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When Data Challenges Theory: Unexpected and paradoxical evidence in information structure
Edited by Davide Garassino and Daniel Jacob
[Linguistik Aktuell/Linguistics Today 273] 2022
► pp. 203–238

To be or not to be focus adverbials?

A corpus-driven study of It. anche in spontaneous spoken Italian

| Technische Universität Dresden

The goal of this study is to cast new light on one of the main defining properties of focus adverbials, namely their interaction with the focus structure of the sentence. Following the framework known as Language into Act Theory, we describe the interaction between It. anche and focal information, considered in relation to the accomplishment of a speech act. The results of a corpus-driven study of spontaneous spoken Italian allow proposing a more detailed definition of focus adverbials, which takes into account two layers of information structure: the semantico-presuppositional layer and the pragmatic-illocutionary layer. We claim that association with focus is a stable feature of focus adverbials only in relation to the first layer of information structure.

Keywords: focus adverbials, focus structure, pragmatically based units, information units, spoken Italian, corpus-driven analysis
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Focus adverbs and focus structure
    • 2.1Focus of FAs or ‘domain of association’
    • 2.2Focus of the sentence and information structure
    • 2.3FAs as focus-binders
  • 3.The information distribution of It. anche in utterances produced in spoken Italian: A corpus-driven analysis following the Language into Act Theory
    • 3.1General characterization of the Language into Act Theory (L-AcT)
      • 3.1.1Main pragmatic reference units: Utterance, information units and Commentxs
      • 3.1.2Topic-Comment according to L-AcT
    • 3.2Overview of the information distribution of It. anche in the spoken utterances of DB-IPIC
      • 3.2.1Distribution of anche in textual and dialogic IUS
      • 3.2.2Distribution of anche in textual IUs: Absolute and relative frequencies
    • 3.3The information distribution of anche in the textual IUs: A qualitative analysis
      • 3.3.1It. anche in Comment (COM)
      • 3.3.2It. anche in Topic (TOP)
      • 3.3.3It. anche in Parenthesis (PAR)
      • 3.3.4It. anche in Appendix (APC and APT)
    • 3.4Conclusions on the information distribution of It. anche in spontaneous speech
  • 4.Interaction between anche and focal information: A description based on the Language into Act theory
    • 4.1It. anche interacts with the C-focus
      • 4.1.1Defining C-focus in L-AcT
      • 4.1.2C-focus on anche’s DA and anche in Comment
      • 4.1.3C-focus on anche’s DA and anche in Appendix
      • 4.1.4C-focus on anche alone in the Comment
    • 4.2It. anche interacts with the T-focus
      • 4.2.1Defining T-focus in L-AcT
      • 4.2.2T-focus on anche’s DA and anche in Topic
      • 4.2.3T-focus on anche
    • 4.3It. anche does not interact with a focus
      • 4.3.1It. anche + DA in Parenthesis or Appendix
      • 4.3.2It. anche + DA in Topic
    • 4.4Conclusions on the interaction between It. anche and focal information as defined in L-AcT
  • 5.General concluding remarks
  • Acknowledgments
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 22 February 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/la.273.07de
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