This paper explores a relatively new approach to lexical representation in Multilingual Natural Language Processing.
Related languages exhibit many similarities across their syntax, morphology, phonology, etc.
Consider adding new languages. The rationale of inheritance-based lexicons requires information to be pushed as far up the hierarchy as it can go, generalising as much as possible. In a monolingual lexicon, this means that information which applies to all words of the language appears right at the top of the hierarchy, whereas information that is common to all nouns will appear above all the individual noun entries and so on. Currently, it is not clear what is the best way of structuring such a hierarchical multilingual lexicon. I will explain both models and I will discuss their advantages and disadvantages with reference to two sample lexical fragments of Danish, Dutch, English and Icelandic.