This chapter shows how ISO-Space evolved from MITRE’s SpatialML. Both present a specification language for the annotation of spatial information on geographical names and landmarks and also directional information involving orientations. Unlike SpatialML, ISO-Space extended its scope to motions and motion-triggered dynamic paths. ISO-Space also generalized distance measures to measures of other types and dimensions so that spatial annotation can be integrated with other semantic annotation schemes such as temporal annotation (e.g., ISO-TimeML). I also discuss how spatial relators, called signals, are enriched with fine-grained specifications, especially related to directional or orientational configurations involving frames of reference. SpatialML is a compact and very simple annotation scheme and is made easily mappable to other geospatial annotation schemes. In contrast, ISO-Space is more expressive and complex than SpatialML, meeting semantic needs of interpreting complex spatial language and computational needs of application envisioned in the coming years.

In this chapter, I discuss how the abstract syntax for a semantic annotation scheme is modeled on a formal grammar of language. I design a semantic annotation scheme as consisting of three components: a (nonempty) set of annotation structures, a syntax, and a semantics. The metatheoretic syntax formally defines, or generates, annotation structures each of which consists of base structures and link structures. The semantics interprets annotation structures, while validating the formulation of the syntax. I also discuss how the specification of attribute-value assignments determine the well-formedness of annotation structures and its substructures, anchoring and content (feature) structures. This chapter focuses on the formulation of an abstract syntax.

Viewing ontology as a science of things, this chapter treats times as real objects in the world. Such a view of ontology of times, called temporal ontology, conforms to Neo-Davidsonian semantics and to the type-theoretic semantics, which treats time points as one of the basic types that include individual objects, events, and spatial points. It is thus designed to provide a sound basis for the development of a semantics for the annotation and interpretation of event-based temporal information in language. In this chapter, I first introduce OWL-Time ontology which classifies temporal entities into instances and intervals. I then introduce an interval temporal calculus with 13 base relations over time points and intervals. I also discuss how eventualities are temporalized to be treated as denoting time intervals. Eventualities are then temporally related to times. To apply the notions of time points and intervals to the interpretation of tenses and aspects of language, especially the progessive aspect and the present perfective aspect, I define the notion of neighborhood and apply it to the definition of the present perfect as denoting the neighborhood of the present moment.

This chapter is about semantic annotation, discussed from formal and computational perspectives. Annotation is viewed as a scholarly technique or methodology. This chapter explains what annotation was in general and is now, how annotation has gradually developed and become applicable to the automatic building of larger data in language, and what applications semantic annotation aims at and what principles govern the modeling of semantic annotation schemes. There are two governing principles discussed: the partiality and situatedness of information to be annotated. I also mention the use of machine learning techniques for the automatic annotation of language data, which is represented either in a textual form or in a graphic form.

This chapter introduces a concrete syntax. It is ideally isomorphic to an abstract syntax that specifies a semantic annotation scheme, while providing a format for representing annotation structures. This format can represent them either in a serialized way from left to right, or in graphic images or tabular forms with linking arrows. Representation formats may vary, depending on kinds of the use of annotation. Human readers, for instance, prefer tabular formats especially for illustrations or demonstrations. For the purposes of merging, comparing, or exchanging various types of annotations or different annotations of the same type, graphs are considered useful. In this chapter, I introduce a graphic annotation format, called GrAF, for linguistic annotation. For the construction of larger corpora, however, there are practical computing reasons to prefer a serialization of annotations. For the serialized representation of annotation structures, this chapter mainly discusses two formats: (i) XML and (ii) pFormat, a predicate-logic-like representation format, which represents annotation structures in a strictly serial (linear) manner by avoiding embedded structures.

In Chapter 9, I introduce eXTimeML, an extended variant of ISO-TimeML, with three extensions. (i) Temporal measure expressions are annotated as part of generalized measure: e.g., 30 hours. (ii) Quantified temporal expressions are annotated as part of generalized quantification: e.g., every day. (iii) Adjectives and adverbs are annotated as modifiers of nouns and verbs, respectively: e.g., daily, never. Temporal measures and temporal quantifiers are treated as part of generalized measures and quantifiers. I then illustrate how the representation language of ABS applies to each of these extensions in eXTimeML by deriving appropriate (logical) semantic forms from the well-formed annotation structures of temporal measures, quantifiers, and modifiers. Semantic forms are then interpreted with respect to admissible models, constrained by the formal definitions of logical predicates such as twice or three thousand.

In this chapter, I introduce the four types of category path: static, dynamic, oriented, and projected, while characterizing them for the interpretation of path-related information in language. Static paths are finite paths with two endpoints, but neither of the endpoints is identified intrinsically as the start or the end of a path. Dynamic paths are trajectories caused by motions. Oriented paths are simply directed to some goals and may not reach the goals. Projected paths are virtual or intended, which are not actually traversed but devised in the mind of a human or rational agent. To discuss their characteristic features in formal terms, I introduce Pustejovsky and Yocum’s (2013) axioms on motions and derive a corollary based on them. This corollary relates a mover to an event-path. I then show how the movement link (moveLink) is reformulated to link a mover to a motion-triggered event-path with the relation traverses. I also analyze the notions of orientation and projection with respect to the frames of reference, either absolute, relative, or intrinsic, while showing how these frames apply to the annotation and interpretation of oriented or projected paths.

This chapter works toward the specification of a dynamic annotation scheme, called dSpace. It extends the scope of ISO-Space to the domains of space and time over motions by being amalgamated with ISO-TimeML. In dSpace, various types of temporal relations interact with spatial relations. The temporal dimension characterizes various types of paths and motions anchored to each location on the paths; dSpace also generalizes the notion of paths by classifying them into four types: static, dynamic, projected, and oriented, while introducing a relational link, called pathLink, over paths with various relation types such as meet and deviate.