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A model of language inflection graphs

Author

Listed:
  • Henryk Fukś

    (Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada L2S 3A1, Canada)

  • Babak Farzad

    (Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada L2S 3A1, Canada)

  • Yi Cao

    (Department of Mathematics and Statistics, Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada L2S 3A1, Canada)

Abstract

Inflection graphs are highly complex networks representing relationships between inflectional forms of words in human languages. For so-called synthetic languages, such as Latin or Polish, they have particularly interesting structure due to the abundance of inflectional forms. We construct the simplest form of inflection graphs, namely a bipartite graph in which one group of vertices corresponds to dictionary headwords and the other group to inflected forms encountered in a given text. We, then, study projection of this graph on the set of headwords. The projection decomposes into a large number of connected components, to be called word groups. Distribution of sizes of word group exhibits some remarkable properties, resembling cluster distribution in a lattice percolation near the critical point. We propose a simple model which produces graphs of this type, reproducing the desired component distribution and other topological features.

Suggested Citation

  • Henryk Fukś & Babak Farzad & Yi Cao, 2014. "A model of language inflection graphs," International Journal of Modern Physics C (IJMPC), World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd., vol. 25(06), pages 1-12.
    • Handle: RePEc:wsi:ijmpcx:v:25:y:2014:i:06:n:s0129183114500132
    DOI: 10.1142/S0129183114500132
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