Test 8 · Colours

What would happen if you said zì instead of zǐ for purple?

Mova's choice: option 2 · The right answer: option 2 · right ✓ · Who acts: you · What happens: happen, say · To what, where: zì · Speech: someone speaks here

This is test 8 of lesson 8 «Colours» 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 said	mark
5	you	you	PRON	Case=Nom Person=2 PronType=Prs	6 said	nsubj
6	said	say	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=2 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	3 happen	advcl
7	zì	zì	NOUN	Number=Plur	6 said	obj
8	instead	instead	ADV	ExtPos=ADP	10 zǐ	case
9	of	of	ADP	_	8 instead	fixed
10	zǐ	zǐ	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 said	obl
11	for	for	ADP	_	12 purple	case
12	purple	purple	NOUN	Number=Sing	10 zǐ	nmod
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	say speech: assert a condition, not said to happen	past	you	zì				instead zǐ for purple	vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent zì=Topic

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

Nothing, they are the very same word

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Nothing	nothing	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Neg	root	root
2	,	,	PUNCT	_	8 word	punct
3	they	they	PRON	Case=Nom Number=Plur Person=3 PronType=Prs	8 word	nsubj
4	are	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	8 word	cop
5	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	8 word	det
6	very	very	ADV	_	7 same	advmod
7	same	same	ADJ	Degree=Pos	8 word	amod
8	word	word	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Nothing	conj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	present	they	the same word					tree rules

Option 2 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer

You'd say «character, letter» instead

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	You	you	PRON	Case=Nom Person=2 PronType=Prs	3 say	nsubj
2	'd	would	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	3 say	aux
3	say	say	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	root	root
4	«	«	PUNCT	_	5 character	punct
5	character	character	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 say	obj
6	,	,	PUNCT	_	7 letter	punct
7	letter	letter	NOUN	Number=Sing	5 character	conj
8	»	»	PUNCT	_	5 character	punct
9	instead	instead	ADV	_	3 say	advmod

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	say speech: assert	would	You	character and letter				instead property	vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V NP.topic»: agent=Agent character=Topic

Option 3

It would mean yellow

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	yellow	yellow	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 mean	obj

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

Option 4

It would mean pink, a lighter kind of purple

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	pink	pink	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 mean	xcomp
5	,	,	PUNCT	_	8 kind	punct
6	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	8 kind	det
7	lighter	light	ADJ	Degree=Cmp	8 kind	amod
8	kind	kind	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 mean	conj
9	of	of	ADP	_	10 purple	case
10	purple	purple	NOUN	Number=Sing	8 kind	nmod

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

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/8-colours/t8/