Naturalezza e marcatezza nella punteggiatura inglese

The paper addresses the topic of punctuation from a semiotically based cognitive pragmatic perspective. A long-standing scientific debate has focused on the prosodic versus grammatical function of punctuation marks. In this paper I claim that such an approach is an oversimplification and by itself insufficient to explain the complexities of punctuation: no matter how hard we try to systematically connect punctuation with intonation, pauses and syntactic boundaries, exceptions will always turn out in usage that force us to find specific explanations in specific contexts in terms of intentionality, attitudes, pragmatic force, etc. As an alternative, the paper explores the hypothesis that punctuation is a complex system of signs, adaptable to contexts and sensitive also to semantic and pragmatic meanings. The proper domain of investigation of punctuation is neither the word nor the sentence but the text/discourse. From a cognitive point of view, I will argue, punctuation signs contribute to the economy of text interpretability indicating points in the text where cognitive processes may operate to construct a pattern which enables its interpretation in an efficient, efficacious and appropriate manner.