Subject Clitics in the Northern Italian Dialects : A Comparative Study Based on the Minimalist Program and Optimality Theory

1. 0 INTRODUCTION This book provides an encompassing analysis of Subject Clitics (SCLs) by giving a detailed description of these elements in two varieties of Piedmontese, a Northern Italian Dialect: Astigiano and Turinese spoken in the areas of Asti and Turin respectively. It accounts for the structural position and function of these elements inside the computational system and for their morphological and distributional properties. It also provides an empirical and theoretical comparison between Piedmontese SCLs and SCLs in other Northern Italian Dialects (NIDs). of SCLs types in the NIDs have been regarded as Since the 1980s, the majority elements of agreement, in that they contribute to the realisation of subject verb agreement by expressing features of the subject similar, in a way, to verbal inflection. Nonetheless, SCLs are not to be assimilated to verbal affixes as they exhibit different properties. Most distinctively, they can be separated from the verb by other clitic elements and, in the case of the varieties considered here, SCLs are optional in all contexts and may be omitted in coordination. A more refined identification of SCLs separates SCLs which encode agreement features from those which do not and are related to pragmatic factors, as originally observed by Beninca (1994) with respect to the clitic a in Paduano The different morphological and syntactic properties that characterise SCLs across the NIDs have justified numerous accounts which regard them as head of their own projection.

Chapter 1 Introduction.- 1.0 Introduction. 2.0 The Dialect. 3.0 The object of inquiry. 4.0 Objectives and proposals. 5.0 Theoretical background. 5.1 The Minimalist Program. 5.1.1 Features and Checking Theory. 5.1.2 The T-model (Chomsky 1995). 5.1.3 The MP and Variation. 5.2 Optimality Theory. 5.2.1 Input, GEN, CON and EVAL. 5.2.2 Variation and optionality. 6.0 This study: questions and answers. 6.1 What is the empirical and theoretically significance of working with SCLs in Piedmontese? 6.2 Why is a twofold approach adopted and what are the benefits of this choice? 6.3 What are the boundaries of each approach in the analysis proposed in this book? 7.0 The Data. 8.0 Organisation. Notes. Chapter 2 The Data.- 1.0 Introduction. 2.0 Turinese. 2.1 Turinese SCLs and types of subjects and verbs. 2.2 Linear order between SCLs and other proclitics. 2.3 SCLs and negative markers. 2.4 Direct interrogatives. 2.5 SCLs in subordinate clauses. 2.6 SCLs in coordinated clauses. 2.7 *SCL: Non-finite forms and true imperatives. 2.7.1 Non-finites. 2.7.2 True imperatives. 2.8 Optionality. 3.0 Astigiano. Notes. Chapter 3 Optimal Agreement. The position and the function of SCLs.- 1.0 Introduction. 2.0 The proposal. 3.0 Preverbal subjects. 3.1 Arguments against the left dislocation analysis of unmarked preverbal subjects in Italian and the NIDs. 3.2 Subject-in-CP analysis (Poletto 2000b). 3.3 Subject positions below the CP boundary: more evidence for SCLs in T. 3.3.1 More about SCLs inside TP. 4.0 The Extended Projection Principle. 4.1 SCLs and the EPP. 5.0 A multi-layered model for SCLs: an overview. 5.1 Four types of SCLs: an outline of Poletto’s Agreement Field. 5.1.1 Morphology. 5.1.2 Optionality. 5.1.3 Strong Negation. 5.1.4 Interaction with elements in CP. 5.1.5 Omission in coordination. 5.1.6 Exclamatives and new information contexts. 5.1.7 SCLs and interrogative inversion. 5.2 The Agreement Field. 5.3 Reviewing the AgreementField: Turinese and Astigiano. 5.3.1 Complex SCL it and at/al. 5.3.2 Movement: SCL climbing inside Agreement Field. 5.3.3 The Agreement Field and verbal inflection. 5.3.4 Optionality. 6.0 Conclusion. Notes. Chapter 4 Optimal Agreement. The morphology and the distribution of SCLs.- 1.0 Introduction. 2.0 Optimal Agreement. 3.0 The feature specification of Piedmontese SCLs. 3.1 The Basic System and the Deictic Systems. 3.2 Full and Person Optionality. 3.2.1 Agreement projections and optionality. 3.3 SCLs in coordination. 3.3.1 Optimal Agreement and feature repetition in coordinated structures. 3.3.2 Omission in coordination as a property of invariable clitics (Poletto 2000b). 4.0 Summary and conclusion. Notes. Chapter 5 Beyond Piedmontese.- 1.0 Introduction. 2.0 Beyond Piedmontese and the minimalist component of Optimal Agreement. 2.1 Negation. 2.1.1 Vocalic SCLs (invariable and deictic SCLs) - negation - finite verb. 2.1.2 Pre-negative marker agreement SCLs. 3.0 A common property across the NIDs and SCL types. 3.1 Imperatives. 3.2 Non-finite verb forms. 3.2.1 Personal infinitives. 4.0 Beyond Piedmontese and the OT component of Optimal Agreement. 4.1 Renzi and Vanelli’s (1983) SCL Systems and Florentine. 5.0 Illegitimate candidates. 5.1 Candidates that do not encode [± add,sg]. 5.2 Two feature combination constraints. 5.3 An alternative analysis: [f ] Dominance Scale. 6.0 Conclusion. Notes. Chapter 6 Beyond SCLs: Piedmontese interrogatives.- 1.0 Introduction. 2.0 Interrogative inversion and ICLs. 2.1 ICLs as interrogative morphology. 2.2 Agreement constraints and ICLs. 3.0 A unitary account of Piemdontese interrogation strategies. 3.1 Wh+che questions. 3.1.1 Parry (1998a). 3.1.2 The demise of ICLs: wh+che re-assessed. 3.1.3 Wh+che and V to C movement. 3.2 The proposal. 3.2.1 Theoretical background. 3.2.2 Wh+che explained. 3.2.3 Further questions. 4.0 Summary. 5.0 Interrogativity and the Agreement Field (Poletto