Modal particles in Italian. Adverbs of illocutionary modification and sociolinguistic variation

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The study delves into the unique roles of specific Italian adverbs, such as "also," "only," and "a bit," in modifying speech acts within their contextual use. It highlights how these adverbs influence the interpretation and illocutionary force of speech acts while indexing inferred meanings in the interaction's common ground. By utilizing data from both standard and regional varieties of Italian, the research employs pragmatics, language change models, and sociolinguistic methods to analyze the adverbs' modal functions and their distribution across dialects.