Hints for Homework #1
11-722: Grammar Formalisms
Spring 2004
Hint #1
What did Sam seem to try to eat?
• First decide what you want your final tree
to look like.
• You might want Lori to make sure that your
final tree is right before you start figuring
out how to derive it.
Hint #2
What did Sam seem to try to eat?
• The initial tree should contain the question word
and the gap.
– Since a question word can’t occur without a gap and
a gap can’t occur without a question word, they go
together in the initial tree.
• The terminal string of the initial tree should be:
– what PRO to eat e
• As the derivation proceeds, the question word
will get farther and farther from the gap.
Hint #3
What did Sam seem to try to eat?
• You should be able to use the same
auxiliary trees for seem and try that we
used in class.
– Lexical trees should not have to be different
for each sentence that contains the word.
“Seem” type verbs in TAG
VP
S
NP
VP
V
John
Adjunction site
AP
to be happy
Initial Tree
This will be a derived
tree for the try clause and
the eat clause. It will also
contain the word what.
V
VP
seem
Auxiliary Tree
These trees represent the number of
arguments for each verb:
“Seem” has one argument, represented
as a VP.
“To be happy” has one argument, “John”.
“Try” type verbs in TAG
This tree
will also
contain
the word
what.
S
NP
VP
V
John
S
S
NP
In the final tree,
try is an infinitive,
so the word to
has to be in this
tree.
VP
TO
PRO
tried
Auxiliary Tree
Adjunction site
VP
leave
Initial Tree
These trees show the number of arguments for
each verb:
“Try” has two arguments.
“Leave” has one argument.
Hint #4
What did Sam seem to try to eat?
• You might need to make a tree for did.
– It might not work to put it in the same auxiliary
tree with seem.
• The position for did should be at the
beginning of the sentence (before the
subject).