Exam question 1 · Persuasive letters, newspaper articles and diaries
Identify the persuasive device employed in the sentence «Surely you agree?»
Mova's choice: option 3 · The right answer: option 3 · right ✓ · Who acts: you · What happens: identify, employ, agree · To what, where: persuasive device, sentence
This is exam question 1 of lesson 24 «Persuasive letters, newspaper articles and diaries» of the English course of Mova's primary school, asked in stiff, formal language. 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 | Identify | identify | VERB | Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 2 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 4 device | det |
| 3 | persuasive | persuasive | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 4 device | amod |
| 4 | device | device | NOUN | Number=Sing | 1 Identify | obj |
| 5 | employed | employ | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 4 device | acl |
| 6 | in | in | ADP | _ | 8 sentence | case |
| 7 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 8 sentence | det |
| 8 | sentence | sentence | NOUN | Number=Sing | 5 employed | obl |
| 9 | « | « | PUNCT | _ | 12 agree | punct |
| 10 | Surely | surely | ADV | _ | 12 agree | advmod |
| 11 | you | you | PRON | Case=Nom Person=2 PronType=Prs | 12 agree | nsubj |
| 12 | agree | agree | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=2 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 8 sentence | acl:relcl |
| 13 | ? | ? | PUNCT | _ | 1 Identify | punct |
| 14 | » | » | PUNCT | _ | 1 Identify | punct |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | identify | imperative | you not said here | the persuasive device | vn characterize-29.2-1-1 «NP V NP S_ING»: agent=Agent device=Theme | ||||
| 2 | employ | participle | the persuasive device not said here | the sentence | vn hire-13.5.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent | ||||
| 3 | agree speech: agree in a quote | present | you | the sentence not said here | surely property | vn correspond-36.1-1 «NP V S»: agent=Agent sentence=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
A caption
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 2 caption | det |
| 2 | caption | caption | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
Option 2
A glossary entry
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 3 entry | det |
| 2 | glossary | glossary | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 3 entry | amod |
| 3 | entry | entry | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
Option 3 · ← Mova's choice · ✓ the right answer
A rhetorical question
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 3 question | det |
| 2 | rhetorical | rhetorical | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 3 question | amod |
| 3 | question | question | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
Option 4
A numbered instruction of the kind found in a recipe
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | A | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 3 instruction | det |
| 2 | numbered | number | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 3 instruction | amod |
| 3 | instruction | instruction | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
| 4 | of | of | ADP | _ | 6 kind | case |
| 5 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 6 kind | det |
| 6 | kind | kind | NOUN | Number=Sing | 3 instruction | nmod |
| 7 | found | find | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 3 instruction | acl |
| 8 | in | in | ADP | _ | 10 recipe | case |
| 9 | a | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 10 recipe | det |
| 10 | recipe | recipe | NOUN | Number=Sing | 7 found | obl |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | number | participle | vn classify-29.10 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent | ||||||
| 2 | find | participle | a numbered instruction of the kind not said here | a recipe | vn declare-29.4-1-1 «NP V what S_INF»: agent=Agent | ||||
| 3 | instruct | the kind | nom instruction «communication transitive»: of=patient |
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/english/24-persuasive-letters-newspaper-articles-and-diaries/e1/