Z

Gert: /* seem (Raising verb) */

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:20:36Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]] 

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives



Extended Coherence Condition [non-final version] (p. 138)
* All governable functions present in an f-structure must occur in the value of a local PRED feature.
* All functions that have a PRED value must have a theta role.
-->

 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:20:09Z

Gert: /* expect(Object raising verb) */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]] 

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives



Extended Coherence Condition [non-final version] (p. 138)
* All governable functions present in an f-structure must occur in the value of a local PRED feature.
* All functions that have a PRED value must have a theta role.
-->

 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 15

2026-07-21T11:19:56Z

Gert: Created page with "==''expect(Object raising verb)''== ''expect'' is an object raising verb. Exercise 9.4 Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations below: (5) Ingrid expected Fred to buy olives. 1000px     500px 500px 4. The most com..."

==''expect(Object raising verb)''==

''expect'' is an object raising verb.

Exercise 9.4 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations below:

(5) Ingrid expected Fred to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 1000px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]
[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

4. The most complex task is to encode the control behavior of the different verbs. We need statements to the effect that the subject (or object) of the higher verb controls (= is identical) to the subject of the XCOMP. For that, we need to add special equations to the lexical entries of control verbs, which are of the general form:

(↑ GF) = (↑ XCOMP SUBJ);

where GF is either SUBJ or OBJ. In the first case we get:

(↑ SUBJ) = (↑ XCOMP SUBJ);

This means, informally: my subject is identical to my XCOMP's SUBJ. In other words, this encodes subject control. Object control works the same. Remember to use the arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitive complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://147.210.117.56 and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 

6. Parse and make sure that all 6 sentences come out as grammatical.

* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].
* Create a new project and copy your previous grammar into your new project.
* On the basis of pages 102-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following o

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentence below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:17:42Z

Gert: /* Object control: persuade */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives

==''expect(Object raising verb)''==

''expect'' is an object raising verb.

Exercise 9.4 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations below:

(5) Ingrid expected Fred to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 1000px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]
[[File:Ingrid-expected-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

4. The most complex task is to encode the control behavior of the different verbs. We need statements to the effect that the subject (or object) of the higher verb controls (= is identical) to the subject of the XCOMP. For that, we need to add special equations to the lexical entries of control verbs, which are of the general form:

(↑ GF) = (↑ XCOMP SUBJ);

where GF is either SUBJ or OBJ. In the first case we get:

(↑ SUBJ) = (↑ XCOMP SUBJ);

This means, informally: my subject is identical to my XCOMP's SUBJ. In other words, this encodes subject control. Object control works the same. Remember to use the arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitive complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://147.210.117.56 and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 

6. Parse and make sure that all 6 sentences come out as grammatical.

* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].
* Create a new project and copy your previous grammar into your new project.
* On the basis of pages 102-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following o

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentence below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]] 

[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives



Extended Coherence Condition [non-final version] (p. 138)
* All governable functions present in an f-structure must occur in the value of a local PRED feature.
* All functions that have a PRED value must have a theta role.
-->

 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:16:56Z

Gert: /* Object control: persuade */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.

==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:16:37Z

Gert: /* seem (Raising verb) */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.

==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:16:10Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

-->

==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:15:27Z

Gert: /* Exercise 6.1 Infinitives */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

-->

==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:15:00Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.

==== Exercise 6.1 Infinitives ====

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

-->

==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:14:36Z

Gert: /* Object control: persuade */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives

==== Exercise 6.1 Infinitives ====

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

-->

==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:14:17Z

Gert: /* Guiding ideas */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.

In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives

==== Exercise 6.1 Infinitives ====

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

-->

==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:11:29Z

Gert:

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives

==== Exercise 6.1 Infinitives ====

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

-->

==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:11:00Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.



