The next talk in the phonology colloquium will be by Marta Wierzba (Potsdam University) – Abstract below:
06.11.19 Marta Wierzba:
„Focus projection: extending the empirical data base“
Room: IG 4.301
Everybody is welcome!
In this talk, I present two experiments on focus projection in German.
In transitive sentences, prosodic prominence on the object is compatible
with interpreting a larger unit (VP, IP) as focused. Such a broad-focus
interpretation is usually assumed to be less available when the subject
or the verb is the most prominent element. In experiment 1, I use a new
experimental paradigm to test whether this prosodic asymmetry carries
over to sentences with wh-movement. In experiment 2, I investigate
whether projection is also possible for a different
information-structural category, namely contrastive topics (CTs), and to
what extent CT projection follows the same pattern as focus projection.
In transitive sentences, prosodic prominence on the object is compatible
with interpreting a larger unit (VP, IP) as focused. Such a broad-focus
interpretation is usually assumed to be less available when the subject
or the verb is the most prominent element. In experiment 1, I use a new
experimental paradigm to test whether this prosodic asymmetry carries
over to sentences with wh-movement. In experiment 2, I investigate
whether projection is also possible for a different
information-structural category, namely contrastive topics (CTs), and to
what extent CT projection follows the same pattern as focus projection.