Università Roma Tre

This course is intended to analyze the interplay ("interface") between syntax, prosody and semantics in the realization and interpretation of discourse categories, also in relation to a hierarchy of functional projections in the left periphery of the sentence. In particular the course will focus on four major issues:
(1) the interpretation of different types of focus (informative, corrective, contrastive, mirative) and its formal realization, both from a prosodic and a syntactic viewpoint (in situ vs. fronted, in matrix vs. embedded clauses) in typological diverse languages. Special attention will be dedicated to postverbal subject in Romance languages.
(2) Different types of Topics and their function in the discourse and in conversational analysis.
(3) The interpretation of Null Subjects and creation of topical chains in consistent, partial and radical pro-drop languages.
(4) Identification of syntactic, prosodic and discourse indexes for the interpretation of information on forums, interviews and social nets.

• Puglielli, Annarita e Mara Frascarelli (2011). Linguistic Analysis: From Data to Theory. (Trends in Linguistics Series) Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter (Chapters 6-7).
• Bianchi, V. (2013). On Focus movement in Italian. In Victoria Camacho-Taboada et al (eds.), Information Structure and Agreement, 194-215. Amsterdam/Philadelphia, John Benjamins.
• Frascarelli, Mara (2007) Subjects, Topics and the Interpretation of Referential pro. An interface approach to the linking of (null) pronouns. Natural Language and Linguistic Theory, 25, 4: 691-734
• Bianchi, Valentina & Mara Frascarelli (2010). Is Topic a Root Phenomenon? Iberia: An international Journal of Theoretical Linguistics. Vol. 2.1 (Special Issue on Information Structure), 43-88.
• Frascarelli, Mara (2018) The interpretation of pro in consistent and partial NS languages: A comparative interface analysis. in Federica Cognola & Jan Casalicchio (eds.), Null-Subjects in Generative Grammar. A synchronic and diachronic perspective, Part IIB, Ch. 9. OUP, Oxford/New York.
• Frascarelli, Mara & Giorgio Carella (2019). Topic chains and the interpretation of null subjects: The acquisition of discourse-related strategies in Italian. The Linguistic review.