Anna MORBIATO

ResearchGate: https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Anna_Morbiato

Research experience

• 2022-2025: Research member within the PRIN Project ACHIEVE "The acquisition of Chinese resultative verbal complexes by L1 Italian learners: Combining learner corpus and experimental data": https://pric.unive.it/projects/achieve/home
• 2020, October-2024: Researcher (VIU) within the 4-year Horizon 2020 Project “MUHAI - Meaning and Understanding in Human-centric AI”, funded by the European Commission. (WP1 and WP3): Case studies in Cognitive Semantics and pragmatics.
• 2019-2021: Research Affiliate, School of Languages and Cultures, the University of Sydney
• 2021, November, ongoing: Fixed-term Assistant Professor (ricercatore R.T.D./B), Dept. of Asian and North African studies, Ca’Foscari University of Venice
• 2018, June-2021-October: Fixed-term Assistant Professor (ricercatore R.T.D./A), Dept. of Asian and North African studies, Ca’Foscari University of Venice
• 2017, August-December: Research Assistant, School of Languages and Cultures, the University of Sydney: Research towards the development of the BA of Advanced Studies in Multilingual Translation, with Prof. R. Suter.
• 2017, July-December: Research Assistant, Sydney Democracy Network, the University of Sydney: Cross-linguistic research on the concept of post-truth (focusing on China and Italy), in collaboration with Prof. J. Keane.
• 2016, March-July: Research Assistant, Department of Linguistics, the University of Sydney and PAT Inc.Researcher towards the development of innovative NLU (Natural Language Understanding) technology.
• 2011, February-2014, February: Research Fellow (assegnista di ricerca), Ca'Foscari University of Venice (Grant obtained after a competitive call for bid)

Teaching, supervising, and tutoring activities

• 2018-ongoing: Ca’Foscari University of Venice, Department of Asian and North African Studies. Courses: Chinese language and linguistics, translation. Supervisor of BA and MA theses.
• 2019-ongoing: responsible for Chinese teaching curricula (responsabile della formazione linguistica per il cinese).
• 2017-2018: Alma Mater Studiorum, University of Bologna, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures. Adjunct Professor. Courses: Mandarin Chinese language and linguistics. Supervisor of BA theses.
• 2016-2018: University of Verona, Faculty of Foreign Languages and Literatures - Adjunct Professor. Courses: Mandarin Chinese language, Chinese contemporary society.
• 2009-10 and 2014-2016: Ca’Foscari University of Venice, Department of East Asian studies - Teaching fellow and tutor - MA and BA courses: interpreting and translation, Chinese language; Supervisor of BA and MA theses on Chinese language, society; translation studies; teaching innovation.

Education and qualification

• 2018: Cotutelle (double degree) Ph.D.: PhD in Linguistics, University of Sydney, supervisor: Dr. William A. Foley; PhD in Asian and African studies, Ca’Foscari University of Venice, supervisor: Dr. Magda Abbiati. Thesis title: “Word order and sentence structure in Mandarin Chinese: new perspectives” (Awarded with First Class Honours).
• 2010:  MA in Technical and Scientific Translation (Chinese-English-Italian) Ca’Foscari University of Venice (awarded with First Class Honours).
• 2007: BA in Translation and Interpretation (Chinese-English-Italian) Ca’Foscari University of Venice (awarded with First Class Honours).

Other education

• 2016: Porquerolles, France: European Summer School in Linguistic Typology 2016 - Funded by the FASS Travel Grant Scheme 2016, the University of Sydney.
• 2014:  Palacky University, Olomouc: Summer School in Chinese Linguistics - Funded by the FASS Travel Grant Scheme 2016, the University of Sydney.
• 2011: TESOL (Teaching English to Students of Other Languages) Course, Trinity College London.
• 2009: Ludwig Maximilian Universität, München ERASMUS Semester. Research towards MA dissertation. Funded by the European Union (Erasmus exchange scholarship).
• 2008: Beijing Language and Culture University (北京语言大学) Courses: Chinese language, culture, history and modernity. Scholarship by the Chinese Ministry of Education (Chinese Bridge Scholarship).
• 2008: Shaanxi Normal University (陕西师范大学), Xian, China Intensive semester. Courses: - Chinese language, culture, politics and geography. Scholarship by the Cassamarca Foundation.
• 2006: Beijing Capital Normal University (北京首都师范大学) Intensive semester. HSK (Chinese Language Proficiency) Course and Certificate level 7.

