Přednášky doktorky Zrinky Kolakovic

In Croatian, clause-initial constituents composed of two individually stressed words are associated with variation in clitic (CL) placement. In sentences containing such constituents, CLs can be positioned after the first multi-word constituent, after the first stressed word of the multi-word constituent, or follow the second constituent. This talk addresses the methodological intricacies that researchers encounter when studying the three competing CL placement options in the left periphery of declarative sentences. The methodological challenges range from the selection of data sources and the limited size of available data to the non-trivial questions of data annotation and the choice of statistical tools that can effectively test and disprove existing hypotheses and theoretical models.

In this workshop session, we will explore the interplay between information structure (IS) and clitic (CL) placement in Croatian. Attendees will engage in discussions about how to differentiate between various but highly intertwined IS properties and how these can be reliably annotated in ecologically valid corpus linguistic data. Drawing on preliminary findings from a corpus linguistic study, we will present empirical evidence demonstrating how IS concepts such as givenness and contrast influence CL placement options in declarative sentences in Croatian, based on approximately 400 annotated sentences.