Parts of Speech - linguistics.byu.edulinguistics.byu.edu/faculty/deddingt/545/A Ch 11.pdfParts of Speech Speech errors ... If gender assignment is rule-based error rates should be

Parts of Speech

● Content words and function words– Examples?

Parts of Speech

● Speech errors involving substitution keep part of speech– He's going to have with them < He's having to

go with them

Parts of Speech


go with them● What does that say about speech

processing?

Parts of Speech


go with them● What does that say about speech

processing?– Part of speech is encoded in word in the mental

lexicon

Parts of Speech

● In word association nouns generate mainly nouns and verbs mainly verbs– What does that say?

Parts of Speech

● In word association nouns generate mainly nouns and verbs mainly verbs– What does that say?

– It is more evidence that part of speech is integral part of words

Characteristics of Nouns

● They have meronyms – X is a meronym of Y if X is part of Y

• What are the meronyms of car?

• What are the meronyms of cell phone?

• What are the meronyms of feeling?


● They have holonyms – X is a holonym of Y if Y is part of X

• keyboard is a holonym of key since key is a part of keyboard




• What is a holonym of brain?




• What is a holonym of brain?

• What is a holonym of car?


● Nouns have attributes– coins are metallic, round, shiny, have faces


● Nouns have attributes– coins are metallic, round, shiny, have faces

● Nouns have functions– coins are used to buy things, they jingle, get

dirty


● Nouns often have or are hyponyms– X is a hyponym of Y if every X is a kind of Y



• a daisy is a flower since every daisy is a kind of flower

• a chair is furniture since every chair is a kind of furniture





● daisy is a hyponym of flower because it falls under flower

● chair is a hyponym of furniture because it falls under furniture





● Not all nouns are or have hyponyms• a handshake is a kind of ?

• a leaf is a kind of ?


● Nouns often have or are hypernyms– X is a hypernym of Y if every Y is a kind of X

• a flower is a hypernym of daisy since every daisy is a kind of flower

• furniture is a hypernym of chair since every chair is a kind of furniture


● What is the relationship between these?– building and structure


● What is the relationship between these?– building and structure

• building is a hyponmy of structure

• structure is a hypernym of building


● What is the relationship between these?– sport and soccer



– liposuction and surgery



– liposuction and surgery

– cough and ?

– sound and ?

Characteristics of Adjectives

● Meaning depends on what they modify– hot water (temperature)

– hot taco (spice)

– hot athlete (effective)

– hot guy (attractive)


● Two kinds of adjectives– Descriptive: give value to noun

– hard surface– fuzzy appearance


● Two kinds of adjectives– Descriptive: give value to noun

– hard surface– fuzzy appearance

• Usually have opposites– soft surface– sharp appearance


● Two kinds of adjectives– Pertaining to

– historical figure– religious guru– musical virtuoso


● Two kinds of adjectives– Pertaining to

– historical figure– religious guru– musical virtuoso

• Don't have opposites– *non-historical figure– *atheistic guru– *tone deaf virtuoso

Characteristics of Verbs

● Do verbs have hypo- and hypernyms?


● Do verbs have hypo- and hypernyms?– Yes, but the difference is not is X a kind of Y


● Do verbs have hypo- and hypernyms?– Yes, but the difference is not is X a kind of Y

– It entails doing something in a particular way

– It is called troponymy


● X is a troponym of Y if X is doing Y in a particular way– wiggle is a troponym of move since wiggle is

moving in a particular way



moving in a particular way• nibble, scarf, gorge are troponyms of ?




• roll, and slide are troponyms of ?




• roll, and slide are troponyms of ?

• march and stroll are troponyms of ?


● Entailment– X is entailed by Y if by doing Y you must be

doing X as well • Sleeping is entailed by snoring since to be snoring

you must also be sleeping





• What is entailed by kissing?





• What is entailed by kissing? Touching






• What is entailed by buying?






• What is entailed by buying? Paying

Content vs. Function Words

● How are they different?– We can easily add new content words (google,

blog)

– Few new function words are added (behind, to, for, every)



blog)


– Broca's aphasia entails loss of function words, not content words



blog)


– Broca's aphasia entails loss of function words, not content words

– In LDT there are frequency effects for content, but not function words

More Experiments

● Spanish gender– all nouns are either masculine or feminine

More Experiments

● Spanish gender– All nouns are either masculine or feminine

– Nouns pass the gender to the adjectives that modify them

much* gente alt*

│

fem.

Lots of tall peopleF

More Experiments



mucha gente alta

│

fem.

Lots ofF tallF peopleF

More Experiments



much* edificio alt*

│

masc.

Lots of tall buildingsM

More Experiments



muchos edificios altos

│

masc.