Publications

• In preparation: Grammatica del cinese moderno, Hoepli Press (with Bianca Basciano and Giorgio F. Arcodia)
• Forthcoming: 意大利语着汉语词序错误分析：以表达有定和已知信息的结构为例 (Challenges for Italian L1 learners of Chinese: a contrastive analysis of word order errors connected to definiteness and givenness). Multicultural Perspectives in Chinese Language and Literature (provisional title). Beijing, Peking University Press.
• 2024: with Cani P. A multilingual study of reference tracking and evolutive anaphors in culinary narratives. In Porzel, Robert and Steels, Luc (eds), Meaning and Understanding in Human-Centric AI: Understanding Everyday Activities, Venice: Venice International University. (Articolo su libro)
• 2024: The linguistic ingredients of recipes: aspect, causation, and argument structure. In Porzel, Robert and Steels, Luc (eds), Meaning and Understanding in Human-Centric AI: Understanding Everyday Activities, Venice: Venice International University. (Articolo su libro)
• 2023. With Pontiggia Andrea. L’intraducibile diventa una sfida al management, Economia & Management, vol. 1, pp. 51-56 (ISSN 1120-5032)
• 2022. Pragmatics of Narration with Language, In Steels, Luc (eds), Foundations for Meaning and Understandingin Human-centric AI, Venice, Venice International University, pp. 109-121
• 2021. Una panoramica degli studi sull’acquisizione di aspetti sintattici e strutture grammaticali del cinese da parte di italofoni, La lingua cinese in Italia. Studi su didattica e acquisizione, Roma, RomaTrE-Press, pp. 87-114 (ISBN 979-12-5977-067-7)
• 2020. With Basciano B. and Gatti F. (eds) Corpus-Based Research on Chinese Language and Linguistics. Sinica Venetiana. Venice: ECF.
• 2020. With Basciano, Bianca, Gatti, Franco (2020). Introduction. In Basciano, Bianca, Gatti, Franco, Morbiato, Anna (eds), Corpus-Based Research on Chinese Language and Linguistics, Venezia, Edizioni Ca' Foscari (ISBN 978-88-6969-406-6; 978-88-6969-407-3) (ISSN 2610-9042)
• 2020. Chinese sentence-initial indefinites: what corpora reveal. In Basciano B. Morbiato A. and Gatti F. (eds), Corpus-Based Research on Chinese Language and Linguistics. Sinica Venetiana. Venice: ECF.
• 2020. Il tema in cinese tra frase e testo: Struttura sintattica, informativa e del discorso (Topic in Chinese between the sentence and the text: Syntactic, Information and Discourse Structure). Venice: Cafoscarina.
• 2020. Acquisition of Double-Nominative Constructions by Italian L1 Learners of Chinese A Cross-Sectional Corpus Study. In Annali di Ca' Foscari. Serie Orientale, vol. 56, pp. 1-32 (ISSN 1125-3789)  Link DOI 
• 2020. Topic and subject in Chinese and in the languages of Europe: comparative remarks and implications for Chinese as a Second/Foreign Language teaching. Chinese as a Second Language Research, De Gruyter Mouton. (With G. F. Arcodia and B. Basciano) Link DOI
• 2020. Cognitive-functional principles shaping linear order in Chinese: an integrated perspective. Special issue of the Journal of Cognitive Linguistic Studies, John Benjamins. Link DOI
• 2020. Parole intraducibili? Uno sguardo al cinese moderno, Mantua Humanistic Studies, Universitas Studiorum, vol. XI, pp. 117-129 (ISBN 978-88-3369-088-9)
• 2019. Conceptual Word Order Principles and Mandarin Chinese Grammar. In Shei C. (eds), The Routledge Handbook of Chinese Discourse Analysis, Routledge.
• 2018. How Subjective Is the Subject? A Fresh Look at Grammatical Relations in Mandarin Chinese. Annali Di Ca’ Foscari, 54, 205–224.DOI: http://doi.org/10.30687/AnnOr/2385-3042/2018/01/014
• 2018. “Word order and sentence structure in Mandarin Chinese: new perspectives”. Ph.D. dissertation: Università Ca' Foscari Venezia, The University of Sydney.
• 2017. Information Encoding, Mandarin Chinese Word Order and CSLA: A Cognitive- Functional Account. In I. Kecskes (eds), Explorations into Chinese as a Second Language, Educational Linguistics (Vol. 31, pp. 83–107). Springer International Publishing. [Peer-reviewed] ISBN: 978-3-319-54027-6, DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-54027-6_4
• 2015. What Chinese do not say: zero anaphora and non-specification of arguments in Mandarin (in Italian). In M. Abbiati & F. Greselin (eds), Lingua cinese: variazioni sul tema (Sinica venetiana 2) (pp. 79–102). ECF.         ISBN (eBook): 978-88-6969-040-2, DOI: http://doi.org/10.14277/--/SV-2-70
• 2014. Cognitive Principles and Preverbal Position in Chinese. Annali Di Ca’ Foscari, 50, 205–224.         ISSN: 2385-3042, DOI: http://doi.org/10.14277/2385-3042/11p