In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives

==== Exercise 6.1 Infinitives ====

(4) Ingrid buys olives. 
(5) Ingrid tried to buy olives 
(6) * Ingrid tried buys olives 
(7) Ingrid pursuaded Fred to buy olives 
(8) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred bought olives 
(9) Ingrid promised Fred to buy olives 
(10) * Ingrid promised Fred buys olives 
(11) * Ingrid tried she to buy olives 
(12) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred he to buy olives 
(13) * Ingrid promised Fred she to buy olives 

Make sure that the following sentences come out to be ungrammatical:

(14) * Ingrid tried to rain 
(15) * Ingrid persuaded Fred to rain 
(16) * Ingrid promised Fred to rain

==''seem (Raising verb)''==

Notation:

The verb ''seem'' differs from the verb ''try'' in that ''seem'' does not assign a semantic role to its SUBJ. This is the first time we encounter such verbs. In XLFG, GFs that the predicate does not assign a role to are written between the closing > and the final apostrophe, as follows:

* PRED:'X<...>Y'

Meaning of the line above: the GFs listed in ... are assigned semantic roles by the predicate, but the grammatical function Y is not.

Exercise 9.2 
* Go to [https://147.210.117.56 https://147.210.117.56].
* Make sure that under 'Output Parameters' '''Extended Coherence test on Feature-Structures''' is set to '''Yes'''.
* Extend your previous grammar.

* On the basis of pages 104-108 in the textbook, make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (4):

(4) Ingrid seemed to buy olives.

[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-cs.JPG | 500px]]    
[[File:Ingrid-seemed-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 500px]]

-->

==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:10:31Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.



In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. The grammar contains 14 test sentences.
4. Add lexical entries and phrase structure rules so that your grammar makes the correct grammaticality predictions for all 14 test sentences.
6.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:08:21Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.



In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. Copy the verb ''disappeared'' from your version of Grammar 4 and add it to the lexicon. 
4. Add lexical entries for all English personal pronouns, i.e. ''I'', ''you'', ... with their correct AGR values. You will need two entries for ''you''.
5. For each pronoun, add a sentence to the testsuite that consists of the pronoun followed by ''disappeared'' and nothing else. 

6. Parse and make sure that all 6 sentences come out as grammatical.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 2

2026-07-21T11:07:33Z

Gert: /* Your first grammar in xlfg */

== Your first grammar in xlfg ==

Please do the following:

You first log onto xlfg:

# Go to https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 

Then you locate our workshop:

# Choose Workshops|All Workshops.
# Look for the workshop "Syntax 1" for the current semester.
# In the column "Action", click the button "Consult the workshop".

Now you find a project of the workshop:

# On the right side of the screen is the list of projects of our workshop.
# Look for "Grammar 1" and click on "Create your own version".
# Now click on "Edit your version".

You have now arrived in the grammar editor for the grammar "Grammar 1", where you can make changes to the grammar.

Look around a bit, but leave the button "Output Parameters" alone for now.

Click on the buttons in the row beginning with "Test suite". Whenever you do, a window will open where you can enter or change information. Do not make any changes yet. To get to a different input window, just click on its button.

The four input buttons have the following functions:

* Test suite: here you can type in example sentences that you want to test.
* Declarations: here you can enter information that determines the behavior of the program.
* Grammar: this is where you add phrase structure rules.
* Lexicon: the place to write lexical entries.

== Exercise 2.1 ==
We are now going to write a first grammar. The goal of the grammar is to recognize all the sentences from Exercise 1.1. Here they are one more time, together with the syntactic categories we want to use in the exercise:

=== Sentences ===

(1) John [disappeared]. 
(2) the bottle [broke]. 
(3) Martha [stayed at the hospital]. 
(4) Fred [talked about Chicago]. 
(5) Robert [went to the hospital]. 
(6) Alice [moved into the room]. 
(7) Joe [saw Fred]. 
(8) Alice [broke the bottle]. 
(9) we [moved it into the room]. 
(10) Fred [took Alice to the hospital]. 
(11) John [sent Martha a check]. 
(12) we [gave Fred a wastebasket].

=== Syntactic Categories ===

S, NP, N, VP, V, PP, P, AP, A, D

== The first example sentence ==

* Go to the xlfg window.
* Click on "Test suite".

You see all the test sentences for the grammar. Our test sentences are already listed.

The first example sentence is "John disappeared" and on the right we have told the program that this sentence is grammatical in English.

We will now test this example against our grammar. To this end,

* Click on the blue "Parse the whole test suite" button right below the name of our project. "to parse" in German means "Daten analysieren".

This instructs xlfg to inspect all test sentences to see whether the grammar licenses them.

The result is diappointing: a new window opens and we read the following in the first line:

* Unknown word: disappeared

The grammar can only parse a sentence, if it knows all the words in the sentence. This problem is easy to fix:

* Click on "Input" to get back to the editor window. Let us inspect the grammar!

