Cognitive linguistics seminar
Speaker: Raissa (University of Edinburgh)
Title: A diachronic analysis of some microconstructions of the [V + AA] subschema in Brazilian Portuguese
Abstract: This research is diachronic analysis of some micoconstructions in Brazilian Portuguese from the subschema [V AA] : [falar alto], [bater forte], [pagar caro], [fazer bonito], [fazer feio], [pegar leve], [pegar pesado] and [dar certo] . All the microconstructions here presented consist of a verb being modified by an adjective and consist of chunks, which means they are understood as one cognitive piece and could not be analyzed as individual items. Our main goal is to understand the process behind the constructionalization (Traugott and Trousdale, 2013) of these constructions that lead to the upbringing of these more metaphorical expressions, that are different from other [V AA] constructions in which the adjective is modifying the verb in its prototypical meaning.
To study this phenomenon in Brazilian Portuguese, we rely on the theoretical approach of the Usage-Based Construction Grammar and we have been collecting data from the Corpus do Português in two different tabs: genre/historical and web dialects. We’ll also be analyzing some formal and discursive-pragmatic factors such as: the presence of intervenient elements, the items occurring as subject and objects of the sentences in which this microconstructions occur, the information structure of the micrconstructions, the genre/discursive domain in which the constructs of these constructions occur, the transitivity of the verbs and the level of compositionality and analyzability of the constructions. This research is still in progress and we will be presenting only preliminary findings.
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Cognitive linguistics seminar
Room G26, Psychology Building, 7 George Square, Edinburgh, EH8 9JZ