Linguistic Variation - Volume 26, Issue 1, 2026

This paper addresses vocative truncation in Romanesco (Italo-Romance), which has been described as conditioned by a host of constraints at different structural levels. We crowdsourced the data collection with an online questionnaire devised to ask the three research questions whether the acceptability of truncation depends on (a) grammatical number, (b) the individual lexical items, and (c) speaker’s age. Respondents’ ratings on a 5-point Likert scale were analysed by means of Random Forests and Conditional Inference Trees. The results confirmed the significance of number and lexeme as conditioning factors.

In a series of papers, Calabrese (2012ff) has convincingly argued that there is a link between the (a)thematicity and the (ir)regularity of verbal forms, cf. the regular and thematic past participles amato ‘loved’, battuto ‘beaten’ and partito ‘left’ vs. the irregular and athematic forms perso ‘lost’, corso ‘run’ and chiuso ‘closed’. While we completely agree with Calabrese’s observation that the presence of a Theme Vowel (ThV) has a direct effect on regularity of the respective verbal forms whereas its absence may cause allomorphy, in this paper, we will show that his analysis is far too complex and can be simplified by assuming Spanning (Svenonius 2012, Merchant 2015) for Vocabulary Insertion. We argue that Theme Vowels function as a kind of intermediate domain delimiter and we show, following the Vocabulary Insertion-Only Model (Haugen & Siddiqi 2016) within the framework of DM (Distributed Morphology), that many of the context-specific rules and processes proposed by Calabrese can be reduced to Vocabulary Insertion.

This paper discusses the distribution of subject clitics in nominal copular constructions in the variety of Este (PD) which is a partial pro-drop language where null subjects alternate with subject proclitics: when a postverbal subject NP is present, no subject clitic is allowed with lexical verbs. However, subject proclitics are allowed with postverbal subjects in inverse copular sentences where the postverbal NP agrees with both the copula and the subject proclitic. This paper explores the available discourse semantic interpretations of inverse copular sentences resulting by this inflectional pattern: while the preverbal predicative NP is a topicalized intensional element that instantiates a description, the postverbal NP represents new information. The preverbal predicative NP does not refer to an entity, but to a property representing the subset that includes the postverbal subject NP which a focal element introduced, just in this configuration, by a subject proclitic.

This study discusses clitic placement in restructuring contexts in Italian and the Italo-Romance dialects spoken in Italy. The data come from AIS map 1086 and a judgement task experiment conducted on bilectal speakers of Italian and the dialect at six representative points in the Italian territory. The variation between clitic climbing and enclisis turns out to be much more complex than previous literature has suggested. The two clitic positions are available to all varieties, but at different rates and with different degrees of optionality. Optionality can be analysed as a function of language dominance in an intricate fashion.

In this work I sharpen the description of Object Clitic Reduplication in Perugino, providing additional, relevant data with respect to the ones described in Di Domenico (2022). In specific, in this work I will deal with the distinction between non-reflexive se and all other clitics (including reflexive se) observed in previous work, providing evidence that concerns their distribution beyond restructuring sentences, where the phenomena at stake were originally observed.

First of all, the analysis will show that the impossibility of having clitic reduplication with non-reflexive se cannot be due to an impossibility of having non-reflexive se in enclisis to the infinitive, since it may occur in enclisis in infinitives introduced by the preposition da.

Furthermore, as the data show, the clitic string proclitic to the infinitive (activated by negation) and the one proclitic to the finite verb cannot be equated, as they behave differently with respect to the distribution of non-reflexive se. Finally, as I will show, when the pre-infinitival position is available, i.e. in negative infinitives, clitics, with the exception of non-reflexive se, can reduplicate: Clitic reduplication is thus possible in Perugino also beyond restructuring sentences.

