---
title: “What can you do to help?” asked T’ang Sung. — Gleanings from Chinese folklore · tree and pragmatics
description: “What can you do to help?” asked T’ang Sung. Who acts: you, T’ang Sung. A sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, T’ang Sung’s Journey to Get the Buddhist Classics, with its dependency tree and the pragmatics of every clause.
---

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# Gleanings from Chinese folklore, T’ang Sung’s Journey to Get the Buddhist Classics, sentence 13

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“What can you do to help?” asked T’ang Sung.

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**Who acts:** you, T’ang Sung · **What happens:** do, help, ask · **Speech:** someone speaks here

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This is a sentence of «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, T’ang Sung’s Journey to Get the Buddhist Classics. The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (you, T’ang Sung), 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:pg75089:16:13
# text = “What can you do to help?” asked T’ang Sung.
1	“	"	PUNCT	``	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	What	what	PRON	WP	PronType=Int	5	obj	_	_
3	can	can	AUX	MD	VerbForm=Fin	5	aux	_	_
4	you	you	PRON	PRP	Case=Nom|Person=2|PronType=Prs	5	nsubj	_	_
5	do	do	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	10	ccomp	_	_
6	to	to	PART	TO	_	7	mark	_	_
7	help	help	VERB	VB	VerbForm=Inf	5	advcl	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	?	?	PUNCT	.	_	5	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	”	"	PUNCT	''	_	5	punct	_	_
10	asked	ask	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=1|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	0	root	_	_
11	T’ang	T'ang	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	12	compound	_	_
12	Sung	Sung	PROPN	NNP	Number=Sing	10	obj	_	SpaceAfter=No
13	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	10	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **do** *in a quote* | can | you |  |  |  |  | What *obj* | vn act-114-1 «NP V NP»: agent=Agent what=Eventuality |
| 2 | **help** *in a quote* | to-infinitive | you *not said here* |  |  |  |  |  | vn help-72.1-1-1 «NP V PP.theme»: agent=Agent |
| 3 | **ask** *speech: ask* | past | T’ang Sung |  |  |  |  |  | vn inquire-37.1.2 «NP V how S»: agent=Agent clause=Topic |

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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:** «Gleanings from Chinese folklore» by Nellie Naomi Russell, Project Gutenberg book 75089 (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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