Giuliano Bocci
Prosodic prominence, focus, and syntactic derivation in Italian wh-questions
In this talk, I discuss the relationship between prosodic properties and syntactic derivation in bare wh-questions in Italian. In particular, I address the issue of whether the focal interpretation is directly read off the prosodic structure of a sentence, or it is rather mediated by a [focus] feature encoded in the syntactic representation. The results of two prosodic experiments cast doubt on the direct association between prosodic prominence and a focal interpretation. The experimental findings consistently show that i. the nuclear pitch accent and main stress fall on the lexical verb, without a concomitant focal interpretation of the latter and that ii. main prominence assignment is sensitive to the derivational history of the wh-phrase, as shown by the comparison of questions featuring short-distance vs. long-distance wh-movement. To account for these data, it is proposed that main prominence distribution is determined by the presence of [focus] feature which is bundled with the [wh] feature. The bundle is borne by every probing phase head (v° or C°) that the wh-phrase crosses on its way to its final landing site. At PF, main prominence is then assigned to the rightmost non-null phonological element which endowed with the focus feature. This element corresponds to the lexical verb (incorporated in v°) of the clause from which the wh-element is extracted. Time permitting, I will enlarge the empirical discussion by presenting the results of a third production experiment in which the prosodic properties of d-linked and aggressively non-dlinked wh-questions were tested. I will then propose a tentative typology of Italian wh-elements based on their prosodic and syntactic properties.