This paper focuses on the Occitan varieties spoken in Italy from the perspective of language contact. The study investigates the Gallo-Romance colony of Guardia Piemontese (Calabria), examining this minority and endangered language. The methodology involves comparing data from two corpora, representing opposite ends of the continuum between a stable, conservative stage (older generation) and a stage involving younger speakers with strongly influenced by Italian. Current measures of language endangerment typically rely on external factors such as intergenerational language transmission, number of speakers, and linguistic domains of use. To explore changes in the internal structure of endangered languages, this study examines two marked syntactic structures: subject clitics and negation. The comparison aims to verify the mechanisms of “microcontact” and assess the stability of the morphosyntactic structures under external pressures.

Postverbal subjects occupy different positions across languages, as they can result from V-to-C movement (e.g., German) or from the subject remaining low (e.g., Italian), either in a thematic or low focus position. We test postverbal subjects in Old Venetian and show that their frequency increases in (i) main clauses, and (ii) unaccusative/predicative/passive verbs. Postverbal pronominal subjects exclusively increase under (i), postverbal non-pronominal subjects under (ii). This indicates that Old Venetian lacked an active low focus subject position and that postverbal pronominal and non-pronominal subjects are different: pronominal subjects are postverbal due to V-to-C movement, while non-pronominal subjects are postverbal due to their low thematic position. We model this by proposing that pronominal subjects must leave their low thematic position for checking their Ground features in the low CP area, a position not available for non-pronominal subjects, which either stay low or move to the high Topic layers in the CP.

This article offers a comparative survey of the distributional and interpretive properties of the adverbial particles po/pa across the Dolomitic region. By comparing the syntactic behaviour and the semantic contribution of this lexical item in different but closely related dialects, I try to better characterize the diachronic process of grammaticalization the Latin adverb post has undergone in the relevant geographic area, showing that it amounts essentially to a successive upward reanalysis along the functional spine of the clausal hierarchy. In this particular case, an erstwhile temporal and locative adverb takes up a discourse-related functional value, turning eventually into a marker of (canonical or non-canonical) interrogative force. The structural portion involved in the process seems to correspond to the highest functional projections identified by Cinque (1999).

In this article we analyze how the Arbëresh variety spoken in Piana degli Albanesi, in Sicily, has changed its original strict Negative Concord system (as seen in Albanian) to a non-strict one under the influence of Sicilian and, more recently, Italian. After describing the peculiar language contact environment which is found in Piana, we propose an account of the variation based on the idea that Negative Concord, i.e. the presence of sentential negation with negative indefinites, is a Last Resort type operation, and that interlinguistic differences are based on the interaction between parameters regulating the position where negation is expressed and a hierarchy of relevant grammatical features. In our particular case, we claim that the change is a consequence of contact with varieties with adverbs with independent negative meaning merged higher than T, and without systematic Nominative/Accusative distinction.

Numerous Southern Italian dialects are characterized by a dual complementizer system, with two declarative complementizers surfacing according to the class of the main verb, the mood of the embedded verb, the presence of left-peripheral elements, etc. This phenomenon is here investigated under the lens of the Parametric Comparison Method, an innovative tool for language comparison based on syntactic parameters. We argue that the occurrence of a dual complementizer in SIDs can be parametrized considering at least four parameters that regularize the operations of Grammaticalization, Checking, Strength and Spread. Therefore, an alternative view of the dual complementizer system is offered, suggesting that different structural operations play a crucial role in shaping the realized complementizer. This approach allows for a more nuanced understanding of the parametric differences and similarities among varieties that are traditionally grouped within the same linguistic area.

In Valdôtain Patois, an understudied Francoprovençal language spoken in Aosta Valley (Italy), wh-phrases can either be fronted or occur clause-internally. In this paper, I analyze the syntax and pragmatics of clause internal wh-phrases, showing that they require to be either activated in the preceding linguistic context or inferable. Based on evidence from word order and parasitic gaps, I argue that in Valdôtain Patois clause-internal wh-phrases are not in-situ, but move to an A′-position at the edge of vP.