Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-vdxz6 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-29T01:14:50.908Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Variable past participles in Portuguese perfect constructions

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 May 2019

Scott A. Schwenter ,
Mark Hoff ,
Eleni Christodulelis ,
Chelsea Pflum  and
Ashlee Dauphinais
Scott A. Schwenter
Affiliation:
The Ohio State University
Mark Hoff
Affiliation:
The Ohio State University
Eleni Christodulelis
Affiliation:
The Ohio State University
Chelsea Pflum
Affiliation:
The Ohio State University
Ashlee Dauphinais
Affiliation:
The Ohio State University
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Some Portuguese verbs have two past participle forms: one regular (stem + -do), and the other irregular (often identical to the first person singular present indicative). Per grammars, the perfect auxiliaries ter/haver take regulars, while irregulars appear with passive/adjectival ser/estar. To test these claims, we analyzed naturally-occurring data from Brazil (twentieth century) and Portugal (nineteenth and twentieth). We coded 1077 tokens from 21 verbs for ten predictors and performed mixed-effects logistic regressions in R. Irregulars appear with ter/haver 54% overall and in 68% of cases from Portugal. Our results demonstrate that past participle choice is determined by the interaction of several linguistic factors. While lexical verb is the most significant predictor of participle selection, verbs with irregular participles identical to the first person singular present indicative occur in the irregular significantly more than other verbs. We conclude that analogical processes underpin the variation. This conclusion allows us to adjudicate between competing accounts of past participle choice in Portuguese.

Type
Research Article
Information
Language Variation and Change , Volume 31 , Issue 1 , March 2019 , pp. 69 - 89
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

We are grateful to the other participants in Scott Schwenter's Portuguese 5611 class at The Ohio State University in Spring 2016 for their invaluable help on this project. Thanks as well to the audiences at NWAV 45 in Vancouver (2016) and ICLaVE 9 in Málaga (2017), and to Patrícia Amaral, Ana Carvalho, Janayna Carvalho, Luana Lamberti, Lachlan Mackenzie, Marie-Eve Ritz, Malte Rosemeyer, Kim Schulte, Nigel Vincent, and three anonymous LVC reviewers for helpful feedback.

