Test 11 · Africa: countries and capitals

Why might a shared trade language like Swahili spread across many peoples?

Mova's choice: option 2 · The right answer: option 1 · wrong ✗ · Who acts: shared trade language · What happens: share, spread

This is test 11 of lesson 13 «Africa: countries and capitals» of the geography 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	Why	why	ADV	PronType=Int	9 spread	advmod
2	might	might	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	9 spread	aux
3	a	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	6 language	det
4	shared	share	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	6 language	amod
5	trade	trade	NOUN	Number=Sing	6 language	compound
6	language	language	NOUN	Number=Sing	9 spread	nsubj
7	like	like	ADP	_	8 Swahili	case
8	Swahili	Swahili	PROPN	Number=Sing	6 language	nmod
9	spread	spread	VERB	Mood=Ind Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	root	root
10	across	across	ADP	_	12 peoples	case
11	many	many	ADJ	Degree=Pos	12 peoples	amod
12	peoples	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	9 spread	obl
13	?	?	PUNCT	_	9 spread	punct

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	share	participle							tree rules
2	spread	might	a shared trade language like Swahili					across many peoples	vn spray-9.7-1 «NP V PP.destination»: agent=Theme across people=Destination

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 · ✓ the right answer

Traders and travellers from different peoples need one language to understand each other

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	Traders	trader	NOUN	Number=Plur	7 need	nsubj
2	and	and	CCONJ	_	3 travellers	cc
3	travellers	traveller	NOUN	Number=Plur	1 Traders	conj
4	from	from	ADP	_	6 peoples	case
5	different	different	ADJ	Degree=Pos	6 peoples	amod
6	peoples	people	NOUN	Number=Plur	1 Traders	nmod
7	need	need	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	root	root
8	one	one	NUM	NumForm=Word NumType=Card	9 language	nummod
9	language	language	NOUN	Number=Sing	7 need	obj
10	to	to	PART	_	11 understand	mark
11	understand	understand	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	7 need	advcl
12	each	each	DET	ExtPos=PRON PronType=Rcp	11 understand	obj
13	other	other	ADJ	Degree=Pos	12 each	fixed

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	need	present	Traders from different peoples and travellers	one language					vn want-32.1-1-1 «NP V NP ADV»: agent=Pivot language=Theme
2	understand	to-infinitive	Traders from different peoples and travellers not said here	each					vn comprehend-87.2-1-1-1 «NP V NP PP.attribute»: agent=Experiencer each=Stimulus

Option 2 · ← Mova's choice

It is the only language that can be written

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	5 language	nsubj
2	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 language	cop
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 language	det
4	only	only	ADJ	Degree=Pos	5 language	amod
5	language	language	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
6	that	that	PRON	PronType=Rel	9 written	nsubj:pass
7	can	can	AUX	VerbForm=Fin	9 written	aux
8	be	be	AUX	VerbForm=Inf	9 written	aux:pass
9	written	write	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	5 language	acl:relcl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	present	It	the only language					tree rules
2	write	can · passive		the only language					vn scribble-25.2-1 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme

Option 3

It is the oldest language on Earth, so all other African languages grew out of it

The tree, 16 words

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	5 language	nsubj
2	is	be	AUX	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin	5 language	cop
3	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	5 language	det
4	oldest	old	ADJ	Degree=Sup	5 language	amod
5	language	language	NOUN	Number=Sing	root	root
6	on	on	ADP	_	7 Earth	case
7	Earth	Earth	PROPN	Number=Sing	5 language	nmod
8	,	,	PUNCT	_	14 grew	punct
9	so	so	ADV	_	14 grew	advmod
10	all	all	DET	PronType=Tot	13 languages	det
11	other	other	ADJ	Degree=Pos	13 languages	amod
12	African	African	ADJ	Degree=Pos	13 languages	amod
13	languages	language	NOUN	Number=Plur	14 grew	nsubj
14	grew	grow	VERB	Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Past VerbForm=Fin	5 language	conj
15	out	out	ADP	_	17 it	case
16	of	of	ADP	_	17 it	case
17	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	14 grew	obl

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	is a	present	It	the oldest language		Earth			tree rules
2	grow out	past	all other African languages	it					vn appear-48.1.1 «PP.location V NP»: agent=Location it=Theme

Option 4

A king ordered everyone in the world to speak it

The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)

#	word	lemma	UPOS	features	head	relation
1	A	a	DET	Definite=Ind PronType=Art	2 king	det
2	king	king	NOUN	Number=Sing	3 ordered	nsubj
3	ordered	order	VERB	Tense=Past VerbForm=Part Voice=Pass	root	root
4	everyone	everyone	PRON	Number=Sing PronType=Tot	3 ordered	obj
5	in	in	ADP	_	7 world	case
6	the	the	DET	Definite=Def PronType=Art	7 world	det
7	world	world	NOUN	Number=Sing	4 everyone	nmod
8	to	to	PART	_	9 speak	mark
9	speak	speak	VERB	VerbForm=Inf	3 ordered	advcl
10	it	it	PRON	Case=Acc Gender=Neut Number=Sing Person=3 PronType=Prs	9 speak	obj

#	verb	tense, mood	who	what, whom	to whom	where	when	other	roles by
1	order	participle	a king	everyone		the world			vn get-13.5.1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent everyone=Theme
2	speak speech: other	to-infinitive	a king not said here	world					tree rules

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/geography/13-africa-countries-and-capitals/t11/