Lexicon Embedded Syntax

Overview & Synopsis

This paper explores the notion of lexicon embedded syntax: syntactic structures that are preassembled in natural language lexicons. Section 1 proposes a lexicological perspective on (dependency) syntax: first, it deals with the well-known problem of lexicon-grammar dichotomy, then introduces the notion of lexicon embedded syntax and, finally, presents the lexical models this discussion is based on: lexical systems, as implemented in the English and French Lexical Networks. Two cases of lexicon embedded syntax are then treated: the syntax of idioms, section 2, and the syntax of collocations, section 3. Section 4 concludes on the possible exploitation of syntactic structures that can be extracted from lexical systems.