Requirements of Text Processing Lexicons

Abstract

As text processing systems expand in scope, they will require ever larger lexicons along with a parsing capability for discriminating among many senses of a word. Existing systems do not incorporate such subtleties in meaning for their lexicons. Ordinary dictionaries contain such information, but are largely untapped. When the contents of dictionaries are scrutinized, they reveal many requirements that must be satisfied in representing meaning and in developing semantic parsers. These requirements were identified in research designed to find primitive verb concepts. The requirements are outlined and general procedures for satisfying them through the use of ordinary dictionaries are described, illustrated by building frames for and examining the definitions of "change" and its uses as a hypernym in other definitions.