Group theory and computational linguistics
type: Item
instance of: scholarly article
title: Group theory and computational linguistics
zbMATH Open document ID: 0919.03024
DOI: 10.1023/A:1008395026374
author: Marc Dymetman
published in: Journal of Logic, Language and Information
publication date: 1999-08-31T00:00:00Z
review text: The aim of this paper is to define a theory of linguistic description based solely on group structure involving the classical notions of non-commutative free group, conjugacy and group presentations. To do this, the author introduces the concept of \(G\)-grammar, which is a collection of lexical expressions (i.e. products of logical forms), phonological forms and inverses of those. \(G\)-grammars use the group-theoretic notion of conjugacy which allows a uniform description of commutative and non-commutative aspects of language and provides an elegant approach to long-distance dependency and scoping phenomena. The author exhibits a \(G\)-grammar for a fragment of English involving quantification and relative pronouns. An example is given to illustrate the generation process. Using the compatible preorder associated to a \(G\)-grammar, the relators of this \(G\)-grammar can be represented as rewrite rules. Several examples of rewriting derivations are presented and discussed. The author compares the new notion of \(G\)-grammar with existing approaches (CFGs, DCGs, CGs). Advantages of \(G\)-grammars for describing commutative and non-commutative aspects of language are discussed. This original paper ends by proving some strong computability properties of \(G\)-grammars from both parsing and generation points of view.
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 03B65
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 68T50
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 20E05
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 68Q45
zbMATH DE Number: 1251518
zbMATH Keywords: group-theoretic approach
zbMATH Keywords: theory of linguistic description
zbMATH Keywords: free group
zbMATH Keywords: group presentations
zbMATH Keywords: \(G\)-grammar
zbMATH Keywords: conjugacy
zbMATH Keywords: long-distance dependency
zbMATH Keywords: scoping
zbMATH Keywords: fragment of English
zbMATH Keywords: quantification
zbMATH Keywords: relative pronouns
zbMATH Keywords: rewriting
zbMATH Keywords: computability properties
zbMATH Keywords: parsing
zbMATH Keywords: generation
MaRDI profile type: Publication
full work available at URL: a:1008395026374
OpenAlex ID: W1590346340
description: scientific article; zbMATH DE number 1251518