Exam question 2 · Soft words for hard things: crime, prison and the police
Identify the principal meaning of "use of force" as employed in police reports.
Mova's choice: option 1 · The right answer: option 3 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: you · What happens: identify, employ, mean, use · To what, where: principal meaning, police reports, use, force
This is exam question 2 of lesson 27 «Soft words for hard things: crime, prison and the police» 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 | Identify | identify | VERB | Mood=Imp VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 2 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 4 meaning | det |
| 3 | principal | principal | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 4 meaning | amod |
| 4 | meaning | meaning | NOUN | Number=Sing | 1 Identify | obj |
| 5 | of | of | ADP | _ | 7 use | case |
| 6 | " | " | PUNCT | _ | 7 use | punct |
| 7 | use | use | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 meaning | nmod |
| 8 | of | of | ADP | _ | 9 force | case |
| 9 | force | force | NOUN | Number=Sing | 7 use | nmod |
| 10 | " | " | PUNCT | _ | 9 force | punct |
| 11 | as | as | SCONJ | _ | 12 employed | mark |
| 12 | employed | employ | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 1 Identify | advcl |
| 13 | in | in | ADP | _ | 15 reports | case |
| 14 | police | police | NOUN | Number=Sing | 15 reports | compound |
| 15 | reports | report | NOUN | Number=Plur | 12 employed | obl |
| 16 | . | . | 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 principal meaning of use of force | vn characterize-29.2-1-1 «NP V NP S_ING»: agent=Agent meaning=Theme | ||||
| 2 | employ | participle | you not said here | police reports | vn hire-13.5.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent | ||||
| 3 | mean | use of force | nom meaning «communication transitive»: of=patient | ||||||
| 4 | use in a quote | force | nom use «act transitive»: of=patient |
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 operation of police vehicles
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 2 operation | det |
| 2 | operation | operation | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
| 3 | of | of | ADP | _ | 5 vehicles | case |
| 4 | police | police | NOUN | Number=Sing | 5 vehicles | compound |
| 5 | vehicles | vehicle | NOUN | Number=Plur | 2 operation | nmod |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | operate | police vehicles | nom operation «state transitive»: of=patient |
Option 2
The application of physics in the classroom
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 2 application | det |
| 2 | application | application | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
| 3 | of | of | ADP | _ | 4 physics | case |
| 4 | physics | physic | NOUN | Number=Plur | 2 application | nmod |
| 5 | in | in | ADP | _ | 7 classroom | case |
| 6 | the | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 7 classroom | det |
| 7 | classroom | classroom | NOUN | Number=Sing | 4 physics | nmod |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | apply | physics in the classroom | nom application «act intransitive»: of=agent |
Option 3 · ✓ the right answer
Violence by police
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Violence | violence | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
| 2 | by | by | ADP | _ | 3 police | case |
| 3 | police | police | NOUN | Number=Plur | 1 Violence | nmod |
The frames reader finds no event or fact in this sentence.
Option 4
The opening of jammed doors
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The | the | DET | Definite=Def PronType=Art | 2 opening | det |
| 2 | opening | opening | NOUN | Number=Sing | root | root |
| 3 | of | of | ADP | _ | 5 doors | case |
| 4 | jammed | jam | VERB | Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass | 5 doors | amod |
| 5 | doors | door | NOUN | Number=Plur | 2 opening | nmod |
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | jam | participle | vn spray-9.7-1-1 «NP V PP.destination»: agent=Theme |
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/27-crime-prison-and-police/e2/