Research into the evolution of grammar requires that we employ formalisms and processing mechanisms that are powerful enough to handle features found in human natural languages. But the formalism needs to have some additional properties compared to those used in other linguistics research that are specifically relevant for handling the emergence and progressive co-ordination of grammars in a po...

The paper examines in how far Construction Grammar is a useful foundation by which artificial agents can self-organise communication systems that are grounded in the real world through a sensori-motor embodiment and use grammar to express certain aspects of meaning. It proposes a particular computational formalism, Fluid Construction Grammar, and mechanisms by which constructions can be progres...

In this paper, we propose a concrete operationalization which incorporates data from the FrameNet database into Fluid Construction Grammar, currently the only computational implementation of construction grammar that can achieve both production and parsing using the same set of constructions. As a proof of concept, we selected an annotated sentence from the FrameNet database and transcribed its...

Abstract This chapter introduces very briefly the framework and tools for lexical and grammatical processing that have been used in the evolutionary language game experiments reported in this book. This framework is called Fluid Construction Grammar (FCG) because it rests on a constructional approach to language and emphasizes flexible grammar application. Construction grammar organizes the kno...

A conversational English text parsing and generation system is described in which its lexicon and construction grammar rules are revised, augmented, and improved via dialog with mentors. Both the parser and generator operate in a cognitively plausible, incremental manner. Construction Grammar is well suited for a precise and robust dialog system due to its emphasis on pairing utterance form wit...

This paper argues for the inclusion of constructional inferences in semantic representation of verbs. By examining the transitive pattern of the Mandarin verb GA N (趕) ‘rush’, it is found that verbal semantics can only be adequately represented if constructionally coerced information is taken into consideration. The construction [GA N + NP] renders specific interpretations that cannot be direct...

An important part of textual inference is making deductions involving monotonicity, that is, determining whether a given assertion entails restrictions or relaxations of that assertion. For instance, the statement ‘We know the epidemic spread quickly’ does not entail ‘We know the epidemic spread quickly via fleas’, but ‘We doubt the epidemic spread quickly’ entails ‘We doubt the epidemic spread...

In this paper we present SINTESI, a system for the knowledge extraction from Italian inputs, currently under development in our re,search centre. It is used on short descriptive diagnostic texts, in order to summarise their technical content and to build a knowledge base on faults. Often in these texts complex linguistic constructions like conjunctions, negations, ellipsis and anaphorae are inv...

In Construction Grammar, rules of syntactic combination (descriptions of local trees, e.g., a verb phrase and its daughters) have meanings. These meanings are represented by syntactic, semantic and usage features that attach to the mother or daughter nodes in these trees (Sag 2007, 2008). A construction defines the distinctive properties of a mode of combination that is part of the grammar of a...