SANTOS, A. S.; http://lattes.cnpq.br/6713198420148002; SANTOS, Aymmée Silveira.
Abstract:
The speakers of each and every language, use many strategies to ensure efficiency and
effectiveness in its communication process. Among these strategies, there is the use of
certain words in linguistic contexts which are not in accordance to their origin, it favors
the language change. These changes are the so called phenomena of lexicalization and
grammaticalization. The latter, the focus of our research, transforms the lexical items
into grammatical instruments. In this direction, this work aims at studying the process of
grammaticalization of the Brazilian linguistic items pronto and (em)bora, very recurring
in the speech of the Paraíba‟s – a Brazilian state – people. For that, audio recordings
were made from some informal conversations among 25 (twenty-five) people of
different gender, education levels and ages. The transcriptions of the data followed
conventions proposed by the Conversation Analysis and Phonetics. This study is
grounded on the studies of Functionalist Linguistics, and based on the theoretical
contributions of Givón (1979, 2012), Martelotta (2011) and Castilho (2010), among
other researchers on the topic. Current outcomes suggest us that the linguistic items
analyzed are being used with different meanings, causing change of the grammatical
class, and that the intonation in which they are pronounced contributes to identify each
meaning. In addition, we found that the people in this research are using the items
pronto and bora independently of any concerning factors, such as education level, age
and gender.
