---
title: “Do not be afraid; I can command a house to build itself.” — Kaffir folk-lore · tree and pragmatics
description: “Do not be afraid; I can command a house to build itself.” Who acts: you, people. A sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II., with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Kaffir folk-lore, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II., sentence 72

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“Do not be afraid; I can command a house to build itself.”

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**Who acts:** you, people · **What happens:** not be, command, build · **To what, where:** house, food · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Kaffir folk-lore» by George McCall Theal, The Story of the Bird That Made Milk. II.. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, people), 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:pg71335:4:72
# text = “Do not be afraid; I can command a house to build itself.”
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	Do	do	AUX	VB	Mood=Imp|VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
3	not	not	PART	RB	Polarity=Neg	5	advmod	_	_
4	be	be	AUX	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	cop	_	_
5	afraid	afraid	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
6	;	;	PUNCT	,	_	9	punct	_	_
7	I	I	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Number=Sing|Person=1|PronType=Prs	9	nsubj	_	_
8	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	9	aux	_	_
9	command	command	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	ccomp	_	_
10	a	a	DET	DT	Definite=Ind|PronType=Art	11	det	_	_
11	house	house	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	obj	_	_
12	to	to	PART	TO	_	13	mark	_	_
13	build	build	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	9	advcl	_	_
14	itself	itself	PRON	PRP	Case=Acc|Gender=Neut|Number=Sing|Person=3|PronType=Prs|Reflex=Yes	13	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
15	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
16	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **not** **is** *in a quote* | imperative · do-support | you *not said here* |  |  |  |  | afraid *property* | tree rules |
| 2 | **command** *in a quote* | can | the people of that town *= people* | a house |  |  |  |  | vn supervision-95.2.2-1 «NP V NP.predicate»: agent=Agent house=Eventuality |
| 3 | **build** *in a quote* | to-infinitive | the people of that town *= people* *not said here* | food |  |  |  |  | vn build-26.1-1 «NP.asset V NP»: agent=Asset itself=Product |

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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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