Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings, XIV. That Deceitful Jug, sentence 55
Niggers bin prom'nadin' by my house all dis summer, holdin' dere heads high up an' de w'ites er dere eyeballs shinin' in de sun. Dey wuz too bigitty fer ter look over de gyardin' palm's. '
Who acts: Niggers, holdin dere heads, de w'ites, Dey wuz · What happens: bin, dis, high up, eyeball, look · To what, where: prom'nadin, de w'ites, shinin
This is a sentence of «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, XIV. That Deceitful Jug. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Niggers, holdin dere heads, de w'ites, Dey wuz), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.
Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher. This tree is Mova's own parse (the en model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.
The tree
The words, one row each (CoNLL-U)
| # | word | lemma | UPOS | features | head | relation |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Niggers | nigger | NOUN | Number=Plur | 2 bin | nsubj |
| 2 | bin | bin | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | root | root |
| 3 | prom'nadin | prom'nadin | NOUN | Number=Sing | 2 bin | obj |
| 4 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 3 prom'nadin | punct |
| 5 | by | by | ADP | _ | 7 house | case |
| 6 | my | my | PRON | Case=Gen Number=Sing Person=1 Poss=Yes PronType=Prs | 7 house | nmod:poss |
| 7 | house | house | NOUN | Number=Sing | 2 bin | obl |
| 8 | all | all | DET | PronType=Tot | 9 dis | advmod |
| 9 | dis | dis | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=2 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 2 bin | advcl |
| 10 | summer | summer | NOUN | Number=Sing | 9 dis | obj |
| 11 | , | , | PUNCT | _ | 16 high | punct |
| 12 | holdin | holdin | NOUN | Number=Sing | 15 heads | compound |
| 13 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 12 holdin | punct |
| 14 | dere | dere | NOUN | Number=Sing | 15 heads | compound |
| 15 | heads | head | NOUN | Number=Plur | 16 high | nsubj |
| 16 | high | high | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 2 bin | conj |
| 17 | up | up | ADP | _ | 16 high | compound:prt |
| 18 | an | a | DET | Definite=Ind PronType=Art | 21 w'ites | det |
| 19 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 21 w'ites | punct |
| 20 | de | de | NOUN | Number=Sing | 21 w'ites | compound |
| 21 | w'ites | w'ite | NOUN | Number=Plur | 16 high | obj |
| 22 | er | er | ADV | Typo=Yes | 24 eyeballs | advmod |
| 23 | dere | dere | X | _ | 22 er | goeswith |
| 24 | eyeballs | eyeball | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Sing Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 21 w'ites | acl:relcl |
| 25 | shinin | shinin | NOUN | Number=Sing | 24 eyeballs | obj |
| 26 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 25 shinin | punct |
| 27 | in | in | ADP | _ | 29 sun. | case |
| 28 | de | de | PROPN | Number=Sing | 29 sun. | compound |
| 29 | sun. | Sunday | PROPN | Number=Sing | 36 look | obl |
| 30 | Dey | Dey | PROPN | Number=Sing | 31 wuz | compound |
| 31 | wuz | wuz | NOUN | Number=Sing | 36 look | nsubj |
| 32 | too | too | ADV | _ | 33 bigitty | advmod |
| 33 | bigitty | bigitty | ADJ | Degree=Pos | 35 ter | amod |
| 34 | fer | f | ADJ | Degree=Cmp | 35 ter | amod |
| 35 | ter | ter | NOUN | Number=Plur | 36 look | nsubj |
| 36 | look | look | VERB | Mood=Ind Number=Plur Person=3 Tense=Pres VerbForm=Fin | 24 eyeballs | parataxis |
| 37 | over | over | ADP | _ | 39 gyardin | case |
| 38 | de | de | X | Foreign=Yes | 39 gyardin | compound |
| 39 | gyardin | gyardin | NOUN | Number=Sing | 36 look | obl |
| 40 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 39 gyardin | punct |
| 41 | palm | palm | NOUN | Number=Sing | 39 gyardin | conj |
| 42 | 's | 's | PART | _ | 41 palm | case |
| 43 | . | . | PUNCT | _ | 2 bin | punct |
| 44 | ' | ' | PUNCT | _ | 2 bin | punct |
Pragmatics
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | bin | present | Niggers | prom'nadin | by my house | vn pocket-9.10 «NP V NP.theme»: agent=Agent prom'nadin=Theme | |||
| 2 | dis | present | Niggers not said here | summer | tree rules | ||||
| 3 | high up | present | holdin dere heads | a de w'ites | tree rules | ||||
| 4 | eyeball | present | a de w'ites not said here | shinin | tree rules | ||||
| 5 | look | present | Dey wuz | sunday | over de gyardin and palm | vn peer-30.3 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent over gyardin=Theme |
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.
Text: «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, Project Gutenberg book 2306 (public domain in the USA). Tree: Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. Frames: Mova's frames reader (prag), the chapter read in order.
This page in Markdown → https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2306/60/55/