The complex prosody of complex wh-questions
Ferin, Maria Francesca (Università degli Studi di Siena)
Bianchi, Valentina (Università degli Studi di Siena)
Bocci, Giuliano (Università degli Studi di Siena)
Cruschina, Silvio (University of Helsinki (Finlàndia))

Data:	2025
Resum:	In this paper, we investigate the prosody of wh-questions with a complex wh-phrase, focusing on the role of the presence of a lexical restriction (e. g. , what book) and of D(iscourse)-linking of the wh-phrase in the distribution of the main prosodic prominence (or nuclear pitch accent [NPA]). Through three read-aloud production studies, we show that the presence of a lexical restriction within the wh-phrase is a necessary condition for NPA assignment to the latter; that lexically restricted wh-phrases allow for NPA assignment to both the verb and the wh-phrase; that the likelihood of NPA assignment to the wh-phrase is sensitive to the phonological heaviness of the wh-phrase, and that D-linking per se is neither a necessary nor a sufficient condition for such NPA assignment, such that there is no detectable correlation of NPA assignment with an interpretive effect. The distribution of NPA assignment in complex wh-questions is discussed in light of the analysis proposed by Bocci et al. (2021, 2024) for bare wh-questions.
Nota:	This study received funding from MUR (This study received funding from MUR (Ministero dell’università e della ricercar, Italy), PRIN 2022, project code 202223PL4N, T-GRA2L: «Testing gradedness and grammaticality in linguistics», CUP B53D23014100006.
Drets:	Aquest document està subjecte a una llicència d'ús Creative Commons. Es permet la reproducció total o parcial, la distribució, la comunicació pública de l'obra i la creació d'obres derivades, fins i tot amb finalitats comercials, sempre i quan es reconegui l'autoria de l'obra original.
Llengua:	Anglès
Document:	Article ; recerca ; Versió publicada
Matèria:	Wh-questions ; Prosody ; Intonation ; Syntax ; Focus
Publicat a:	Isogloss, Vol. 11, Num. 7 (2025) , p. 1-30 (Articles) , ISSN 2385-4138

Adreça original: https://revistes.uab.cat/isogloss/article/view/v11-n7-ferin-et-al
DOI: 10.5565/rev/isogloss.578

30 p, 1.2 MB

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