Seeing clearly: Frame Semantic, Psycholinguistic, and Cross ...

CHAPTER 2. A FRAME SEMANTIC ANALYSIS 61
Only those roles which appear in an equation in the daughter frame are used by it. 8 For
complete inheritance, the attribute \Inherits" is given, followed by the name of the frame
inherited from; in this case, all the semantics and all the roles are inherited.
Within the entry for each sense of see, frames are listed in order of inheritance; this
means that the frame for the sense of see itself may be preceded by several more general
frames from which it inherits. The frames for senses of see all have names of the form
see eye, see recognize, etc. to distinguish them from the more general frames.
More general frames have been postulated not only where they are shared by two
senses of see, but also at levels where certain generalizations are best stated. In most cases,
there is a prose statement of the reasons for setting up each general frame, with a list of
some words that I believe will need that frame as part of their own description.
Where one event frame is must be described in terms of sub-events, these are listed
under the attribute \Scenes" in the frame. Scenes, like frames, have types and may use or
inherit from other frames, in addition to any inheritance of the frame as a whole.
Semantic Speci cations
The semantics of frames and their participants are expressed in several ways,
formally through types, predications, and equations, and informally in prose description. It
is hoped that eventually all the information contained in the prose description can also be
expressed in the Frame Semantic formalism. Obviously, the choice of names for frames and
roles is also intended to be meaningful, although it is sometimes necessary to invent names
for them.
Frames themselves may beoftwo broad semantic types, event or state, indicated
by the \type" attribute. Roles also generally have semantic types, and these types are in-
herited along with the role. Frequently the daughter frame will further restrict the type of
an inherited role. For example, see eye uses perception distant which in turn uses per-
ception basic; perception basic has a role for the body part involved in the perception,
without restriction as to what body part is involved, perception distant requires that the
body part be eyes, ears, or nose (the distant senses), and see eye further restricts the body
8 This mechanism might serve several functions. For example, it can represent Fillmore & Atkins's (1998)
frame blending, as when one sense of argument inherits some structure from the frame for contention
and another sense inherits from the frame for reasoning, while both inherit from the talk frame. Partial
inheritance may also allow representation of Turner & Fauconnier's (1995) blended spaces, but this has
not been worked out in detail.