Light Verbs

Light verbs are verbs that are considered semantically weak. They have to be combined with a noun to indicate the action. Light verbs can be troublesome to information extractors because the action of a sentence is divided between the verb and the direct object. We offer the ability to create a semantically heavy verb by verbalizing the direct object.

The light verbs that Legendary recognizes are:

• do
• give
• have
• make
• take

(as well as their variants, took, takes, gave, given, etc.)

Examples:

Bob had a smoke.

Verb = had, Direct Object = smoke

• Swap Verb = smoked

In some cases, the action verb will shift to a new word:

Bob gave Tom access to the room.

Verb = gave, Direct Object = access

• Swap verb = permitted