Meaning–text theory
The Meaning - Text Model (formerly sometimes referred to as content - text - model ) is a language model, whose development in the 1960's by a group of Moscow linguists to IA Meľčuk, A.K. Žolkovskij, J. D. Apresjan et al was started. A model that simulates human speech by a text ( in written or spoken form) in which it transmits corresponding meaning, and vice versa. The model consists of two components, a grammar, that is a special dependenzorientierten transformational grammar, and a specific dictionary.
This language model is based on the study of many different languages , and is therefore in principle to describe any natural, ie human languages suitable. The importance ⇔ Text model ( BTM or even MST model ' Smysl ⇔ Tekst ' from the Russian модель " Смысл ⇔ Текст " or engl. MTT of ' Meaning ⇔ Text' Theory) are closely matched with respect to dictionary and grammar the information contained in them, and with respect to the formal languages used. The essential components of this model are therefore a special grammar and an equally special Dictionary: The grammar functions as a translator, who shared in several stages of natural language texts in the meanings corresponding to these texts (Russian cмыcл ) and vice versa transfers. In the lexicon can be found, inter alia, Information about the meaning and combinability of lexemes. The model is used accordingly to the translation in two directions: first from the meaning to the text: the synthesis of language or the production of texts, which the human capacity is modeled to talk. 2 from text to meaning: the analysis of texts, so that the ability of humans to understanding of spoken utterances or of the written language is modeled.
Important aspects of the BTM are the following: first, the approach of BTM to deliver a truly systematic description of natural languages ; 2, the so-called lexical functions that are applicable in all natural languages; 3 the Rektionsmodell ( systematic presentation of the valences of a word ); 4 Semantic metalanguage that is used in the BTM for Meaning Explanation of words and complex expressions; 5 the points of contact of the BTM with the field of machine translation.
History
Initial work on the development of the BTM were in the 1960s by a group of Moscow linguists to Igor ' Aleksandrovich Meľčuk, Aleksandr Konstantinović Žolkovskij and Yuri Derenikovič Apresjan (later Moscow Semantic School, Russ Московская семантическая школа or Московская школа семантики, Eng. Semantic Moscow Circle ) done. In 1974, the two fundamental monographs of Meľčuk and Apresjan that provide a fairly comprehensive description of the BTM published. Modifications that were made to the model, or modification proposals have been repeatedly described in recent publications.
In German-speaking countries are to name in connection with the BTM primarily the following names: Tilmann Reuther employed since the late 1970s with the dictionary in BTM, especially with certain lexical features. Daniel Weiss takes a critical approach to the theory of the BTM. Leo Wanner used Lexical features for automatic translation and has among other things an anthology "Recent Trends in Meaning- Text Theory" published. Klaus Hartenstein employed in the 1980s also especially designed with the lexical features, not least with regard to their use for the teaching of foreign languages , but also with theoretical questions in BTM. Hartenstein and Peter Schmidt published in 1983 an extensive, annotated bibliography for BTM.
The actuality of the BTM is evident not least in the fact that since 2003 the two-year distance hosting international conferences on BTM. The first in Paris, then in Moscow ( 2005), Klagenfurt ( 2007), in Montreal (2009) and most recently in September 2011 in Barcelona.
A practical application of the BTM is i.a. the realization of the machine translation system ETAP dar. This system is since 1978, first at the Moscow Institute " Inform electric " and then developed and translated from English into Russian (later Russian Academy of Sciences) at the Institute for Problems of Information Transmission of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR and vice versa.
The two components of BTM
The dictionary of the BTM, the explanatory - Combinatorial Dictionary ( EKW, russ тoлкoвo - кoмбинaтopный cлoвapь ), provides much richer information than a conventional dictionary. This information is distributed in the EKW up to ten clearly structured zones for each dictionary entry. Some of these zones are also known from conventional dictionaries, but others convey information that is not found in ordinary dictionaries.
Three of these areas are particularly important: ( a) the Bedeutungsexplikation, an exact explanation of the keyword returns using the semantic metalanguage ( b ) the Rektionsmodell that contains all the relevant information on the semantic and syntactic valences of the keyword, as well as to its syntactic properties and ( c ) a zone with a list of all lexical features of the keyword, making the crucial information on all ways of connecting the keyword to be supplemented with other words.
The grammar in BTM first is a dependency grammar Tesnière'scher embossing, on the other hand a transformation or translation grammar that models the transition from meaning to text and vice versa. In order to make this transition, the model of different intermediate levels served. Specifically, the following four main levels in BTM used, with the former level, the semantic representation of meaning corresponds to the latter, the phonological or orthographic representation, the text:
Semantic representation ↕ Syntactic representation ↕ Morphological representation ↕ Phonological / Orthographic representation The last three levels of representation are doing, that divides a surface and a depth level into two sublevels.