* Click on "Lexicon". There is only one line:
John N;

This says that there is a lexical entry spelled "John" and that its syntactic category is "N". This makes sense.

It is easy to add more words to the lexicon:

* Enter the following into the second line of the "Lexicon" editor:
disappeared V;

'''Make sure that you end every lexical entry with a semicolon.''' Otherwise, xlfg will create an error message. It needs to know where one lexical entry ends and the next one starts.

* Click on "Save this version" to save your new grammar!

Now that the grammar knows both words of our sentence, we parse the sentence again:
* Click on "Parse the whole test suite".
The output window opens again: we see our example sentence in depressing red: the grammar still does not recognize our sentence! It tells you that in two ways:

* It doesn't draw a tree in the box labeled "Constituent Structure".
* At the righthand side of the line that contains our test sentence, it says 0 CS, which means that the sentence is compatible with no constituent structures that the grammar licenses.

Let us find out what the problem is this time.

* Click on "Input" to get back to the editor. When you click on "Grammar", you will see immediately why the sentence is not recognized: the grammar does not have all the phrase structure rules needed to draw a complete tree for the sentence!

Let's fix this problem next.
* Add the following PS rules, one per line, making sure that you end each rule with a semicolon:
NP -> N;
VP -> V;
Use the button labeled "->" above line 1 to enter the arrow! Do not enter any arrows from your keyboard, as xlfg will throw an error.
* Parse.
Now, the output window should open. Our test sentence "John disappears" should appear in green and the box labeled "Constituent Structure" should contain a phrase structure tree of our sentence, which is xlfg's way of saying that our grammar recognizes the string "John disappears" as grammatical!

== Exercise 2.2 ==
* If you aren't there already, then click on "Input" to go back to the editors.
For every remaining example sentence (2)-(12), do the following:
* Click on "+ Add a sentence".
* Enter the sentence into the textbox that opens.
* Test the sentence! If it parses, then move on to the next sentence.
* If the sentence does not parse yet, then add the lexical entries and phrase structure rules needed to parse it.
* Make sure to save your grammar each time you have made a change!

 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar|'''Main page''']] '''Week 2''' [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>

Practical Grammar 2

2026-07-21T11:07:21Z

Gert: /* Your first grammar in xlfg */

== Your first grammar in xlfg ==

Please do the following:

You first log onto xlfg:

# Go to https://https://xlfg.labri.fr/ and log in. 

Then you locate our workshop:

# Choose Workshops|All Workshops.
# Look for the workshop "Syntax 1" for the current semester.
# In the column "Action", click the button "Consult the workshop".

Now you find a project of the workshop:

# On the right side of the screen is the list of projects of our workshop.
# Look for "Grammar 1" and click on "Create your own version".
# Now click on "Edit your version".

You have now arrived in the grammar editor for the grammar "Grammar 1", where you can make changes to the grammar.

Look around a bit, but leave the button "Output Parameters" alone for now.

Click on the buttons in the row beginning with "Test suite". Whenever you do, a window will open where you can enter or change information. Do not make any changes yet. To get to a different input window, just click on its button.

The four input buttons have the following functions:

* Test suite: here you can type in example sentences that you want to test.
* Declarations: here you can enter information that determines the behavior of the program.
* Grammar: this is where you add phrase structure rules.
* Lexicon: the place to write lexical entries.

== Exercise 2.1 ==
We are now going to write a first grammar. The goal of the grammar is to recognize all the sentences from Exercise 1.1. Here they are one more time, together with the syntactic categories we want to use in the exercise:

=== Sentences ===

(1) John [disappeared]. 
(2) the bottle [broke]. 
(3) Martha [stayed at the hospital]. 
(4) Fred [talked about Chicago]. 
(5) Robert [went to the hospital]. 
(6) Alice [moved into the room]. 
(7) Joe [saw Fred]. 
(8) Alice [broke the bottle]. 
(9) we [moved it into the room]. 
(10) Fred [took Alice to the hospital]. 
(11) John [sent Martha a check]. 
(12) we [gave Fred a wastebasket].

=== Syntactic Categories ===

S, NP, N, VP, V, PP, P, AP, A, D

== The first example sentence ==

* Go to the xlfg window.
* Click on "Test suite".

