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Frameworks for the Generation of Referring Expressions
Robert Dale
Microsoft Institute
When: Friday, 29th April 1994
Time: 4:00pm
Where: Microsoft Institute, Conference Room 1 (sign in at reception)
Abstract:
As computational systems get more and more complex, they need increasingly sophisticated ways of interacting with their users. Graphical interfaces obviously have advantages in certain contexts, but in some situations what's really needed is natural language. We can eventually expect to see natural language generation systems playing an important role in these interfaces, so that systems can communicate with us using more than canned text.
This talk focusses on one sub-part of the NLG problem: the generation of referring expressions. Every natural language generation system needs to refer to the entities that inhabit its world; how easy or hard this is depends on the underlying representations assumed. In this talk, I'll review some work I've done over the last few years whose aim is to produce portable, domain-independent algorithms for generating referring expressions, and point out the deficiencies and advantages of a number of approaches.
I'll then go on to show how looking more closely at some types of referring expressions that have so far been generally ignored (in particular, what are usually called one-anaphoric expressions, as in "Mary has a red t-shirt; John has a blue one") may cause us to reassess the standard architectures we have so far assumed for natural language generation systems.
SPEAKER:
Robert Dale has recently taken up the position of head of the natural language research unit at Microsoft Institute. Previously he was with the Centre for Cognitive Science and Deputy Director of Human Communication Research Centre at Edinburgh University. His research interests are in two distinct areas: natural language generation and intelligent text processing.
Enquiries: Maria Milosavljevic 9850 6345 mariam@mpce.mq.edu.au
| Last modified: July 1997 |