Daniela Elisabetta Casartelli

Tutkimuksen ja opetuksen kuvaus

Research

I am a doctoral researcher in general linguistics with a specialization in typology and formal pragmatics. I hold a BA in General Linguistics (Allgemenie Sprachwissenschaften) from the University of Zurich, and a MA in Linguistics (Linguistique Générale) from the University of Geneva.

My thesis work focuses on conventionalized inferred meanings and other functions of reported speech constructions, meaning reported speech constructions that do not report an actual utterance but instead convey different meanings. Such constructions have been previously described in unrelated languages individually.

This observation raises questions about the morphosyntactic properties of these constructions and potential similarities in the meanings they express. The meanings conveyed by these constructions range from lexical categories, such as volition, apprehension, desire, and attempt, to verbal categories, including aspect and evidentiality.

In my thesis monograph, I present an analysis that employs a methodological approach from linguistic typology, contextualized with theoretical insights from formal pragmatics, to examine this phenomenon across different languages.

To deepen my understanding of the phenomenon in African langauges, I visited the project Discourse reporting in African storytelling (PI Tatiana Nikitina) at the LLACAN-CNRS in Paris in autumn 2021, with the funding of the Labex PhD Mobility grant.
My research is carried out within the project Language emerging from human sociality: the case of speech representation (PI Stef Spronck).


Teaching

2021 University of Helsinki

• LDA-L311 Anthropological Linguistics (Autumn 2021)
• KIM-DE341 Pragmatik des Deutschen (Autumn 2021)

2023 Hanken University

• 5401-B-V (2023/P3-P4) Español I B, Helsinki & Vaasa (Spring 2023)