A person split analysis of the progressive forms in some southern Italian varieties

The present continuous in some varieties of the Barese (a dialect spoken in the Apulia region) is formed by an inflected stative verbs ste (=to stay) a connecting element a (=to) and the present indicative of the lexical verb which agrees in person and number with the matrix verbs. Similar constructions are found with motion verbs in Barese and in other different southern Italian dialects (Cardinaletti & Giusti, 2003). These progressive constructions (as all progressive) are linked to the location of the subject (Mateu,2002) in the event denoted by the lexical verbs selected. The agreement with the subject is marked with both verbs: the functional and the lexical one. The morphology of the subject seems to play a central role in the derivation of progressive form (i.e. subject clitics see Loporcaro, 2012, Franco 2013).