This handbook brings together in a single volume detailed accounts of all facets of the Italian language from a wide range of perspectives. Data from Italian have always been prominent in the linguistic literature, thanks to the language's richly documented diachronic and synchronic variation. This perennially fertile yet still under-explored testing ground has a central role to play in challenging linguistic orthodoxies and shaping and informing new ideas and perspectives about language change, structure, and variation.

The volume is divided into six parts that explore, respectively: the making of Italian, historical changes, structures of Italian, sociolinguistics of Italian, Italian outside of Italy, and Italian in contact. The data and analyses featured across the chapters demonstrate that our knowledge and understanding of many fields of linguistics continue to be enhanced through the study of Italian. This handbook will therefore be a valuable resource not only for Italianists and Romance linguists, but also for general linguists - undergraduate and graduate students and established scholars - interested in the insights that Italian has to offer