---
title: "Dat's w'at I'm a gittin' at, boss," said Uncle Remus, smiling a fee… — Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings · tree and pragmatics
description: "Dat's w'at I'm a gittin' at, boss," said Uncle Remus, smiling a feeble smile. " Who acts: w'at, gittin. A sentence of «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, XV. the Florida Watermelon, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

<!-- md -->
[Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2306/61/14/)

<!-- crumbs -->
[home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [tales](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/) / [Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2306/) / [XV. the Florida Watermelon](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2306/61/) / 14

# Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings, XV. the Florida Watermelon, sentence 14

<!-- .ven lang=en -->
"Dat's w'at I'm a gittin' at, boss," said Uncle Remus, smiling a feeble smile. "

<!-- .vintro -->
**Who acts:** w'at, gittin · **What happens:** be, say, smile · **To what, where:** gittin, boss, feeble smile · **Speech:** someone speaks here

<!-- .vabout -->
This is a sentence of «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, XV. the Florida Watermelon. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (w'at, gittin), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

<!-- .note-en -->
**Parsed by Mova, not checked by a teacher.** This tree is Mova's own parse (the `en` model, on the CPU, when the site is built); it may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg2306:61:14
# text = "Dat's w'at I'm a gittin' at, boss," said Uncle Remus, smiling a feeble smile. "
1	"	"	PUNCT	``	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Dat	Dat	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	4	nmod:poss	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	's	's	PART	POS	_	2	case	_	_
4	w'at	w'at	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nsubj	_	_
5	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	8	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	'm	be	AUX	VBP	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	8	cop	_	_
7	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	8	det	_	_
8	gittin	gittin	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	'	'	PUNCT	''	_	8	punct	_	_
10	at	at	ADP	IN	_	12	case	_	SpaceAfter=No
11	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	12	punct	_	_
12	boss	boss	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	8	nmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	8	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
14	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	8	punct	_	_
15	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
16	Uncle	Uncle	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	17	compound	_	_
17	Remus	Remus	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	15	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	19	punct	_	_
19	smiling	smile	VERB	VBG	Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Part	15	advcl	_	_
20	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	22	det	_	_
21	feeble	feeble	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	22	amod	_	_
22	smile	smile	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	19	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
23	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	15	punct	_	_
24	"	"	PUNCT	''	_	15	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

<!-- .fr -->
| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **is a** *in a quote* | present | Dat's w'at | a gittin |  | boss |  |  | tree rules |
| 2 | **say** *speech: assert* | past | a gittin |  |  |  |  |  | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **smile** | gerund | a gittin *not said here* | a feeble smile |  |  |  |  | vn manner\_speaking-37.3 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent smile=Topic |

<!-- .note -->
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.

<!-- div src -->

**Text:** «Uncle Remus, His Songs and His Sayings» by Joel Chandler Harris, Project Gutenberg book 2306 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

<!-- /div -->

<!-- pn -->
- ← previous: [sentence 13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2306/61/13/)
- next →: [sentence 15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2306/61/15/)
- ↑ back to [XV. the Florida Watermelon](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/tales/pg2306/61/)