Investigando as formas reduzidas de a gente no dialeto mineiro

Abstract

The goal of this research is to study the grammaticalization of the form a gente in Brazilian Portuguese, specifically in the Mineiro dialect, with a brief overview of the transition from the nominal to pronominal form, followed by the research of the current phase in the process.The proposal is that the occurrence of reduced formas of a gente acting as clitics is part of a general trend of syntactic changes related to the reorganization of the pronominal system in terms of fill in the position of the DP subject, ie, the change of pro-drop language to the non pro-drop language (cf. Duarte, 1996).The theoretical support is the perspective of grammaticalization as a process, rooted in the formal approach (Chomsky, 1993, 1995), in articulation with contributions from other theoretical frameworks such as Labovian Sociolinguistics (Weinreich, Labov & Herzog, 1968; Labov, 1994), and Phonology (Albano, 1999; Abaurre & Galves, 1995; Bisol, 1992, Ladd, 1996).The analisis looked at two ways the form a gente can be used: reduced and plain forms. The results account for the process of cliticization of the pronominal form a gente.