Towards a linguistically motivated computational grammar for Hebrew
			    Shuly Wintner

While the morphology of Modern Hebrew is well accounted for
computationally, there are few computational grammars describing the
syntax of the language. Existing grammars are scarcely based on solid
linguistic grounds: they do not conform to any particular linguistic
theory and do not provide a linguistically plausible analysis for the
data they cover. This paper presents a first attempt towards the
construction of a formal grammar for a fragment of Hebrew that is both
linguistically motivated and computationally implementable.  The
grammar, concentrating on the structure of noun phrases, is designed
in accordance with HPSG, a linguistic theory that lends itself most
naturally to computational implementation. It is the first application
of HPSG to any Semitic language. Several theoretical issues are
addressed, including the status of the definite article, the
application of the DP hypothesis to Hebrew, definiteness agreement in
the noun phrase as well as definiteness inheritance in constructs.
All the analyses presented in the paper were tested and their
predictions were verified. This is a work in progress, and the results
described herein are preliminary.