Test 5 · ★★ · The four tones: same sound, different meaning

What would happen if you called your mum mà instead of māma?

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 4 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: you · What happens: happen, call · To what, where: mum mà · Speech: someone speaks here

This is test 5 · ★★ of lesson 2 «The four tones: same sound, different meaning» of the Chinese street course of Mova's primary school. The page gives the question's syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause, then the 4 options as the student saw them, each with its tree and pragmatics. Every text is parsed by Mova itself. How the student answered it, with the score of every option and why: the test at school.

The question

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	What	what	PRON	PronType=Int	3 happen	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 happen	aux
3	happen	happen	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	if	if	SCONJ	_	6 called	mark
5	you	you	PRON	Case=Nom Person=2 PronType=Prs	6 called	nsubj
6	called	call	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=2 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 happen	advcl
7	your	your	PRON	Case=Gen Person=2 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	9 mà	nmod:poss
8	mum	mum	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 mà	compound
9	mà	mà	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 called	obj
10	instead	instead	ADV	ExtPos=ADP	12 māma	case
11	of	of	ADP	_	10 instead	fixed
12	māma	māma	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 called	obl
13	?	?	PUNCT	_	3 happen	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	happen	would							vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
2	call a condition, not said to happen	past	you	your mum mà				instead māma	vn initiate_communication-37.4.2-1 «NP V NP.recipient»: agent=Agent mà=Recipient

One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree.

The options

Option 1 · ← Mova's choice

It would mean grandma

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 mean	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 mean	aux
3	mean	mean	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	grandma	grandma	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 mean	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	mean	would	It	grandma					vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent grandma=Topic

Option 2

Nothing, all four tones of ma mean mum

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nothing	nothing	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Neg	8 mean	nsubj
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	1 Nothing	punct
3	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	5 tones	det
4	four	four	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	5 tones	nummod
5	tones	tone	NOUN	Number=Plur	8 mean	nsubj
6	of	of	ADP	_	7 ma	case
7	ma	ma	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 tones	nmod
8	mean	mean	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
9	mum	mum	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 mean	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	mean	present	Nothing	mum					vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent mum=Topic
2	intonate			ma					nom tone «communication transitive»: of=patient

Option 3

It would sound extra polite

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 sound	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 sound	aux
3	sound	sound	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	extra	extra	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 sound	xcomp
5	polite	polite	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 sound	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	sound	would	It					extra, polite property	vn stimulus_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus

Option 4 · ✓ the right answer

It would sound like «scold», not «mum»

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	It	it	PRON	Case=Nom Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	3 sound	nsubj
2	would	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 sound	aux
3	sound	sound	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	like	like	ADP	_	6 scold	case
5	«	«	PUNCT	_	6 scold	punct
6	scold	scold	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 sound	obl
7	»	»	PUNCT	_	3 sound	punct
8	,	,	PUNCT	_	11 mum	punct
9	not	not	PART	Polarity=Neg	11 mum	advmod
10	«	«	PUNCT	_	11 mum	punct
11	mum	mum	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 sound	obl
12	»	»	PUNCT	_	11 mum	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	sound	would	It	mum				like scold	vn stimulus_subject-30.4 «NP V PP.attribute»: agent=Stimulus

Text: the tests of Mova's primary school, written for Mova (world/data/school/), as the course runner gave them to the student. Trees: Mova's own parse — the en model on the CPU, when the site is built — not checked by a teacher; they may be wrong. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), each text read on its own. Elamur Cosmic License.

This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/questions/chinese-street/2-the-four-tones/t5/