Dissemination and communication of research

Blog entries (MUHAI website, Meaning and Undersanding in Human-Centric AI (Horizon 2020 - grant agr. No 951846):

·      Anna Morbiato. 2024. Anaphora Unveiled: Tracking Culinary Transformation in the Tech-Driven Kitchen. https://muhai.org/blog/11-understanding-everyday-activities/255-anaphora-unv
·      Anna Morbiato. 2023. Pragmatics: the secret ingredient. https://muhai.org/blog/10-human-centric-ai/213-pragmatics-the-secret-ingredient
·        Anna Morbiato. 2022. Human-centric AI : Deconstructing Recipes. https://muhai.org/blog/10-human-centric-ai/203-deconstructing-recipes

WOTM (Word of the Month) section entries: Anaphora, Pragmatics

Conference presentations 

• 2024 - Abstract accepted for 12th International Conference of the European Association of Chinese Linguistics (EACL- 12). Rome, September 19-20, 2024.
• 2024 - JLAO37 (37th Paris Meeting on East Asian Linguistics). Paris INALCO, July 04-05, 2024. Presentation title: On the issue of subjecthood in Modern Standard Chinese.
• 2024 - 8th Edition of the Study Days on Chinese Linguistics (AILC-08). Verona, 16-21 June 2024. Presentation title: Complex anaphoric phenomena in Chinese procedural texts
• 2024 - ICAART (16th International Conference on Agents and Artificial Intelligence), 24 March - Invited speaker in the opening session of the conference "Large Language Models and Artificial Consciousness". Presentation title: The linguistics of cognition: frames, foregrounds, and foci.
• 2023 - Doctoral School seminar, Università Ca' Foscari Venezia, 13 December: Corpora as a research tool from linguistics to AI: case studies, methodological potential, and issues."
• 2023 - Università di Roma Sapienza,  “XIX Convegno AISC 2023”  September 21-23. Panel: Le costruzioni verbali risultative in cinese L1 e L2: dai dati all’analisi. Presentation: “Composti risultativi, struttura informativa e realizzazioni argomentali: un’analisi corpus-based.”
• 2023 - Universität Osnabrück, Conference “Topic, Focus and Subject between grammatical necessity and information-structural load”. September 19-23 Presentation “Subjecthood and topichood, with special reference to Chinese”
• 2022 –Università di Bergamo, 9-10 September AILC: Study Days on Chinese Linguistics (VI)
• 2021 – Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna, Forlì - AILC: Study Days on Chinese Linguistics (VI) Acquisition of double-nominative constructions by Italian L1 learners of Chinese: a crossectional corpus study.
• 2021 – Alma Mater Studiorum University of Bologna, Forlì - AILC: Study Days on Chinese Linguistics (VI) (With Greta Marchetti): I fattori che condizionano la motivazione ad apprendere il cinese da parte di studenti italofoni: un approccio sociodinamico
• 2021 – The George Washington University, Washington DC 汉语作为第六语言研究国际研讨会 6th Int. Conference on Chinese as a Second Language Research (CASLAR-6) Double-nominatives: thematic structure and acquisitional issues
• 2021 – Centre de Recherches Linguistiques sur l’Asie Orientale, Paris 34th Paris Meeting on East Asian Linguistics (JLAO 34) A corpus approach to Chinese sentence-initial indefinites
• 2020 – Olomouc, Czech Republic - 11th International Conference of the European Association of Chinese Linguistics (EACL-11) Panel convenor (with B. Basciano): Corpus-based approaches to Chinese linguistics: towards increased empiricism (postponed due to the COVID emergency)
