Università Roma Tre

The course aims to analyze, within the theoretical framework of Generative Grammar, the relationship between syntax, prosody, semantics and discourse grammar, and to provide skills related to research in the scientific field, through the creation of experiments to be submitted to informants (native speakers of the language chosen for analysis), for the collection of data to be subsequently subjected to analysis (including through statistical analysis tools).
Specifically, the research work may focus on the following areas of investigation (to be defined during the course):
(1) The interpretation and implementation of different types of Focus (informative, corrective, contrastive, exclusive, purposive), taking into account their semantic, syntactic (in situ vs. fronted) and prosodic properties.
(2) The interpretation and implementation of different types of Topic, the creation of topic chains and the interpretation of the null subject in a comparison of pro-drop languages (total, partial to radical) and non-pro-drop languages (such as Germanic languages).
(3) Nominal modification in its various cross-linguistic realizations (adjectives, relative phrases, prepositional phrases).
(4) Verbal modification, with special attention to the category of so-called "adjuncts."

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