An implementable semantics for comparative constructions
Manny Rayner, Amelie Banks · KTH Publication Database DiVA (KTH Royal Institute of Technology) · 1990
We describe a fairly comprehensive handling of the syntax and semantics of comparative constructions. The analysis is largely based on the theory developed by Pinkham, but we advance arguments to support a different handling of phrasal comparatives - in particular, we replace the use of C-ellipsis with a method of interpretation we call contrastive comparison. We explain the reasons for dividing comparative sentences into different categories, and for each category we give an example of the corresponding Montague semantics. The ideas have all been implemented within a large-scale grammar for Swedish, a "toy" version of which is presented, along with examples of the output.