Verbal alternation in conditional constructions: a sociolinguistic study of paulista speech

Abstract

This project proposes a study on a phenomenon already present in Portuguese for a long time, although not too much studied, especially in 'Paulista' variety: the alternation between the conditional and the indicative imperfect in their simple forms (compraria/comprava) and their periphrastic forms (teria comprador/ia comprar) in hypothetical conditional clauses. It is what is seen in examples as "é porque o MEU acesso é discado... que se fosse é:: de Speedy de via rádio era mais rápido..." (AC-117; RP: L.351-352) and "e eu comentei quando a equipe que chegô(u) com as meninas lá dentro do quarto... que se eu tivesse::... infra-estrutu::ra né? que já trabalhasse tal eu levaria a J. embora..." (AC-118; NE: L.115-118). Such constructions will be studied in oral speech produced by inland 'Paulista' speakers; the corpus comes from the data base of the Project "Amostra Linguística do Interior Paulista" (ALIP). The study aims to analyze linguistic factors - as verbal form, clause position (se A,B; B se A), grammatical person, localization of the events in time (retrospective or prospective reading), and extralinguistic factors (age, sex/genre, education level, type of text) that could explain the verbal alternation phenomenon. The theoretical and methodological grouding includes the approach of the Variationist Sociolinguistics (WEINREICH, LABOV, HERZOG, 2006 [1968]; LABOV, 2008 [1972]), the concept of 'norm' (COSERIU, 1979; MATTOS; SILVA, 1995; FARACO, 2008; CAMACHO, 2013) and the understanding of the role of style on the variation processes (ECKERT; RICKFORD, 2001; BIBER, 1986, 1988; BIBER; FINEGAN, 1989; BIBER; CONRAD 2009).