Practical Grammar 15

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.

   

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/.
• 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

   

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

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

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.
• 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.

   

(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

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.

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