Let’s Parsetalk — Message-Passing Protocols for Object-Oriented Parsing

Abstract

As a response to the requirements imposed by real-world natural language processing , we argue for a design of natural language grammars and their associated parsers in which declarative knowledge about language structure and procedural knowledge about language use are equally balanced within a strictly object-oriented specification and implementation framework. In particular, we introduce fundamental message-passing protocols for object-oriented parsing , which include, besides the one for basic dependency parsing, protocols for ambiguity handling, robustness, backtracking , preferential and predictive parsing, as well as textual reference resolution. Based on an empirical evaluation , we also provide reasons for sacrificing completeness of the parse in favor of efficiency gains.