This paper proposes a rational analysis of referential inference. Referential inference is involved whenever a speaker has to provide an utterance that will effect some action on the part of their listener—a situation that occurs constantly in everyday language use. Our rational analysis of referring makes certain assumptions about the goal, environment, and computational constraints involved i...

In this paper we discuss referential choice – the process of referential device selection made by the speaker in the course of discourse production. We aim at explaining the actual referential choices attested in the discourse sample. Two alternative models of referential choice are discussed. The first approach of Kibrik (1996, 1999, 2000) is the cognitive calculative approach. It suggests tha...

The relationship between how people describe objects and when they choose to point is complex and likely to be influenced by factors related to both perceptual and discourse context. In this paper, we explore these interactions using machine-learning on a dialogue corpus, to identify multimodal referential strategies that can be used in automatic multimodal generation. We show that the decision...

In this paper we present the ongoing efforts to expand the depth and breath of the Open Multilingual Wordnet coverage by introducing two new classes of non-referential concepts to wordnet hierarchies: interjections and numeral classifiers. The lexical semantic hierarchy pioneered by Princeton Wordnet has traditionally restricted its coverage to referential and contentful classes of words: such ...

Based on Eugene Nida’s functional equivalence theory, this article delves into the language features of petroleum engineering English from three dimensions vocabulary, syntax and discourse. With practical translation examples for illustration, several strategies are developed at each level respectively, such as contextual domestication, ground supplement, unity in form spirit, transfer dynamic ...

Referential expressions are used to introduce and continue reference to entities with par ticular referential properties, but also with particular discourse properties. In this paper we investigate the referential and discourse properties of pemarked indefi nite direct objects in Romanian, which are an instance of Diff erential Object Marking (DOM). Pe -marking is generally obligatory for defi ...

This paper examines issues related to transitivity in Chinese, looking in particular at verb use in non-referential contexts. Four variants of non-referential verb use involving generic bare nouns and postverbal manner adverbs are analyzed. It is suggested that in these cases of non-referential verb use, the verb is first merged with an adverbial complement, and then copied to yield the verb co...