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The Acquisition of Italian; Editorial page; Title page; LCC data; Table of contents; Aknowledgements; Introduction; The different modes of acquisition; Some general assumptions of linguistic analysis; The acquisition of verb inflections and clause structure; 1.1 Introduction; 1.2 Acquisition of verbal tenses; 1.3 Acquisition of present tense inflections; 1.4 The process of subject-verb agreement; 1.5 Acquisition of the finite versus infinitive verb distinction; 1.6 Why aren't there any root infinitives in early Italian?; 1.7 Imperatives as the Italian analogue of root infinitives; 1.8 Copula.

1.8.1 Descriptive facts and generalizations1.8.2 An account of the declarative versus wh-question asymmetry in copula omission; 1.8.3 The copula in negative contexts; 1.9 Compound tenses and optional past participles; 1.10 Past participles: Verbal or adjectival nature?; 1.11 Regular and irregular past participles and past definite; 1.12 The 'imperfetto'; 1.13 Acquisition of verb inflections in children with SLI and Developmental Dyslexia; Summary and questions for future research; The acquisition of articles and aspects of nominal inflection; 2.1 Introduction.

2.2 The L1 acquisition of articles2.3 Article use in Italian keeping an eye on the crosslinguistic dimension; 2.4 Article omission and phonological constraints; 2.5 Article omission and the syntactic context: The subject-object asymmetry in Italian; 2.6 An attempt towards a multi-facet explanation; 2.7 Article omission in non-initial positions: Complement of prepositions; 2.8 Acquisition of articles in the bilingual children and adult L2 learners; 2.9 Article omission in children with Specific Language Impairment.

2.10 The acquisition of nominal inflection in children with typical development and in children with SLI2.11 Morphological derivation: The diminutive; Summary and questions for future research; The acquisition of pronominal clitics; 3.1 Introduction; 3.2 Clitics in L1 Italian; 3.2.1 Clitic omission in early Italian productions; 3.2.2 Is the unexpressed object an omitted clitic or a null-object?; 3.2.3 Italian clitics and past participle agreement; 3.3 Clitics in L2: Bilingual/Child L2 Italian and Adult L2 Italian; 3.4 Italian clitics in atypical development; 3.4.1 Clitics in SLI.

Clitics as markers of language impairment3.4.2 Clitics in children with cochlear implant; 3.4.3 Clitics in children with Developmental Dyslexia; 3.5 The comprehension of object clitics by monolingual children acquiring Italian; Summary and questions for future research; The acquisition of relative clauses; 5.1 Introduction; 5.2 Production; 5.2.1 The production of subject and object relatives in typically developing children; 5.2.2 The production of Passive Object Relatives in children; 5.2.3 The production of Passive Object Relatives in adults in comparison with children of different ages.

A major contribution to the study of language acquisition and language development inspired by theoretical linguistics has been made by research on the acquisition of Italian syntax. This book offers an updated overview of results from theory-driven experimental and corpus-based research on the acquisition of Italian in different modes (monolingual, early and late L2, SLI, etc.), as well as exploring possible developments for future research. The book focuses on experimental studies which address research questions generated by linguistic theory, providing a detailed illustration of the fruitf.