Exploring a type-theoretic approach to accessibility constraint modelling

TL;DR

This paper extends a type-theoretic framework for discourse representation theory (DRT) to handle additional accessibility constraints, including proper nouns and rhetorical relations, using a continuation-based approach.

Contribution

It introduces new rules for accessibility constraints in a type-theoretic DRT model, integrating proper noun referents and rhetorical discourse structures.

Findings

The approach effectively models accessibility constraints involving proper nouns.

It demonstrates how rhetorical relations can be incorporated into the type-theoretic framework.

The continuation-based method manages multiple principles in discourse modeling.

Abstract

The type-theoretic modelling of DRT that [degroote06] proposed features continuations for the management of the context in which a clause has to be interpreted. This approach, while keeping the standard definitions of quantifier scope, translates the rules of the accessibility constraints of discourse referents inside the semantic recipes. In this paper, we deal with additional rules for these accessibility constraints. In particular in the case of discourse referents introduced by proper nouns, that negation does not block, and in the case of rhetorical relations that structure discourses. We show how this continuation-based approach applies to those accessibility constraints and how we can consider the parallel management of various principles.