Lots ofM tallM buildingsM

Spanish Gender

● Weird cases: masculine nouns take feminine article

– elM águila

F

– elM áncla

F

– elM árma

F

– *laF águila

F

– *laF áncla

F

– *laF árma

F

Spanish Gender

● Weird cases: masculine nouns take feminine article

– elM águila

F

– elM áncla

FWHY?

– elM árma

F

– *laF águila

F

– *laF áncla

F

– *laF árma

F

Spanish Gender

● Traditional explanation– you do this to avoid [a á] sequences

• *laF águila

F

• elF águila

F

The el is just a variant form of la that is feminine, but just looks masculine

Spanish Gender

● So, only el is OK before these words. The words are still feminine

● Problem: people put all kinds of masculine modifiers before these words

Spanish Gender

● Problem: people put all kinds of masculine modifiers before these words (Google search)

Masculine Feminine

este agua 82,900 esta agua 210,000

ese hacha 1,140 esa hacha 1,170

aquel águila 240 aquella águila 421

mucho hambre 13,700 mucha hambre 138,000

todo el área 122,000 toda el área 383,000

poco agua 34,500 poca agua 136,000

un único área 129 una única área 14,100

Spanish Gender

● Problem: people put all kinds of masculine modifiers before these words (Google search) WHY?

Masculine Feminine

este agua 82,900 esta agua 210,000

ese hacha 1,140 esa hacha 1,170

aquel águila 240 aquella águila 421

mucho hambre 13,700 mucha hambre 138,000

todo el área 122,000 toda el área 383,000

poco agua 34,500 poca agua 136,000

un único área 129 una única área 14,100

Spanish Gender

● Answers– Lots of people have bad grammar

Spanish Gender


• But you can even find it in the writings of “good writers”

Spanish Gender


• But you can even find it in the writings of “good writers”

● I think these words are hermaphroditic (have both genders)

– At least on the left side

Spanish Gender

● Evidence for this are masculine modifiers on left

– tanto ansia so much anxiety

– ese arma that arm

– buen alma good soul

– propio agua own water

● Even when separated by another word

– el abundante agua the abundante water

– un único área the only area

Spanish Gender

● So, gender doesn't radiate from noun to modifiers

muchagente alta

│

fem.

Lots ofF tall

F people

F

Spanish Gender

● Instead, people experience feminine modifiers around feminine nouns and masculine modifiers around masculine ones.

● They choose appropriately gendered modifiers by analogy, not by rule

● The hermaphroditic nouns give best evidence of this

Spanish Gender

● Examples: F=feminine modifier

F F F F F F

F F F F casa F F F F

F F F F F F F F F

Spanish Gender

● Examples: M=feminine modifier

M M MM M M M M M

M M M M caso M M M M

M M M M M M M

Spanish Gender

● Examples: M, F

M F M F M M M M M

F M F M agua M M M M

M F F F M M M M

Hypothesis

● If gender assignment is rule-based error rates should be similar for:

– post- and preposed modifiers.

– different kinds of nouns.

● If gender assignment is analogical:

– differing error rates are expected for different nouns. – different error rates for post-and preposed modifiers.

Experiment

● Subjects: 25 native Spanish speakers

● Test items:

– Noun with an inflected modifier and uninflected modifier

• nuestra hambre constante

• la peor ancla

– Items varied between prescriptively correct and incorrect

• nuestro/a hambre constante

• el/la peor ancla

– Distractor items were included with number agreement

• humilde curas católicos

Experiment

● Test items: Items varied on placement of inflected modifier (before or after noun)

– original arpa clásico/a

– el/la mejor arma

● 3 types of nouns:

– Regular: hermana, elemento, carne

– Transvestite: problema, enigma, drama (masculine, but look feminine)

– Hermaphroditic: arca, asta, haba (Have both genders)

Experiment

● Task: Press bien or mal key depending on if words could appear together in a correct sentence.

● Measure: Number of correct/incorrect responses in each category.

● Errors:

– Answering mal to a prescriptively good sequence:

• la dulce agua

– Answering bien to a prescriptively bad sequence:

• *el dulce agua

Results

● People made more errors on hermaphroditic and transvestite words (regardless of whether the modifier came before or after noun)

Results

● People made more errors on hermaphroditic and transvestite words (regardless of whether the modifier came before or after noun)

● More errors made on modifiers to the left of noun, especially for hermaphroditic nouns (and less so for transvestite nouns)

Conclusions

1-If gender were inherent to nouns and were passed equally to all modifiers, all modifiers would be as likely to induce errors, but hermaphroditic nouns are much more error prone. Exemplar-models expect this given actual usage.

2-Fluidity of agreement in usage does not support rule-approach.

3-Errors on preposed and postposed modifiers differ, while rule approach would predict similar patterns for each.

Parts of Speech - linguistics.byu.edulinguistics.byu.edu/faculty/deddingt/545/A Ch 11.pdfParts of Speech Speech errors ... If gender assignment is rule-based error rates should be

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