Topics of history of Portuguese from the perspective of grammaticalization

The aim of this paper is to discuss the basic concepts of the grammaticalization phenomenon, applying them to some change processes in the history of Portuguese. The didactic proposal is based on the most classic version of grammaticalization paradigm, discussing mainly the loss and acquisition of morphosyntactic properties in the recategorization processes. First, we present data that are recurrently used to discuss the phenomenon of grammaticalization (amarehabeo > amarei; noun mente > adverbial suffix). Then, we discuss other relevant phenomena in the history of Portuguese: the pronominalization of nominal expressions (gente ‘people” > a gente; Vossa Mercê > você) and the formation of conjunctions from adverbs. The analysis of the selected cases proves that the grammaticalization is not a process that can extinguish, not even during the chronologically later stages. The descriptions presented show that in the grammaticalization processes some original properties will tend to survive in the new grammaticalized form. The identification of formal and semantic properties that persist in the lexical items/constructions helps us to understand some apparent common idiosyncrasies of grammatical categories coming from grammaticalization processes.