Formation, processing and lexical access of blends and compounds in European Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese

• Grant number: 18/26571-8
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research
• Start date: March 03, 2019
• End date: May 19, 2019
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Linguistics - Linguistic Theory and Analysis
• Principal Investigator: Rafael Dias Minussi
• Grantee: Rafael Dias Minussi
• Host Investigator: Alina Maria Santos Martires Villalva
• Host Institution: Escola de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (EFLCH). Universidade Federal de São Paulo (UNIFESP). Campus Guarulhos. Guarulhos , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Universidade de Lisboa, Portugal

Abstract

This project lies within the domain of studies on word formation, since two types of word formation processes are taken into consideration: blending (e.g., cantriz 'singer/actress'; chafé 'tea/coffee', lit. "weak coffee") and compounding (e.g., cantora-atriz 'singer/actress'; guarda-roupa 'wardrobe', lit. 'keep-clothes'). Compounding is a widely studied process in the literature and it is basically defined as the merging of two bases or roots (cf. VILLALVA e GONÇALVES, 2016). On the other hand, blending is a non-concatenative process, usually considered as a marginal type of word formation process (cf. GONÇALVES, 2006). Our main objective is to discuss the structure of the blends in comparison to the structure of the compounds, since some authors now bring these two processes together (see KUBOZONO (1989) and SANDMANN (1990, 1991)) and sometimes distance them (PIÑEROS ), GONÇALVES (2003a, 2003b)). Our preliminary hypothesis is that compounds and blends have different structures. In order to verify this hypothesis and add to the theoretical discussion we intend to test the processing of blends and compounds and investigate whether there are significant differences between them, or if they behave in a similar fashion.