A-not-a questions in Mandarin Chinese : an HPSG account

• Main Author: Wang, Wenjie
• Other Authors: Francis Bond
• Format: Final Year Project
• Language: English
• Published: 2015
• Subjects: DRNTU::Humanities::Linguistics::Syntax
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10356/62741
• Institution: Nanyang Technological University

In this paper, I look at a-not-a questions in Mandarin Chinese, and create an account based on the framework of Head-driven Phrase Structure Grammar (HPSG) and Minimal Recursion Semantics (MRS). While the a-not-a structure has seen extensive research in the past decades, they have largely been movement-based. Thus, this paper attempts to provide a non-movement but constraint-based HPSG/MRS account, which has thus far not been performed. Secondly, I have also begun initial implementation of said account into the HPSG-based Zhong [|] computational grammar for Chinese. While the basic forms of the a-not-a structure were accounted for and implemented, it was found that limitations in the system and formalisation prevented VP-not-VP questions from being successfully implemented.