You see all the test sentences for the grammar. Our test sentences are already listed.

The first example sentence is "John disappeared" and on the right we have told the program that this sentence is grammatical in English.

We will now test this example against our grammar. To this end,

* Click on the blue "Parse the whole test suite" button right below the name of our project. "to parse" in German means "Daten analysieren".

This instructs xlfg to inspect all test sentences to see whether the grammar licenses them.

The result is diappointing: a new window opens and we read the following in the first line:

* Unknown word: disappeared

The grammar can only parse a sentence, if it knows all the words in the sentence. This problem is easy to fix:

* Click on "Input" to get back to the editor window. Let us inspect the grammar!

* Click on "Lexicon". There is only one line:
John N;

This says that there is a lexical entry spelled "John" and that its syntactic category is "N". This makes sense.

It is easy to add more words to the lexicon:

* Enter the following into the second line of the "Lexicon" editor:
disappeared V;

'''Make sure that you end every lexical entry with a semicolon.''' Otherwise, xlfg will create an error message. It needs to know where one lexical entry ends and the next one starts.

* Click on "Save this version" to save your new grammar!

Now that the grammar knows both words of our sentence, we parse the sentence again:
* Click on "Parse the whole test suite".
The output window opens again: we see our example sentence in depressing red: the grammar still does not recognize our sentence! It tells you that in two ways:

* It doesn't draw a tree in the box labeled "Constituent Structure".
* At the righthand side of the line that contains our test sentence, it says 0 CS, which means that the sentence is compatible with no constituent structures that the grammar licenses.

Let us find out what the problem is this time.

* Click on "Input" to get back to the editor. When you click on "Grammar", you will see immediately why the sentence is not recognized: the grammar does not have all the phrase structure rules needed to draw a complete tree for the sentence!

Let's fix this problem next.
* Add the following PS rules, one per line, making sure that you end each rule with a semicolon:
NP -> N;
VP -> V;
Use the button labeled "->" above line 1 to enter the arrow! Do not enter any arrows from your keyboard, as xlfg will throw an error.
* Parse.
Now, the output window should open. Our test sentence "John disappears" should appear in green and the box labeled "Constituent Structure" should contain a phrase structure tree of our sentence, which is xlfg's way of saying that our grammar recognizes the string "John disappears" as grammatical!

== Exercise 2.2 ==
* If you aren't there already, then click on "Input" to go back to the editors.
For every remaining example sentence (2)-(12), do the following:
* Click on "+ Add a sentence".
* Enter the sentence into the textbox that opens.
* Test the sentence! If it parses, then move on to the next sentence.
* If the sentence does not parse yet, then add the lexical entries and phrase structure rules needed to parse it.
* Make sure to save your grammar each time you have made a change!

 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar|'''Main page''']] '''Week 2''' [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:06:07Z

Gert: /* Exercise 10.1 The past tense */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.



In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 Controlled infinitival complement clauses ====

1. Go to https://147.210.117.56 and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. Copy the verb ''disappeared'' from your version of Grammar 4 and add it to the lexicon. 
4. Add lexical entries for all English personal pronouns, i.e. ''I'', ''you'', ... with their correct AGR values. You will need two entries for ''you''.
5. For each pronoun, add a sentence to the testsuite that consists of the pronoun followed by ''disappeared'' and nothing else. 

6. Parse and make sure that all 6 sentences come out as grammatical.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:05:34Z

Gert:

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.



In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

==== Exercise 10.1 The past tense ====

1. Go to https://147.210.117.56 and log in. 
2. Open ''Grammar XXX''. 
3. Copy the verb ''disappeared'' from your version of Grammar 4 and add it to the lexicon. 
4. Add lexical entries for all English personal pronouns, i.e. ''I'', ''you'', ... with their correct AGR values. You will need two entries for ''you''.
5. For each pronoun, add a sentence to the testsuite that consists of the pronoun followed by ''disappeared'' and nothing else. 

6. Parse and make sure that all 6 sentences come out as grammatical.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:04:40Z

Gert:

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.



