È stato un mezzo disastro… Points of Convergence Between Approximation and Intensification: A Contrastive Italian-Russian Study

Based on the case-study of the Italian downtoner mezzo, ‘half of’, the present work aims to highlight, through a usage-based approach, interesting points of semantic and functional convergence between approximation and intensification, which are traditionally considered divergent meaningconstruction strategies. Mezzo functions both on the semantic level, by modulating the referential force of nouns, verbs, and adjectives, and on the pragmatic level, where it acts as a discourse marker, enabling the speaker to reduce the illocutionary force of their assertions and helping the receiver to make the inferences necessary to recognise the speaker’s communicative intentions in cases of “loose talk” (in Relevance Theory terms), such as understatement and overstatement. In the second part of the article, the results of a contrastive analysis with Russian are discussed, based on the assumption that the identification of functional equivalences between different languages is a valid heuristic method to explain the semantic and pragmatic multifunctionality of certain lexical elements, also from a cross-linguistic perspective.

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