Adjuncts and the Processing of Lexical Rules

TL;DR

This paper extends the HPSG framework to explain the scope ambiguity of adjuncts in Germanic verb clusters by introducing recursive lexical rules and delayed evaluation techniques.

Contribution

It introduces a novel extension to HPSG that models adjunct scope ambiguity using recursive lexical rules and constraint-logic programming methods.

Findings

Successfully models narrow-scope readings of adjuncts in verb clusters.

Demonstrates the use of delayed evaluation techniques for processing complex lexical rules.

Provides a systematic account of adjunct scope ambiguity in Germanic languages.

Abstract

The standard HPSG analysis of Germanic verb clusters can not explain the observed narrow-scope readings of adjuncts in such verb clusters. We present an extension of the HPSG analysis that accounts for the systematic ambiguity of the scope of adjuncts in verb cluster constructions, by treating adjuncts as members of the subcat list. The extension uses powerful recursive lexical rules, implemented as complex constraints. We show how `delayed evaluation' techniques from constraint-logic programming can be used to process such lexical rules.