Acquiring phrasal lexicons from corpora
This thesis deals with the acquisition from corpora of information about the phrasal lexicon. While varying greatly in their treatment of such items, all schools of linguistic thought acknowledge that the lexicon contains not only single words, but a considerable number of multiword sequences (multiword expressions or MWEs). As for individual words, an adequate description of MWEs must be based on the systematic study of real usage, which can best be achieved with the use of corpus data. However, lexicographers cannot manually inspect every combination of words in the corpus with a view to deciding whether that phrase should be included in the lexicon. There is therefore considerable need for well-motivated ways of automatically identifying units of interest. We begin by looking at the range of arguments that have been made for the inclusion of different kinds of multiword expression in the lexicon. We identify arguments for inclusion made on the separate grounds of frequency, syntax and meaning. Subsequent chapters look at acquiring information about these three different dimensions, and demonstrate that different varieties of expression require different techniques. In chapter three, we look at the relative
Bannard, Colin
Acquiring phrasal lexicons from corpora. This thesis deals with the acquisition from corpora of information about the phrasal lexicon. While varying greatly in their treatment of such items, all schools of linguistic thought acknowledge that the lexicon contains not only single words, but a considerable number of multiword sequences (multiword expressions or MWEs). As for individual words, an adequate description of MWEs must be based on the systematic study of real usage, which can best be achieved with the use of corpus data. However, lexicographers cannot manually inspect every combination of words in the corpus with a view to deciding whether that phrase should be included in the lexicon. There is therefore considerable need for well-motivated ways of automatically identifying units of interest. We begin by looking at the range of arguments that have been made for the inclusion of different kinds of multiword expression in the lexicon. We identify arguments for inclusion made on the separate grounds of frequency, syntax and meaning. Subsequent chapters look at acquiring information about these three different dimensions, and demonstrate that different varieties of expression require different techniques. In chapter three, we look at the relative
phrasal lexicon corpus deal acquisition corpus information phrasal lexicon vary greatly treatment item school linguistic think acknowledge lexicon contains single_word considerable_number sequence expression individual word adequate description must base systematic_study real usage best achieve use corpus_data however manually inspect every combination word corpus view decide whether phrase include lexicon therefore considerable need well motivated way automatically identify unit interest begin_look range argument_make inclusion different_kind expression lexicon identify argument inclusion make separate ground frequency syntax meaning subsequent look acquire information three_different dimension different variety expression require different technique look relative