--- title: Many British people praise by playing down, so as not to sound big-h… — A bit nippy and not ideal: British understatement · tree and pragmatics description: Many British people praise by playing down, so as not to sound big-headed: «the girls did alright today» after a 5–0 cup final win means they were brilliant. Who acts: Many British people, girls. A sentence of the lesson «A bit nippy and not ideal: British understatement» of the language course of M --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/49-a-bit-nippy-and-not-ideal-british-understatement/13/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Language](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/) / [A bit nippy and not ideal: British und…](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/49-a-bit-nippy-and-not-ideal-british-understatement/) / 13 # A bit nippy and not ideal: British understatement, sentence 13 Many British people praise by playing down, so as not to sound big-headed: «the girls did alright today» after a 5–0 cup final win means they were brilliant. **Who acts:** Many British people, girls · **What happens:** praise, play down, not sound, do, mean, be · **Speech:** someone speaks here This is a sentence of the lesson «A bit nippy and not ideal: British understatement» of the language course of Mova's primary school. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (Many British people, girls), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree. ## The tree {#tree} ```conllu # sent_id = school:language:049-a-bit-nippy-and-not-ideal-british-understatement.lesson:13 # text = Many British people praise by playing down, so as not to sound big-headed: «the girls did alright today» after a 5–0 cup final win means they were brilliant. # source = school lesson (ours) # course = language # lesson = 049-a-bit-nippy-and-not-ideal-british-understatement.lesson # annotation = Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R6-punct-agree ×1, R7-rel-agree ×2, R8-pos-agree ×1 1 Many many ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 3 amod _ _ 2 British British ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 3 amod _ _ 3 people people NOUN NNS Number=Plur 4 nsubj _ _ 4 praise praise VERB VBP Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 0 root _ _ 5 by by SCONJ IN _ 6 mark _ _ 6 playing play VERB VBG VerbForm=Ger 4 advcl _ _ 7 down down ADV RB _ 6 compound:prt _ Agree=R7-rel-agree|Haiku=6:advmod 8 , , PUNCT , _ 13 punct _ _ 9 so so ADV RB _ 13 advmod _ _ 10 as as SCONJ IN _ 13 mark _ _ 11 not not PART RB Polarity=Neg 13 advmod _ _ 12 to to PART TO _ 13 mark _ _ 13 sound sound VERB VB VerbForm=Inf 6 advcl _ _ 14 big big ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 16 amod _ Agree=R7-rel-agree|Haiku=16:compound 15 - - PUNCT HYPH _ 14 punct _ _ 16 headed head ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 13 xcomp _ Agree=R8-pos-agree|Haiku=13:xcomp|HaikuPos=VERB:VBN:Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass 17 : : PUNCT : _ 21 punct _ _ 18 « « PUNCT `` _ 21 punct _ _ 19 the the DET DT Definite=Def|PronType=Art 20 det _ _ 20 girls girl NOUN NNS Number=Plur 21 nsubj _ _ 21 did do VERB VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 4 parataxis _ _ 22 alright alright ADV RB _ 23 advmod _ _ 23 today today NOUN NN Number=Sing 21 obl:unmarked _ _ 24 » » PUNCT '' _ 21 punct _ Agree=R6-punct-agree|Haiku=30:punct 25 after after ADP IN _ 32 case _ _ 26 a a DET DT Definite=Ind|PronType=Art 32 det _ _ 27 5 5 NUM CD NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card 28 nummod _ _ 28 – – NOUN NN Number=Sing 30 compound _ _ 29 0 0 NUM CD NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card 28 flat _ _ 30 cup cup NOUN NN Number=Sing 32 compound _ _ 31 final final ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 32 amod _ _ 32 win within NOUN NN Number=Sing 21 obl _ _ 33 means mean VERB VBZ Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin 4 parataxis _ _ 34 they they PRON PRP Case=Nom|Number=Plur|Person=3|PronType=Prs 36 nsubj _ _ 35 were be AUX VBD Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin 36 cop _ _ 36 brilliant brilliant ADJ JJ Degree=Pos 33 ccomp _ _ 37 . . PUNCT . _ 4 punct _ _ ``` ## Pragmatics {#pragmatics} - form: statement - act: assert - voice: narrator - polarity: none - teacher: changed act=assert | # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 1 | **praise** | present | Many British people | | | | | | vn characterize-29.2 «NP V NP to be ADJ»: agent=Agent clause=Attribute | | 2 | **play down** | gerund | Many British people *not said here* | | | | | | vn performance-26.7-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent | | 3 | **not** **sound** | to-infinitive | Many British people *not said here* | | | | | head *property* | vn stimulus\_subject-30.4 «NP V ADJ»: agent=Stimulus | | 4 | **do** *in a quote* | past | the girls | | | | after a cup final win; today | | vn act-114-1 «NP V»: agent=Agent | | 5 | **mean** | present | | | | | | | vn intend-61.2-1 «NP V S»: agent=Agent | | 6 | **is** | past | girls *= girl* | | | | | brilliant *property* | tree rules | One row per clause the reader finds. «not said here»: a role filled from the clause above. «roles by»: a VerbNet class and frame when one fits the verb, else the reader's rules on the tree. **Licence: [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/)**, as the whole of Mova corpus 0.4, of which this treebank (the agreed school, `mova-school-agreed-en.conllu`) is part. The lessons were written for Mova's primary school. Sentence `school:language:049-a-bit-nippy-and-not-ideal-british-understatement.lesson:13`. **The tree:** Mova annot: Rust (en) → Haiku 5.5 (medium, Batches API) patches; gates UD 2.18; agreed by treeagree rules (Stanza, Trankit, spaCy trf): R6-punct-agree ×1, R7-rel-agree ×2, R8-pos-agree ×1. **The frames** are read from the tree by Mova's frames reader (`prag`) when this page is built, the lesson read in order, so a pronoun may be resolved from an earlier sentence. See the [release 0.4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/releases/0.4/). - ← previous: [A bit nippy and not ideal: British und…, 12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/49-a-bit-nippy-and-not-ideal-british-understatement/12/) - next →: [A bit nippy and not ideal: British und…, 14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/49-a-bit-nippy-and-not-ideal-british-understatement/14/) - ↑ back to [the lesson](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/language/49-a-bit-nippy-and-not-ideal-british-understatement/)