Syntactic annotation – coordination

Phrase-level coordination

Phrase-level coordination is applied in cases where any one of the conjuncts consists of more than one word.

Broadly speaking, phrase-level coordination is presented using CONJP, a phrasal category headed by KON. The only exception to this are coordinated matrix clauses with coreferential subjects, which are treated as separate tokens (see here).

• The general structure for phrase-level coordination is:

(XP1 (XP2 first-conjunct)
     (CONJP (KON conjunction)     ← CONJP is sister to first conjunct
            (XP3 second-conjunct))  ← The second conjunct is conjunct to the head KON
)

 

• In cases for third and subsequent conjuncts, this general structure is just extended:

(XP1 (XP2 first-conjunct)
     (CONJP (KON conjunction)     
            (XP3 second-conjunct))
     (CONJP (KON conjunction)
            (XP4 third-conjunct))
)

(NP-OB1 (NP (DDARTA dat)
            (NA wijf))
        (CONJP (KON oft)
               (NP (NE eua)))
)

Word-level coordination

• Single-word conjuncts can just conjoin at word level; no CONJP is needed:

(XP (X1 (X2 first-conjunct)
        (KON and)
        (X3 second-conjunct))
)

(ADJP-PRD (ADJD (ADJD seker)
                (KON vnde)
                (ADJD ghewijs))
)

(NP-ADT (DPDS (DPDS dit)
              (KON of)
              (DPDS dat))
)

 

• Coordination of nonfinite verbs:

(VVFIN (VVFIN comen)
       (KON eder)
       (VVFIN quamen)
)

Inserting empty conjunctions

Note that an empty conjunction (KON Ø) is inserted in certain contexts (see here).

Correlative conjunctions

Word-level correlative conjunctions are treated as a flat structure:

(NP (NA (KON X)
        (NA Y)
        (KON Z)
        (NA Q))
)

In cases of phrase-level correlative conjunction, the first conjunction is annotated as a sister of the first conjunct. The rest of the phrase is treated as per non-correlative phrase-level coordination.

(NP-OB1 (KON beide)           
        (NP (ADJA hillighe)
            (NA scrift))
        (CONJP (KON vnde)
               (NP (ADJA natuerlike)
                   (NA scrift)))
)

Coordination with shared pre-modification

For cases of conjunction with shared pre-modifiers, we do not use NX, ADJX etc, as in the general Penn scheme. Rather, we follow the following guidelines:

• If word-level conjunction can apply, apply it (see above)
• Otherwise, attach the pre-modifier to the highest node, and annotate conjunction of a phrase-level category (XP):

        (NP-SBJ (DPOSA dine)                       ← Pre-modifier attached high
                (NP (ADJA grote)                |  ← Structural parallelism
                    (NA vnere))                 |
                (CONJP (KON vnde)               +-- Phrase-level conjunction
                       (NP (ADJA bedreuenne)    |
                           (NA schande))))      /

The rule to attach high by default is used in these cases. As illustrated above, this rule can be overridden in the case of structural parallelism between the two conjuncts. The adjective grote could in principle be treated as a shared pre-modifier, but to maintain parallelism it is attached inside the first conjunct instead.

 

Conjunction of unlike categories

Sometimes two unlike categories will be conjoined. In such cases, the category enclosing the conjunction structures is the same as the category of the first conjunct.

(NP-OB1 (NP (CARDA seuen)
             (NA vrowen))
        (CONJP (KON vnd)
               (PP (APPR bouen)
                   (NP (XY xx)
                       (NA sone))))
)

Unlike in the general Penn scheme, we use this policy for both phrase-level and word-level conjunction.

Use of gapping instead of word-level conjunction with separable verb prefixes

In some cases, what is logically word-level conjunction between two verbs cannot be annotated as such because of separable verb prefixes which are annotated as separate words. In such cases, the second (or later) conjunct is annotated as a gap instead:

    (IP-MAT-1 (PP (APPR Van)
                  (NP (DDARTA dessen)
                      (NA ghelde)))
              (VMFIN scholen)
              (NP-SBJ (NP (NE Gherd))
                      (CONJP (KON vnde)
                             (NP (NA vor)
                                 (NE vredeke)
                                 (ADJN vorghenompt))))
              (PTKVZ weder)
              (VVINF gheuen)
              (IP-MAT-PRN=1 (KON vnde)
                            (VVINF betalen))
     )

Not:

    (IP-MAT ...
            (PTKVZ weder)
            (VVINF (VVINF gheuen)
                   (KON vnde)
                   (VVINF betalen))
    )