A group of researchers within RomLing focuses on the synchronic study of Romance languages at the morphological, syntactic and semantic levels. Specific research questions within this domain include constituent order, attributive and predicative modification, referential properties of noun phrases and pronouns, functions of determiners, adjective and verb semantics, valency, and also features of the lexicon e.g. analysis of formulaic sequences and lexicometric analysis of literary and journalistic prose.
In recent years, some researchers within the group have combined system and usage based approaches with the study of variation in order to analyse spoken and written media discourse (French), academic writing (Portuguese) and different forms of spoken and written communication (Spanish and Portuguese). Frequency of use of lexical items and syntactic structures and its effects on meaning and form of e.g. frequently occurring verb-subject combinations, is an important aspect of the analysis of spoken data. Examples of the research carried out within the framework of frequency effects include the study of grammaticalization of referential expressions such as a gente ‘the people; we’ or uma pessoa ‘a person; one’ in Portuguese. We use extensive databases consisting of both written and spoken data in our research.
Another key research field within our research group is the analysis of syntax and semantics from a cognitive perspective, examining the relationship between language and human cognition. The cognitively oriented research within RomLing is directed towards three main areas. The first area deals with the relation between grammar and semantics, analysing for example different types of clausal complements and the semantic contents of different complement structures. Another research area examines verb modes and modality, e.g. the choice between subjunctive and indicative in relation to concepts such as control and domain. Lexical semantics, in particular the study of polysemy and meaning potential of words, constitutes the third research dimension. The cognitive approaches aim at establishing a relation between varying meanings and general conceptual schemes.