1 From digressive marker to topic shifter and beyond. The case of Italian tra parentesi (‘in brackets’) 1 Ilaria Fiorentini, Andrea Sansò Abstract This paper aims to investigate the uses and functions of the phrasal adverb tra parentesi (literally ‘in brack- ets’) in present-day Italian. Tra parentesi is the verbalization of the punctuation mark < ( ) >. It is used both in written and spoken texts as a strategy to signal a slight digression from the main topic, in which second- ary, non-central information is presented. The expression has also developed other uses in which digression is not at stake, such as topic shifting. Such changes were followed by an increase in subjectification and in- tersubjectification, whereby tra parentesi acquired new functions as a focus marker and as a turn-taking device. The analysis will show (i) that contrary to Pons Bordería & Estellés Arguedas (2009), digressive markers, i.e. dedicated markers overtly encoding the beginning of a digression, exist; (ii) that they may de- velop further functions in which digression is not at stake (topic shifting, additive focus marking, turn tak- ing); and (iii) that they may be recruited to serve these new functions mostly for politeness reasons: since changing topic implies some discontinuity that requires the hearer’s attention, marking a topic shift by means of a marker originally used to signal the beginning of a digression allows the speaker/writer to be less blunt and to soften the transition to the new topic. 1. Introduction The phrasal adverb fra/tra parentesi, 2 literally ‘between parentheses’/‘in brackets’, has various uses in pre- sent-day Italian. The passage in (1) exemplifies its most frequent use as a strategy to signal the beginning of a slight digression from the main topic, in which secondary information is presented: 3 (1) Si chiama Alessandra, ha un carattere calmo però balla be.called.3SG Alessandra have.3SG a character calm but dance.3SG anche negli spettacoli di agosto, fine anno ecc. La sua also in.ART shows of August end year etc. ART her 1 This article is the result of joint work by the two authors. For academic purposes, Ilaria Fiorentini is responsible for Sections 3 and 4, while Andrea Sansò is responsible for Sections 1, 2, 5 and 6. We wish to thank two anonymous refer- ees and Miriam Locher for their insightful comments on an earlier draft. The usual disclaimers apply. 2 Since tra and fra ‘between’ are exact synonyms, we will not distinguish between the two forms in the remainder of the article. 3 For the sake of simplicity, definite articles in the Italian examples are always glossed as ART, irrespective of their gender and number, while verbs in the present indicative are only glossed for person: for instance, ha, glossed ‘have.3SG’, should be intended as ‘3 rd person singular, present indicative’. On the contrary, tenses and moods differ- ent from the present and the indicative respectively are always explicitly glossed. Past participles and indefinite arti- cles are glossed using the corresponding English form. Idiomatic expressions are glossed as units (e.g. ci diamo da fare, lit. ‘we give ourselves to do’, i.e. ‘we work hard’, in example (1)). The expression tra parentesi is never glossed, and is always translated as in brackets, with the only exception of example (2) (where by the way is John Steinbeck’s original phrasing in the corresponding passage of the novel East of Eden). Although in brackets is less idiomatic than by the way, it allows us to maintain our translations more literal. The following abbreviations are used: 1, 2, 3 = 1 st , 2 nd or 3 rd person; ART = definite article; AUX = auxiliary; COND = conditional mood; F = feminine; FUT = future; IMPERS = imper- sonal marker si; INF = infinitive; IPFCT = imperfect tense; NEG = negation; PFCT = present perfect (verbal periphrasis involving the auxiliaries avere ‘have’ or essere ‘be’ and the past participle); PL = plural; PPF = pluperfect (verbal periph- rasis involving the imperfect tense of the auxiliaries avere ‘have’ or essere ‘be’ and the past participle); PROG = pro- gressive (verbal periphrasis involving the verb stare ‘stay’ + the gerund of the main verb); PST = past (passato remoto); REFL = reflexive; REL = relativizer; SBJV = subjunctive; SG = singular.