Giuliano Bocci & Cinzia Avesani University of Siena & ISTC-CNR - Padova
giulianobocci@unisi.it, avesani@pd.istc.cnr.it
In this paper, we address the issue of the informational structure and prosodic system interface in Tuscan Italian (TI). We propose a model of how the informational properties of focus(-background) along with (left and right) topics, and “Givenness” (Schwarzschild 1999) feed the PA association mechanism. We performed a production experiment using read speech (4 speakers x 46 short scripts x 5-8 repetitions). The scripts were designed in order to induce different types of focus structure in combination with left and right dislocated Topics in different linear orders. Such a design allowed us to factor out the linear order in which focus appears and to evaluate its impact on other phrases endowed with discourse properties, such as dislocated topics. The corpus has been analyzed and ToBI-transcribed. In our corpus, “Given” information occurring before focus is systemically stressed, phrased and accented. This result fully supports the conclusion that Italian fails to deaccent given information (Ladd, 1996; Swerts et al., 2002). In postfocal contexts the pitch contour is low and flat, irrespectively of type, number and length of the constituents.
We show that the lack of pitch movements on postfocal phrases in TI cannot be accounted for neither in terms of “deaccenting/destressing given” (Féry & Samek- Lodovici 2004), nor in terms of extametricality of postfocal material, nor as the result of tonal unspecification. Indeed, we argue that postfocal elements, in spite of the apparent lack of PAs, are metrically phrased and phrasal metrical prominences are assigned. This conclusion is supported by Bocci (2009) which shows that despite the lack of pitch movements, the effects of phrasal prominences in postfocal contexts are detecteble as they involve longer vowel durations, spectral slope differences and more extreme formant values.
We claim that postfocal material is visible to intonation: it is associated with a L* PA. A consequence of such a proposal is that the difference among postfocal prominences in TI, Southern varieties of Italian (Grice et al. 2005) and European Portuguese (Frota 2000) is reduced to a typological one: while the latter associate with special downstepped PAs, TI associates with L*. We propose that L* in TI is a marker exclusively dedicated to define the right edge of the Focus phrase by marking the material to its right as non-focal. L* is incompatible with a focus interpretation. We argue that L* is neither the prosodic correlate of the background, nor of Vallduvi’s (1993) “tail”. We propose that L* distribution is ruled by a Focus Defining Rule which sketchily requires that the focus phrase is associated with the rightmost PA able to express focus (where L* in TI is unable to express focus, as !H+L* is in EP). For instance, minimal pairs of clauses with in situ and ex situ focus (elicited by the same context) share presumably the same focus/background partition and the focus phrases bear invariantly the same PA.
However, the prosodic properties of the background are radically different in the two cases: prefocal material bears PAs different form L*, while FDR forces postfocal material to associate with L* (see fig. 1,.2). Building on Calabrese (1992), we assume that Italian allows only one focus per utterance. We show that
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the domain of FDR in Italian is the Utterance as a follow-on from the uniqueness requirement and that FDR outranks any other PA association. Parenthetical and (certain) adjunct clauses, ClLDed and RDed topics are phrased into independent intonational phrases metrically headed. If they precede focus, they associate with PAs different from L*, while, if they occur after focus, they invariantly associate with L* (see fig. 3, 4).
According to our proposal, L* is not a correlate of any informational property, but it is inserted to define the right edge of the focus phrase, overriding any other PA association. We argue that PA association cannot be exclusively driven by the informational properties of the element which a PA is associated with (contra Pierrehumbert & Hirschberg 1990), but that it is also ruled by structural requirements on the intonational representation.
Figures
References
Avesani C. and Vayra M. (2003). “Broad, narrow and contrastive focus in Florentine Italian”. In Solé M.J et. al. (eds.), Proceedings of the 15th ICPhSs, Barcelona, 1803-1806.
Bocci G. (2009). On syntax and prosody in Italian, PhD. dissertation, University of Siena.
Calabrese, A. (1992) “Some informal remarks on Focus and Logical Structures in Italian.”
Harvard Working Papers in Linguistics, vol. I, 91-127.
Féry C. and Samek-Lodovici V. (2006). “Focus Projection and Prosodic Prominence in Nested Foci”, Language, Vol. 82, 1.
Frota, S. (2000). Prosody and Focus in European Portuguese, New York, Garland.
Grice M., D’Imperio M.P., Savino M. and Avesani C. (2005). “Towards a strategy for ToBI labelling varieties of Italian”. In Sun-Ah Jun (ed.) Prosodic Typology: The Phonology of Intonation and Phrasing. Oxford, OUP, 362-389.
Ladd R. (1996). Intonational Phonology, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
Pierrehumbert J. and Hirschberg J. (1990). “The meaning of intonational contours in the interpretation of discourse”. In P.R. Cohen, J. Morgan and M.E. Pollack (eds.), Intentions in communication, Cambridge, Mass, MIT Press, 271–311.
Schwarzschild R. (1999). “Givenness, avoid F and other constraints on the placement of accent”, Natural Language Semantics, 7, 141–177.
Swerts M., Krahmer E. and Avesani C. (2002). “Prosodic marking of information status in Dutch and Italian: a comparative analysis”, Journal of Phonetics, 30, 4, 629-654.
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Fig. 4. Example of topic-focus order.
A main clause containing a RDed topic (in boldface) precedes an adjunct clause containing an instance of contrastive focus (in capital letters).
Fig. 3. Example of focus-topic order.
An adjunct clause containing an instance of contrastive focus (in capital letters) precedes the main clause containing a RDed topic (in boldface).
Fig. 2. Example of contrastive focus in situ (contrastive focus in capital letters).
Fig. 1. Example of contrastive focus ex situ (contrastive focus in capital letters).
Vallduví E. (1992). The informational component, Garland, New York.
Early acquisition of form and meaning in Catalan and Spanish