Abstract
The aim of this paper is to show that Expansionen (‘expansions’), a category belonging to the grammar of spoken German, in addition to other functions described in previous studies (Salzmann 2017), can serve as intensifiers both in German and Italian. For this purpose, I will first define the concept of expansion and afterwards establish a definition of intensification that can be applied to the analysis of expansions. Intensification is considered as a phenomenon with both semantic and pragmatic aspects, which can be analysed at all levels of the speech act (locution, illocution and perlocution). The central part of this article is dedicated to the interpretation of various examples from a bilingual corpus of academic talks held at conferences.