---
title: Initially, all television stations were state-controlled, but privat… — Sri Lanka · tree and pragmatics
description: Initially, all television stations were state-controlled, but private television networks began broadcasting in 1992. Who acts: private television networks. A sentence of Wikipedia's «Sri Lanka» with its dependency tree and pragmatics.
---

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# Sri Lanka, sentence 532

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From Wikipedia, [«Sri Lanka»](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sri_Lanka), revision of the 2026-09-01 dump, [CC BY-SA 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/). The trees and pragmatics of these pages, Mova's parse of that text, are CC BY-SA 4.0 too.

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Initially, all television stations were state-controlled, but private television networks began broadcasting in 1992.

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**Who acts:** private television networks · **What happens:** control, begin, broadcast · **To what, where:** television stations, 1992

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This is a sentence of the English Wikipedia article «Sri Lanka». The page gives its syntax tree — a dependency tree in the style of Universal Dependencies — and its pragmatics clause by clause: who acts (private television networks), 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 article's note marks are left out of the parse.

## The tree {#tree}

```conllu
# sent_id = wikipedia:Sri_Lanka:532
# text = Initially, all television stations were state-controlled, but private television networks began broadcasting in 1992.
1	Initially	initially	ADV	RB	_	9	advmod	_	SpaceAfter=No
2	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	1	punct	_	_
3	all	all	DET	DT	PronType=Tot	5	det	_	_
4	television	television	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	5	compound	_	_
5	stations	station	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	9	nsubj:pass	_	_
6	were	be	AUX	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Plur|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	aux:pass	_	_
7	state	state	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	9	compound	_	SpaceAfter=No
8	-	-	PUNCT	HYPH	_	7	punct	_	SpaceAfter=No
9	controlled	control	VERB	VBN	Tense=Past|VerbForm=Part|Voice=Pass	0	root	_	SpaceAfter=No
10	,	,	PUNCT	,	_	15	punct	_	_
11	but	but	CCONJ	CC	_	15	cc	_	_
12	private	private	ADJ	JJ	Degree=Pos	14	amod	_	_
13	television	television	NOUN	NN	Number=Sing	14	compound	_	_
14	networks	network	NOUN	NNS	Number=Plur	15	nsubj	_	_
15	began	begin	VERB	VBD	Mood=Ind|Number=Sing|Person=3|Tense=Past|VerbForm=Fin	9	conj	_	_
16	broadcasting	broadcast	VERB	VBG	VerbForm=Ger	15	xcomp	_	_
17	in	in	ADP	IN	_	18	case	_	_
18	1992	1992	NUM	CD	NumForm=Digit|NumType=Card	16	obl	_	SpaceAfter=No
19	.	.	PUNCT	.	_	9	punct	_	_
```

## Pragmatics {#pragmatics}

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| # | verb | tense, mood | who | what, whom | to whom | where | when | other | roles by |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 1 | **control** | past · passive |  | all television stations |  |  |  | state *compound*; initially *property* | vn enforce-63 «NP V NP»: subject=Theme |
| 2 | **begin** | past | private television networks |  |  |  |  |  | vn begin-55.1-1-1 «NP V S\_ING»: agent=Agent clause=Eventuality |
| 3 | **broadcast** *speech: other* | gerund | private television networks *not said here* |  |  | 1992 |  |  | vn instr\_communication-37.4.1 «NP V that S»: agent=Agent |

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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:** the English Wikipedia, «Sri Lanka», revision of the 2026-09-01 dump, CC BY-SA 4.0. **Tree:** Mova's own parse, CC BY-SA 4.0 as the text is. **Frames:** Mova's frames reader (`prag`), the article read in order, CC BY-SA 4.0.

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