Sentenças impessoais do português brasileiro

Abstract

In this article, we highlight key properties of different types of impersonal sentences in Brazilian Portuguese, including impersonals with clitic ‘se’, impersonals with personal pronouns, such as ‘a gente’ (we) and ‘você’ (you), impersonals with 3rd person plural verbs, and, finally, impersonals with 3rd person singular verbs. We show key characteristics of each impersonal type with respect to the possible readings of impersonal subjects, such as generic and existential readings; the phi-specification of these pronouns and the combinations of tense and aspect licensed in each impersonal sentence type. Regarding the last type (impersonal sentences with 3 rd person singular verbs), we relate the characteristics of these impersonal sentences to syntactic changes that have been occurring in BP, showing that null impersonal pronouns differ from null personal pronouns. Hence, those two types of pronouns cannot be treated in the same way.