Computing Perspective in Text - Computational Linguistics and Talking Robots - page 219

with a freer word order than English may use fronting of the object sentence
as an alternative to a passive construction. 5
Consider the DBS graph analysis of examples 1 and 2:

11.4.5 O BJECT SENTENCE :P RONOUN IN HIGHER CLAUSE ( MATRIX )

1. LH': That Mary was happy was known to her .
2. H'L: % She knew that Mary was happy.

(iii) numbered arcs graph (NAG)

(i) semantic relations graph (SRG)

know a. know b. know

4 6

5 1

6

1 23

ça

(Mary)/ça happy (Mary)/ça happy happy

2 4

3

5

Mary Mary Mary

(ii) signature

(iv) surface realization

V

a. 1 2 3

4
was_known

5 6

.

That Mary was_happy to_her

N V

b. 1 2 3 4 5

6

(N)

% She knew that Mary was_happy

In the SRG and NAG (a), the subject of the higher clause is represented by
the ambiguous (Mary)/ça node. In NAG (b), in contrast, this node is repre-
sented unambiguously as ça because this navigation permits only an indexical
pronoun interpretation. This is similar to NAG (b) in the subject sentence con-
structions 11.4.2.
Next consider the DBS graph analysis of constructions 3 and 4 listed in
11.4.4 with the pronoun in the lower clause:

11.4.6 O BJECT SENTENCE :P RONOUN IN LOWER CLAUSE

3. L' H : That she was happy was known to Mary .
4. HL': Mary knew that she was happy.

5 For example, sentence 1 in 11.4.4 may be translated into German as Dass sich Maria freute, wurde
von ihr bemerkt. (passive) or Dass sich Maria freute, bemerkte sie. (fronting of object sentence).