References

REFERENCES

Albright, Adam. (2009). Modeling analogy as probabilistic grammar. In Blevins, J. P. & Blevins, J. (eds.), Analogy in grammar: form and acquisition, 185–213. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Baayen, Harald, Davidson, Doug, & Bates, Douglas. (2008). Mixed-effects modeling with crossed random effects for subjects and items. Journal of Memory and Language 59:390–412.Google Scholar
Bagno, Marcos & Casseb-Galvão, Vânia Cristina. (2016). Hipercorreção e analogia: o caso dos particípios passados. In Rios de Oliveira, M. & Cezario, M. M. (eds.), Funcionalismo linguístico: diálogos e vertentes, 141–156. Niterói: Eduff.Google Scholar
Bates, Douglas. (2010). lme4: Mixed-effects modeling with R. Unpublished manuscript.Google Scholar
Bates, Douglas, Maechler, Martin, Bolker, Ben, & Walker, Steve. (2015). Fitting linear mixed-effects models using lme4. Journal of Statistical Software 67,1:1–48.Google Scholar
Bechara, Evanildo. (2006). Moderna gramática portuguesa, 37a edição. Rio de Janeiro: Editora Lucerna.Google Scholar
Berko Gleason, Jean. (1958). The child's learning of English morphology. Word 14,2–3:150–177.Google Scholar
Bybee, Joan. (2010). Language, usage and cognition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Bybee, Joan. (2015). Language change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Carvalho, Orlene Lúcia & Bagno, Marcos. (2015). Gramática brasileña para hablantes de español. São Paulo: Parábola Editorial.Google Scholar
Chagas de Souza, Paulo. (2007). Athematic participles in Brazilian Portuguese: a syncretism in the making. Acta Linguistica Hungarica 54:119–128.Google Scholar
Chagas de Souza, Paulo. (2011). Particípios atemáticos no Português Brasileiro - um processo paradigmático. ReVEL, special edition 5.Google Scholar
Chagas de Souza, Paulo. (2015). Particípios atemáticos do Português Brasileiro: paradigmas, sincretismo e diacronia. In Alves, I. M. & Ribeiro de Jesus, A. M. (eds.), Os estudos lexicais em diferentes perspectivas, vol. 5, 29–58. São Paulo: Universidade de São Paulo.Google Scholar
Cunha, Celso & Cintra, Lindley. (2001). Nova gramática do português contemporâneo, terceira edição. Rio de Janeiro: Nova Fronteira.Google Scholar
Davies, Mark & Ferreira, Michael. (2006). Corpus do português: 45 million words, 1300s-1900s. http://www.corpusdoportugues.org.Google Scholar
Ganho, Ana Sofia & McGovern, Timothy. (2004). Using Portuguese: A guide to contemporary usage. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
James, Gareth, Witten, Daniela, Hastie, Trevor, & Tibshirani, Robert. 2013. An introduction to statistical learning with applications in R. New York: Springer.Google Scholar
Johnson, Daniel Ezra. (2009). Getting off the GoldVarb Standard: introducing Rbrul for mixed-effect variable rule analysis. Language and Linguistics Compass 3:359–383.Google Scholar
Lima, Carlos Henrique da Rocha. (1972). Gramática normativa da língua portuguesa. Rio de Janeiro: José Olympio.Google Scholar
Lobato, Lucia. (1999). Sobre a forma do particípio português e o estatuto dos traços formais. DELTA 15. Online at: http://www.scielo.br/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S0102-44501999000100005&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=pt#12not.Google Scholar
Mateus, Maria Helena Mira. (2003). Gramática da língua portuguesa. Lisbon: Editorial Caminho.Google Scholar
Mendes, Ronald Beline. (2005). Estar + gerúndio e Ter + particípio: Aspecto verbal e variação em português. PhD dissertation, UNICAMP.Google Scholar
Mendes, Ronald Beline. (2010). Aspectual periphrases and syntactic variation in Brazilian Portuguese. In Walker, J. A. (ed.), Aspect in grammatical variation. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. 27–47.Google Scholar
Miara, Fernanda Lima Jardim. (2013). Particípios duplos: Usos, desusos e alguns “intrusos.” MA thesis, Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina.Google Scholar
Móia, Telmo. 2004. Algumas áreas problemáticas para a normalização linguística–disparidades entre o uso e os instrumentos de normalização. Actos do XX Encontro Nacional da Associação Portuguesa de Linguística. Lisbon: APL. 109–125.Google Scholar
Nevins, Andrew. (2015). Productivity and Portuguese morphology: How experiments enable hypothesis-testing. In Aboh, E. O., Schaeffer, J. C., & Sleeman, P. (eds.), Romance Languages and Linguistic Theory 2013. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing Company. 175–201.Google Scholar
Nevins, Andrew & Rodrigues, Cilene. (2014). The L-syntax of athematic past participles: Evidence from wug experiments. Revista da ABRALIN 13:225–262.Google Scholar
Perini, Mário. (2002). Modern Portuguese: a reference grammar. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Perini, Mário. (2010). Gramática do português brasileiro. São Paulo: Parábola Editorial.Google Scholar
Poplack, Shana & Dion, Nathalie. (2009). Prescription vs. praxis: the evolution of future temporal reference in French. Language 85:557–587.Google Scholar
Poplack, Shana, Lealess, Allison, & Dion, Nathalie. (2013). The evolving grammar of the French subjunctive. Probus 25:139–196.Google Scholar
Poplack, Shana & Malvar, Elisabete. (2007). Elucidating the transition period in language change: The expression of the future in Brazilian Portuguese. Probus 19:121–169.Google Scholar
Powers, Michael D. (1985). Variação dos particípios duplos no português e as suas implicações pedagógicas. Hispania 68:412–417.Google Scholar
Prista, Alexander da R. (1966). Essential Portuguese grammar. Mineola, NY: Dover Publications.Google Scholar
Raposo, Eduardo Buzaglo Paiva, Bacelar do Nascimento, Maria Fernanda, Coelho da Mota, Maria Antónia, Segura, Luísa, & Mendes, Amália. (2013). Gramática do português I, volume II. Lisbon: Fundação Calouste Gulbenkian.Google Scholar
Said Ali, M. (1964). Gramática Histórica da Lingua Portuguesa, 5ª edição melhorada e aumentada. São Paulo: Ediçōes Melhoramento.Google Scholar
Said Ali, M. (2008). Dificuldades da Lingua Portuguesa: Estudos e observações, 7ª edição. Rio de Janiero: Biblioteca Nacional.Google Scholar
Scher, Ana Paula, Lunguinho, Marcus Vinicius, & Takahira, Aline Garcia Rodero. (2013). Innovative participles in Brazilian Portuguese. Revista LinguíStica 9,1:92–111.Google Scholar
Scher, Ana Paula, Lunguinho, Marcus Vinicius, & Takahira, Aline Garcia Rodero. (2014). Voice (a)symmetries and innovative participles in Brazilian Portuguese. Cadernos de Estudos Lingüísticos 56,1:45–64.Google Scholar
Simões, Antônio Roberto Monteiro. (2008). Pois não: Brazilian Portuguese Course for Spanish Speakers with Basic Reference Grammar. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press.Google Scholar
Tagliamonte, Sali. (2006). Analysing sociolinguistic variation. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Tagliamonte, Sali. (2011). Variationist sociolinguistics: change, interpretation, observation. Oxford: Basil Blackwell.Google Scholar
Tagliamonte, Sali, & Baayen, Harald. (2012). Models, forests, and trees of York English: Was/were variation as a case study for statistical practice. Language Variation and Change 24:135–178.Google Scholar
Teixeira da Silva, Inaciane. (2008). O uso do particípio em formações verbais no português do sul do Brasil. MA thesis, Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul.Google Scholar
Thomas, Amanda. (2018). Accounting for double past participle forms in Romance. MA thesis, University of Oxford.Google Scholar
Thomas, Earl. (1969). The syntax of spoken Brazilian Portuguese. Nashville, TN: Vanderbilt University Press.Google Scholar
Villalva, Alina & Almeida, Marta. (2004). Verbos abundantes: usos, desusos e alguns ‘abusos.’ Paper presented at the XX Encontro da Associação Portuguesa de Lingüística, Lisbon.Google Scholar