• 2020 – University Putra Malaysia Bintulu Campus -Cala Conference on Asian Linguistic Anthropology - Presentation: Spatio-temporal frames and Chinese word order--a cognitive-functional analysis based on the containment schema
• 2019 - Ca’Foscari University of Venice - AISC Italian Association for Chinese Studies
• Presentation: Sentence-initial indefinite nominals: a quantitative corpus study on the PKU and BCC-BLCU corpora
• 2019 - DSAAM Research Days—Focus on Endangered Languages and Linguistics in Asia - Presentation: What Corpora can tell: New Perspectives on Mandarin Syntax
• 2018 - The University of Sydney - 18th Int. Symposium of Processability Approaches to Language Acquisition (PALA) - Presentation: Mandarin Chinese word order and interlanguage development: a comparative study on Italian and English L1 learners
• 2018 - Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore - AILC: Study Days on Chinese Linguistics (V) - Presentation: On sentence-initial new and indefinite NPs: redefining cognitive restrictions to topic position in Mandarin
• 2018 - The University of Hong Kong - 汉语作为第五语言研究国际研讨会 5th Int. Conference on Chinese as a Second Language Research (CASLAR-5)  Presentation: Topic and subject in Mandarin and in the languages of Europe: comparative remarks and implications for CSL/CFL teaching. (with G. F. Arcodia and B. Basciano)
• 2017 - University l’Orientale, Naples - Study Days on Chinese Linguistics (IV) Presentation: Information Structure in Mandarin Chinese: linguistic functions and restrictions
• 2016 - University of Roma Tre - Study Days on Chinese Linguistics (III) - Presentation: Remarks on subject-object asymmetries and grammatical relations in Chinese
• 2016 - Porquerolles, France - European Summer School in Linguistic Typology, Student Presentation 
• Presentation: Subjecthood tests and subject-object asymmetries in Mandarin
• 2016 - The University of Sydney - SCSS Sydney China Studies Student Society Seminar Series - Presentation: How Mandarin encodes event participants: S-O asymmetries and grammatical relations
• 2015 - Università degli Studi di Milano - Study Days on Chinese Linguistics (II)  Presentation: Argument structure, event structure, and sentence structure in Mandarin Chinese
• 2015 - Northumbria University, UK - International Cognitive Linguistics Conference (ICLC13) - Presentation: Cognitive-functional principles shaping linear order in Chinese: a new perspective
• 2014 - Ca’Foscari University of Venice - Study Days on Chinese Linguistics (I) Presentation: Cognitive linguistics: new approaches in the description of word order in Mandarin
• 2014 - University of Parma 汉语作为第三语言研究国际研讨会 3rd Int. Conference on Chinese as a Second Language Research (CASLAR-2) - Presentation: Word order and discourse in Chinese as a Second Language Acquisition

Invited lectures

• 2024 –ICAART (16th International Conference on Agents and Artificial Intelligence), 24 March: Invited speaker in the opening session of the conference "Large Language Models and Artificial Consciousness". Presentation title: The linguistics of cognition: frames, foregrounds, and foci.
• 2020, October; VIU, MUHAI (“Meaning and Understanding in Human-centric AI”, project funded by the EU), Kick-off meeting “Handling multilingual language sources: how languages craft meaningful forms and how we make sense of language”
• 2019 School of Languages and Cultures, the University of Sydney
• 2019 (5 November)  “Syntax in translation – a focus on Asian languages”
• 2019 (20 November) “Translation theory and practice: teaching strategies, CAT tools, and AI”