In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:01:59Z

Gert: /* Subject control: try */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T11:01:19Z

Gert: /* Subject control: try */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for many sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:59:40Z

Gert: /* Object control: persuade */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:59:30Z

Gert: /* Subject control: try and promise */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); };

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:59:16Z

Gert: /* Object control: persuade */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

==Object control: ''persuade''==

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:59:04Z

Gert: /* Subject control: try and promise */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ==

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:57:55Z

Gert: /* How to write the control equations in XLFG */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

'''Note:'''

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

'''Also note:''' if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:57:30Z

Gert: /* How to write the control equations in XLFG */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

Note:

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

Also note: if necessary, there may be additional statements inside the curly brackets besides the control equations. Every such statement also ends with a semicolon!

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:55:35Z

Gert: /* How to write the control equations in XLFG */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

Note:

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is '''no''' semicolon before '''{''' ! 
d. There '''is''' a semicolon after '''}''' !

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:54:32Z

Gert: /* How to write the control equations in XLFG */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

Note:

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is no semicolon before '''{''', but there is one after '''}''' !

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:54:05Z

Gert: /* How to write the control equations in XLFG */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

Note:

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There is no semicolon before {, but there is one after } !

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:52:54Z

Gert: /* How to write the control equations in XLFG */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

Note:

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry. 
c. There are no semicolons before and after the curly brackets!

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
{ (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
{ (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); }

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:51:48Z

Gert: /* How to write the control equations in XLFG */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

Each control verb contains a control equation that expresses which of the control verb's arguments controls the understood SUBJ of the control verb's XCOMP. Below, the equations for SUBJ and OBJ control are stated.

Note:

a. Remember to use the up arrow from the editor, not those from your keyboard. 
b. The control equations must occur in curled parentheses at the end of the lexical entry.
c. There are no semicolons before and after the curly brackets!

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
(↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
(↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:48:18Z

Gert: /* Guiding ideas */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercise, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
(↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
(↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:47:29Z

Gert: /* Guiding ideas */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercises, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'', ''promise'', and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
(↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
(↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:46:08Z

Gert: /* Object control: persuade */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercises, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'' and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
(↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

===Object control: ''persuade''===

The OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
(↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:44:45Z

Gert: /* How to write the control equations in XLFG */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercises, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'' and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
(↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

===Object control: ''persuade''===

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:43:42Z

Gert: /* Subject control: try and promise */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercises, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'' and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:
(↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->

Practical Grammar 10

2026-07-21T10:43:30Z

Gert: /* Subject control: try and promise */

== Infinitives ==

Having dealt with complements in the form of NP, PP, and subordinate clauses, we now turn to infinitives. Here are a few typical examples:

(1) Ingrid tried [to buy olives] 
(2) Ingrid pursuaded Fred [to buy olives] 
(3) Ingrid promised Fred [to buy olives]

The bracketed infinitives differ from COMPs in three major ways:
1. The form of the verb is an infinitive;
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' appears before the verb.
3. The infinitive lacks an overt SUBJ.

Let us investigate the meaning of these sentences. ''buy'' is a predicate that needs an AGENT and a PATIENT. The patient in each of the sentences above is mentioned directly: ''olives''. But who is the agent? As is shown by the following (not always natural sounding) paraphrases, in (1) and (3), Ingrid is understood to be the one buying olives and in (2) Fred is understood as the intended olive buyer

(1b) '''Ingrid''' tried to bring it about that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives. 
(2b) Ingrid pursuaded '''Fred''' that '''he (= Fred)''' buys olives. 
(3b) '''Ingrid''' promised Fred that '''she (= Ingrid)''' buys olives.

Interestingly, even though a. there is an understood agent in each case and b. ''buy'' assigns the agent role to its subject, this subject cannot be expressed inside the infinitive. An attempt to add one, for instance as a pronoun leads to ungrammaticality:

(1c) * Ingrid tried ['''she''' to buy olives] 
(2c) * Ingrid pursuaded Fred ['''he''' to buy olives] 
(3c) * Ingrid promised Fred ['''she''' to buy olives]

As the examples above show, the understood subject of the infinitive is not always the same. That naturally raises the question of how the interpretation of the understood subject is determined.

A little thought shows that the understood subject of the infinitive is determined by the (meaning of) the upper verb. When one tries or promises to do something, then one does so for an action that one will perform oneself. On the other hand, when one persuades somebody to do something, it is the pursuaded person that is supposed to perform the action, not the pursuader. The phenomenon that we witness here is called '''Control'''. We say that ''try'' and ''promise'' make their subject control the infinitive, whereas ''pursuade'' makes its object control the infinitive.

