Università Roma Tre

The course aims to analyse, within the theoretical framework of Generative Grammar, the relationship between syntax, prosody, semantics and discourse grammar. In particular, the following areas of investigation and research will be explored:
(1) The semantic properties and interpretation of different types of Focus (informative, corrective, contrastive, exclusive, purposive) and their formal realisation, both syntactic (in situ vs. fronted) and prosodic, in typologically different languages.
(2) The semantic properties and interpretation of different Topic types, the creation of topic chains and the interpretation of the null subject in a comparison between pro-drop (total, partial to radical) and non-pro-drop languages (such as Germanic languages).
(3) The split-DP and the categories realised within the functional area dominating the Noun Phrase.
(4) The phenomena of subject-verb agreement in Romance languages, with a focus on collective and mass nouns, in their evolution into pseudo-quantitative elements.
The course will deal with different languages, based on original data and interpretative investigations, and includes an applied experimental part, with the creation of an original investigation by the students.

- Puglielli, Annarita e Mara Frascarelli (2008). L’analisi Linguistica. Dai dati alla teoria. Roma/Cesena: Caissa Editore (Capitoli scelti).
- 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
- Frascarelli, Mara (2017). Dislocations and Framings. In Elisabeth Stark and Andreas Dufter (eds.) Manual of Romance Morphosyntax and Syntax, 472-501. (Manuals of Romance Linguistics). Berlin: Mouton.
- 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, 211-239, Part IIB, Ch. 9. Oxford University Press, 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, 36 (4): 637-674.
- Frascarelli, Mara & Marco Casentini (2019). The interpretation of null subjects in a radical pro-drop language. Topic chains and discourse semantic requirements in Chinese. Studies in Chinese Linguistics, 40, (1). Online publication DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/scl-2019-0001

- Frascarelli, Mara & Tania Stortini (2019). Focus constructions, verb types and the SV/VS order in Italian: An acquisitional study from a syntax-prosody perspective. Lingua 227 102690 (online).
- Frascarelli, Mara (2010). Narrow Focus, Clefting and Predicate Inversion. Lingua, 120, 9: 2121-2147.

Additional material can be defined during the course. Any additions will be reported on the Moodle platform.