L'uso dell'articolo determinativo davanti ai singenionimi affettivi preceduti da un possessivo: un quadro statistico

Among the most complex rules of Italian grammar are those relating to the use of the definite article with possessive adjectives followed by kinship names: in this case, the article is not employed, but its omission is subject to various structural, syntactical, and semantic restrictions concerning the noun / phrase in question. Grammar books usually highlight the use of the article with plural nouns or with the possessive form loro, but they are much less careful about other features of the kinship noun / phrase in which possessives are involved (compound nouns, nouns followed by prepositional complements, etc.). Furthermore, they disagree with regard to the syntax of affective names, in which case the use of the article is often considered optional. With this study, then, I intend to analyze the use of the definite article with possessive adjectives followed by the affective kinship names mamma and papà (therefore, nouns without suffixes) in the largest corpus of written Italian, Italian Web 2016 of the Sketch Engine system. The results of this research are interesting because, statistically, the use of the article depends on the possessive adjective used in the text (mio, tuo, suo, etc.) and, therefore, on the degree of the speaker's emotional involvement.