Geometric Representations for Minimalist Grammars

Geometric representations for minimalist grammars

We reformulate minimalist grammars as partial functions on term algebras for strings and trees. Using filler/role bindings and tensor product representations, we construct homomorphisms for these data structures into geometric vector spaces. We prove that the structure-building functions as well as simple processors for minimalist languages can be realized by piecewise linear operators in repre...

A Recognizer for Minimalist Grammars

Movement-Generalized Minimalist Grammars

A general framework is presented that allows for Minimalist grammars to use arbitrary movement operations under the proviso that they are all definable by monadic second-order formulas over derivation trees. Lowering, sidewards movement, and clustering, among others, are the result of instantiating the parameters of this framework in a certain way. Even though weak generative capacity is not in...

Adjuncts and Minimalist Grammars

The behaviour of adverbs and adjectives has qualities of both ordinary selection and something else, something unique to modifiers. This makes them difficult to model. Modifiers are generally optional and transparent to selection while arguments are required and driven by selection. Cinque [4] proposes that adverbs, functional heads, and descriptive adjectives are underlyingly uniformly ordered...

Minimalist grammars and recognition

Abstract Recent work has shown how basic ideas of the minimalist tradition in transformational syntax can be captured in a simple generative formalism, a “derivational minimalism.” This framework can model “remnant movement” analyses, which yield more complex antecedent-trace relations, suggesting a new and significant sense in which linguistic structures are “chain based.” Michaelis (1998) sho...