---
title: He said: “Oh, men, what thing is this that calls me father?” — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: He said: “Oh, men, what thing is this that calls me father?” Who acts: face, this. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of Hlakanyana., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of Hlakanyana., sentence 25

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He said: “Oh, men, what thing is this that calls me father?”

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**Who acts:** face, this · **What happens:** say, be · **To what, where:** father · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of Hlakanyana.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (face, this), what happens, when and where, as Mova's frames read it from the tree.

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**Mova's own parse.** This tree may be wrong.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = book:pg71335:10:25
# text = He said: “Oh, men, what thing is this that calls me father?”
1	He	he	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Gender=Masc|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs	2	nsubj	_	_
2	said	say	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
3	:	:	PUNCT	:	_	7	punct	_	_
4	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
5	Oh	oh	INTJ	UH	_	7	discourse	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	5	punct	_	_
7	men	man	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	nsubj	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
9	what	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	2	ccomp	_	_
10	thing	thing	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	nsubj	_	_
11	is	be	AUX	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	14	cop	_	_
12	this	this	PRON	DT	Number=Sing|PronType=Dem	14	nsubj	_	_
13	that	that	PRON	WDT	PronType=Rel	14	nsubj	_	_
14	calls	call	VERB	VBZ	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Pres|VerbForm=Fin	10	acl:relcl	_	_
15	me	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	14	obj	_	_
16	father	father	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	xcomp	_	SpaceAfter=No
17	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	16	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
18	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **say** *speech: ask* | past | face |  |  |  |  | what  men  thing *ccomp* | vn say-37.7-1-1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |
| 2 | **is** *in a quote* | present | this | father |  |  |  | thing *nsubj*; me *obj*; call *property* | tree rules |

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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.

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**Text:** «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, Project Gutenberg book 71335 (public domain in the USA). **Tree:** Mova's own parse, Elamur Cosmic License. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the chapter read in order.

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