A System for Transformational Analysis

A system is proposed here for assigning a derived P-marker to a given transformed sentence and obtaining the corresponding base P-marker at the same time. Rules of analytical phrase-structure grammar for such a system have associated with them i~formation pertaining to the transformational histories of their own derivation. When a phrase-structure analysis of the sentence is obtained, the set of grammar rules used for the analysis contains all the information necessary for the direct mapping of the derived P-marker into the corresponding P-marker. The system can also be used for decomposing a given complex sentence into "kernel" sentences for the purpose of structure matching between a query sentence and stored document sentences in information retrieval. An experimental program for the proposed system has been written and is currently tested with a small sample grammar. Study is underway to see if there is any mechanical procedure for obtaining an smalytical phrase structure grammar of the proposed type for a given transformational grammar.