Glimpses of a different word formation grammar under way in Brazilian Portuguese

Abstract

Over the past four decades, comparative studies have shown that Brazilian Portuguese (BP) has diverged significantly from European Portuguese (EP), especially in its inflectional system and other paradigmatic domains, such as the system of personal pronouns. This divergence, often associated with structural changes like the reconfiguration of the pro-drop parameter, raises the question of whether similar developments have occurred in BP’s word formation grammar. This article addresses this issue by examining three classes of word formation phenomena that either vary from or innovate upon patterns found in EP. These are: (i) category-changing derivatives, viz. parasynthetic verbalizations and nominalizations with -ção and -ada; (ii) non-category-changing derivatives, exemplified by clipped participles; and (iii) nominal compounding. We consider whether the observed variation reflects competition between structurally equivalent forms across the two varieties or instead reveals deeper changes in morphemic distribution and structure. Our analysis draws on empirical data from popular BP, thus avoiding distortions introduced by prescriptive grammars. By focusing on naturally occurring usage, we aim to uncover genuine synchronic shifts and better assess the degree to which BP’s word formation system has been affected by the broader morphological restructuring already observed in other grammatical domains.