Cross-Linguistic Variation in the Meaning of Temporal Clauses

• Grant number: 24/03115-8
• Support Opportunities: Regular Research Grants
• Start date: July 01, 2025
• End date: June 30, 2027
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Linguistics - Linguistic Theory and Analysis
• Principal Investigator: Ana Lucia de Paula Muller
• Grantee: Ana Lucia de Paula Muller
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated researchers: Luiz Fernando Ferreira ; Marta Donazzan

Abstract

This project has at is background the debate on the expression of the notion of time by the grammar of human languages, its possible universals and its parameters of variation. Within this background we focus on the semantics of complex sentences with embedded temporal adverbial clauses. We make use of a methodology which applies the tools of formal semantics to an in depth analysis of the phenomenon in Brazilian Portuguese (Romance) and in Karitiana (Tupi). The analysis will later be included in the debate about cross-linguistic variation on the phenomenon. The project specifically tackles the issues of how Brazilian Portuguese and Karitiana express the notion of time through temporal adverbial clauses, and of how these clauses fit into a general typology of the semantics of adverbial clauses. The project aims at contributing to the broadening of the cross-linguistic picture on the expression of anteriority, simultaneity and posteriority relations between the events of the subordinate clauses and of their matrix. (AU)