Exam question 4 · Soft words for hard things: death and dying

Determine which of the following expressions denotes death in the humorous register of British English.

Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 1 · right ✓ · Who acts: you, British English · What happens: determine, follow, denote, register · To what, where: death, humorous register

This is exam question 4 of lesson 2 «Soft words for hard things: death and dying» of the euphemisms 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	Determine	determine	VERB	Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin	root	root
2	which	which	PRON	PronType=Rel	7 denotes	obj
3	of	of	ADP	_	6 expressions	case
4	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	6 expressions	det
5	following	follow	VERB	VerbForm=Ger	6 expressions	amod
6	expressions	expression	NOUN	Number=Plur	7 denotes	obl
7	denotes	denote	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	1 Determine	ccomp
8	death	death	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 denotes	obj
9	in	in	ADP	_	12 register	case
10	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	12 register	det
11	humorous	humorous	ADJ	Degree=Pos	12 register	amod
12	register	register	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 denotes	obl
13	of	of	ADP	_	15 English	case
14	British	British	ADJ	Degree=Pos	15 English	amod
15	English	English	PROPN	Number=Sing	12 register	nmod
16	.	.	PUNCT	_	1 Determine	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	where	other	roles by
1	determine	imperative	you not said here				vn discover-84 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic
2	follow	gerund					vn occur-48.3-1 «NP V»: agent=Theme
3	denote	present	you not said here	death	the humorous register of British English	of the following expressions	tree rules
4	register		British English				nom register «communication intransitive»: of=agent

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 · ✓ the right answer

Popped his clogs

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Popped	pop	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
2	his	his	PRON	Case=Gen Gender=Masc Number=Sing Person=3 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs	3 clogs	nmod:poss
3	clogs	clog	NOUN	Number=Plur	1 Popped	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	pop	past		his clogs					vn break-45.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent clog=Patient

Option 2

Carked it

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Carked	cark	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=1 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
2	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	1 Carked	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	cark	past		it					tree rules

Option 3

Called home

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Called	call	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
2	home	home	NOUN	Number=Sing	1 Called	xcomp

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	call	participle		home					vn initiate_communication-37.4.2-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent

Option 4

Negative patient outcome

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Negative	negative	ADJ	Degree=Pos	3 outcome	amod
2	patient	patient	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 outcome	compound
3	outcome	outcome	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root

The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.

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/euphemisms/2-death-official-and-slang/e4/