DEMOP Demonstrative pronouns

Xiao C58 child of DEMO_ALL

Definition

Demonstratives functioning as pronouns standing alone: this, that, these, those.

Parent

DEMO_ALL

Detection Rules

mfte

MFTE (line 1008) tags ALL demonstratives (DT) as DEMO, with no distinction between determiner and pronoun uses. The mfte comparison maps DEMO→DEMO+DEMOP, so this rule catches pronominal uses that DEMO’s “DT followed by NN/JJ” rule misses.

cql[word="this|that|these|those" & pos="DT"]
combine: _ & !DEMO

Requires: word, pos

Demonstrative not in a determiner relation with a following noun. Identifies pronominal use. Refines DT.

semgrex{word:/this|that|these|those/; pos:DT}=dem !>det {}

Requires: word, pos, dep

Refines: DT

pybiber

pybiber: demonstrative with dep_rel containing nsubj/dobj/pobj (str.contains matches nsubjpass too) AND preceding token tag not starting with N, not CD, and not containing DT (excludes PDT too). Anchor on last (the demonstrative) for counting.

cql[pos!="N.*|CD|.*DT.*"] [word="that|this|these|those" & pos="DT" & dep="nsubj|nsubjpass|dobj|pobj"]

Requires: word, pos, dep

Anchor: last

Normalization

Per words

Examples

that is good

this was unexpected

those were dark days

Sources

  • biber_1988 — Biber, Douglas (1988) : Variation across Speech and Writing
  • mfte — Le Foll, Elen & Shakir, Muhammad (2023/2025) : Multi-Feature Tagger of English (MFTE) — Python version
  • pybiber — Brown, David West & Reinhart, Alex (2026) : pybiber — Python package for linguistic feature extraction and Multi-Dimensional Analysis
  • xiao_2009 — Xiao, Richard (2009) : Multidimensional analysis and the study of world Englishes

Notes

D1 loading .76 (involved). Pronominal demonstratives are a strong involvement marker — more common in speech and interactive registers.

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