Organisation of National and International conferences

• With Bianca Basciano and Giorgio F. Arcodia: Organisation of the Lecture Series in Chinese Linguistics (2 series, A.A. 2020-21.)
• Lecture series 1: Chinese languages: history, typology and contact. Invited speakers: Hilary Chappell, EHESS – CRLAO; Alain Peyraube, EHESS – CRLAO; Christoph Anderl, University of Ghent; Luisa Paternicò, University of Naples “L’Orientale”.
• Lecture series 2: Focus on Syntax. Invited speakers: Hongyin Tao University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Zhuo Jing-Schmidt University of Oregon, One-Soon Her National Cheng Chi University, Taiwan, Barbara Meisterernst, National Tsing Hua University, Taiwan
• Local chair of the Eighteenth International Conference on New Directions in the Humanities (Venice, July 2020) https://thehumanities.com/2020-conference
• Organiser of the EUROPEANA SPACE Opening Conference (Venice, 15-17 October 2014) European Union Project www.europeana-space.eu “Digital Cultural Content Re-imagined: New Avenues for the Economy and Society”.
• Organiser of the DEF Forum (Venice, 9 May 2013) in collaboration with the US Embassy in Italy.

Prizes and Awards
•     2018 Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Seal of Excellence (https://ec.europa.eu/research/soe/index.cfm)

•     2018 Selected as Valedictorian at Ca’Foscari University of Venice

•     2010 Campus Mentis Award for best graduates under 29 years of age, Italian Council of Ministers   

•     2010 Awarded with first class honours for MA thesis defence

•     2007 International Chinese Bridge Proficiency Competition for Foreign College Students: 3rd prize

•     2007 Awarded with first class honours for BA thesis defence

•     2004 Rotary Club Prize for best high school thesis

Funding and scholarships

•     2019 - OVERSEAS Grant for Visiting Professors towards 2 months at the School of Languages and Cultures, The University of Sydney

•     2018 - Zhuanglin Hu Scholarship, The University of Sydney

•     2017-2018 - China Studies Centre Support Grant, the University of Sydney (2 rounds)

•     2016- Endeavour Research Fellowship, Australian Government

•     2015-2017 - Postgraduate Research Support Scheme (PRSS), the University of Sydney (3 rounds)

•     2015-2017 - FASS Doctoral Travel Grant Scholarship, the University of Sydney (3 rounds)

•     2015-2016 - Overseas Scholarship, the European Union (2 rounds)

•     2011-2014 - Research Fellow Grant (3 years), Ca’Foscari University of Venice

•     2009 - ERASMUS Scholarship, European Union for a research period at Ludwig Maximilian University, München

•     2008 - Foundation Scholarship towards a semester at Shaanxi Normal University, Xian, China

•     2007- Chinese Bridge Scholarship, Chinese Ministry of Education - course at Beijing Language and Culture University

•     2004 - Scholarship by Credito Trevigiano, BCC Bank (3 rounds)

Participation in industrial innovation

• 2020 – MUHAI | Meaning and Understanding in Human-centric AI https://www.univiu.org/focus-areas/science-communication-and-education/muhai-project#
• 2016 - Development of Innovative NLU (Natural Language Understanding) technology. Research project between the University of Sydney’s Linguistics and IT departments and PAT Inc. (a start-up offering Natural Language Understanding API technology) Researcher and expert in linguistics and Mandarin for the development of the technology, and in meeting/pitching with potential investors (e.g. Baidu 百度)

Institutional responsibilities
 

2023-current: Member of the board of the LICSAAM BA Programme

2021-current: Member of the PhD Committe of the doctoral program in Asian and African Studies,

2019-current: Responsabile formazione linguistica (Responsible for Chinese langugage instruction), Dept. of Asian and North African studies, Ca’Foscari University of Venice

2019-current: Direttore responsabile (Editor in chief) Journal: Annali di Ca’ Foscari Serie orientale

2016-current: Reviewer

• Journal of Linguistics
• Routledge Handbook of Chinese Discourse Analysis
• Proceedings of the Role and Reference Grammar (RRG) Conference
• Journal of Cognitive Linguistic Studies

2014-2015: Confucius Institute at Ca’Foscari University of Venice; Responsible for Confucius Classes and teaching activities

2011-2013: Project management – University strategic projects related to innovation and internationalization.