These are the facts that we wish to capture in this unit. As always, we will need lexical entries and annotated phrase structure rules to accomplish that. Here are some guiding ideas to help you do that.

== Guiding ideas ==

1. We analyze infinitival subordinate clauses as VPs. 
2. The infinitive marker ''to'' can be assumed to belong to part of speech '''IM''' (for infinitive marker). That is all the lexicon needs to say about it. 
3. Assume that IM combines with a VP to form another VP. IM and its sister VP are co-heads of their mother-VP. 
4. The infinitive ''buy'' is a new type of verb form for us. So far, all the verb forms that we encountered were tensed forms in the present and past tense, e.g. the third person singular present tense form ''buys'' or the non-third person singular present tense form ''buy'', as in ''I buy olives, you buy olives'', etc. Note that even though the non-third person singular tense forms and the infinitives of most verbs are homophonous (= are pronounced the same way), they must be kept distinct. They have different grammatical properties and for some verbs, they are not homophonous. Note, for instance, ''I am, you are'' vs. ''to be''! 
5. To separate these finite and infinitival verb forms from each other, we introduce a new feature called '''VFORM''', with the values "fin" (= finite = tensed) and "inf" (= infinitive = non-tensed). There will eventually also be VFORM values for progressive verb forms like ''buying'' and participles like ''bought'', but we will not deal with those here. 
6. As always, when we introduce a new expression kind (in this case the infinitive), we need to specify a grammatical function for it. For tensed subordinate clauses we chose the grammatical function COMP (= complement clause). For infinitival complements we postulate the grammatical function '''XCOMP'''. The X stands for the unexpressed subject of the subordinate clause.




In the following exercises, we will extend the grammar to license sentences with verbs like ''try'' and ''persuade''.

== How to write the control equations in XLFG ==

=== Subject control: ''try'' and ''promise'' ===

The SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical:

(↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ);

== Subject control: ''try''==

Notation:

In the exercises of this unit, we will have to implement '''Control''': this means that a grammatical function of the higher verb and the SUBJ of the higher verb's XCOMP are identical.

In XLFG, this is written as follows:

* (↑SUBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the SUBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.
* (↑OBJ) = (↑XCOMP SUBJ); the OBJ of the higher verb and the XCOMP's SUBJ are identical.

Note: remember to use the up and down arrows from the XLFG editor rather than those from your keyboard!

Exercise 10.1 
* Go to [https://xlfg.labri.fr/ https://xlfg.labri.fr/].

* Make all the additions to the grammar that are necessary to yield the following outputs for sentence (1), repeated below:

(1) Ingrid tried to buy olives.

'''Note:''' XLFG will create several f-structures for most sentences involving infinitives. You may have to '''scroll to the right''' in the f-structure window to see the first well formed f-structure.



[[File:Ingrid-tried-to-buy-olives-fs.JPG | 1000px]]
 

Implement the following grammatical assumptions:

* 'to' (the infinitive marker): assume that it is a verb which is marked [IM:+].
* 'buy': [VFORM:INF]

Make sure that your grammar also makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid tried buys olives





==Object control: ''persuade''==

''try'' is a subject control verb, because the controller of the lower subject is the higher '''subject'''. But, objects can control as well. One verb where that is the case is ''persuade''.

Exercise 10.2 

Make all the changes to your current grammar so that it licenses the representations for (2) below:

(2) Ingrid persuaded Fred to buy olives.



[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives.fs.JPG | 500px]]

[[File:Ingrid-persuaded-Fred-to-buy-olives-as.JPG | 500px]]
 

Make sure that your grammar makes the correct predictions for the sentences below:

(2) Ingrid buys olives 
(3) *Ingrid persuaded Fred buys olives



 
 


<div align="center">
[[Practical_Grammar |'''Main page''']] [[Practical_Grammar_2|'''Week 2''']] [[Practical_Grammar_3|'''Week 3''']] [[Practical_Grammar_4|'''Week 4''']] [[Practical_Grammar_5|'''Week 5''']] [[Practical_Grammar_6|'''Week 6''']] [[Practical_Grammar_7_new|'''Week 7''']] [[Practical_Grammar_8|'''Week 8''']] [[Practical_Grammar_9|'''Week 9''']]
</div>



-->