<?xml version="1.0" standalone="yes"?>
<Paper uid="C82-2063">
  <Title>GRAMMATIC AND S~ANTIC NORMATIVITY OF LINGUISTIC UNITS AND FEATCRES AS A FACTOR OF AUTOMATIC TEXT PROCESSING</Title>
  <Section position="1" start_page="0" end_page="0" type="abstr">
    <SectionTitle>
GRAMMATIC AND S~ANTIC NORMATIVITY OF LINGUISTIC UNITS
AND FEATCRES AS A FACTOR OF AUTOMATIC TEXT PROCESSING
</SectionTitle>
    <Paragraph position="0"> Z. M. ShalyapIna Instltut vostokovedenA~a AN 333R, ul. ~danova 12, 103 777 Moskva GSP, SSSR All systems of automatic text processing are explicitly or implicitly based on two general linguistic ~ssumptlons: the assumption o~ grammatioallty of the texts processed, and the assumption of their meaningfulness. These assumptions, however, cannot be considered as absolute laws: It is not unoommon that a text, thongh acceptable to most speakers of the corresponding language, still contains some morpholoEic and/or syntactic lngrammatlcalitles or cannot be completely Interpreted In terms of &amp;quot;standard&amp;quot; semantics; and conversely, startlng from an acceptable (meaningful) semantic structure one may as often as not fail to find fully &amp;quot;grammatical&amp;quot; language means that could express thls structure wlth absolute accuracy (one of the usual translation difficulties). Thls As due, f~om our point of view, not only to Incompleteness of linguistic and extrallngulstlc knowledge of separate people  or to Imperfections In the corresponding formal models, but also to the following two fundamental principles of Ilngulstic performance: I) a large number of ~equlrementa on lexico-gremmatic (superficial) manifestation of natural-language texts, and on their semantic Interpretation, are relative In that they characterize certain manifestations or Interpretations as more or less normative (preferable) in the given conditions, rather than obligatory vs. Inadmissible In the absolute sense; - 255 2) the interaction between the requirements of grammat null Ical and semantic normativlty of texts adheres to a so~ of ~omDlementarlt,7 principle: if the basic meaning of a text fragment is supposed by Its author to be sufficiently transparent or known aprlori to the text addressee, the grammatlcallty requirement for this fragment*s surface manifestation may be somewhat slackened; if on the contrary, the author believes the text to contain much Important Information new to the addressee, the language rules used in composing its surface manifestation are apt to be as standard and rigid as possible.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="1"> In this presentation we Intend to describe one Way of incorporating the above principles in the design of the analysis and synthesis (generation) components of an automat-Ic translation system.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="2"> The general structure of the system viewed from this standpoint Is planned to be as follows.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="3"> The major pert of factual linguistic Anformatlon Is formulated in the system regardless of the tasks of analysis or synthesis. It is shaped principally as a set of descriptive rules arranged into dictionary and grammar according to the so-called lexlco~aphlc principle and classified into two maln types: the context-representation rules making up the contextual dictionary and grammar component, and the context-contrastlvs rules forming the Inter-contextual grammar. The rules of both types describe the possible superficial manifestations and semantic Interpretations for elementary potential components of text structure. The kind of text structure serving as the point of reference for this description 18 defined in our model at the language-sign (LS) level, based primarily on the Saussurian conception of linguistic sign and roughly corresponding to the level of N.Chomsky's deep structures.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="4"> The context-representation rules proceeding from thl8 type of structure specify the contextual functioning of - 256 language unite and features Isolated at the LS-level, by relating them to their associated manifestations end Intex-pretatAonsdeg F~sentlally, they amount to statements of the following pattern: &amp;quot;If the I~S-structure of s text contains s certain unit or feature X An a certain contextual position, thAs unit or feature can be superficially manifested (reap. semantically Interpreted) In this text through the use of expression means Y= Creep. of meaning constituent Z)deg ~ The above principle of &amp;quot;relativity&amp;quot; As Ancorpor~ted In these rules by supplementing each of them by Its priority coefficient showing the degree of Its nor~ativIty. In contrast to mar~7 other &amp;quot;preferential&amp;quot; linguistic models we emphasize the linguistic significance of these coefficients which, An our vAsw, must be derived primarily from the Interplay of synonymy and homony~ as phenomena Inherent In natural language. With our linguistic description centered as It Is around the notion of linguistic sign In the Seussurian sense, It Is possible to evaluate these phenomena, as well as the priority coefficients r~qulred~ In terms of statistical data bearing on the occurrence rate (relative f~equenc~) of vlla'ious specific mstulfestattons and Interpretations of each LS-struotu~e among their alternatives.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="5"> The context-contrsstlve rules Anplement the &amp;quot;relativity&amp;quot; principle even more Immediately. Their general pattern is: &amp;quot;If a fragment of the L$-structure of * text has several alternative manifestations (r~sp. Interpretations) differing An a certain characteristics Y, preference should be given, all things being equal, to the alternative where the value of Y As related to the values of the same variable for the other altex~aatives An a definite wa~&amp;quot;. In terms of such rules one can stats all those particulars of the surface and/or semantic arrangement of natural-language texts (or of a special t~pe of texts) whAoh involve a kind of overall stylistic comparison, rather than the properties of Individual linguistic units and structural features.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="6"> - 257 The descriptive part of the system is made operational by means of special control components acting as &amp;quot;planners&amp;quot; of the analysis and Synthesis processes. One of the main tasks of these components within the framework outlined consists in grading the alternatives obtained from processing separate text fragments, as more or less p~omisln~ for accomplishing * the analysis (rasp. synthesis) of the whole text, this gradat-Ion based, among other things, on the priority coefficients of the rules used to form (or check) different aiternattvesj and on the interrelation between these rules with respect to the grammar and semantics &amp;quot;complementarity&amp;quot; principle. In as much as this aspect of processing Is concerned, the approach accepted makes It possible to re-lnterpret the well-known idea of &amp;quot;analysis through synthesis&amp;quot; and &amp;quot;synthesis through analysis&amp;quot; from the &amp;quot;normetlvlty&amp;quot; angle of vlew. Thus, for analysis one can reduce this Idea to a formalization of the followlng llne of reasoning (quits popular with translators or people somehow concerned with texts In foreign languages): &amp;quot;Expression X in the text at hand cannot mean Y because had the author meant Y he would have much rather used expression Z&amp;quot;.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="7"> Apart from affording better processing accuracy and efficiency, explicit introduction of data on normatlvlty and preferability of linguistic unite and features throughout all the major components of a text processing system, and drawing on statistical characteristics of LS-units&amp;quot; contextual manifestations and interpretations as the controlling factor In selecting the more &amp;quot;promising&amp;quot; among the alternative routes of processing concrete texts, seems to have one more asset.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="8"> Name\]y, possibilities are opened up for automatically perfect-PSr~ the system's functioning when required, and tailoring It to different text styles, by way of modifying the priority I coefficients of the linguistic rules Involved , directly from the current results of the system's operation.</Paragraph>
    <Paragraph position="9"> - 258 -</Paragraph>
  </Section>
class="xml-element"></Paper>