Final stress on Portuguese words

• Grant number: 06/03038-5
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: September 01, 2006
• End date: December 31, 2008
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Linguistics - Linguistic Theory and Analysis
• Principal Investigator: Gabriel Antunes de Araujo
• Grantee: Ana Lívia dos Santos Agostinho
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil

Abstract

This project consists in the analysis of the final stress in Portuguese supported by a statistical research. Since there are thousands of final stress words in this language and many of them are borrowed, the goal of this research is to determinate the origin of these words, once there were no final stress in Latin. Therefore, the analysis will be done considering the original language and the date of entrance (according to the etymological Houaiss dictionary). Furthermore, this project intends to investigate if the word was final stressed in its original language and to describe the eventual phonological processes underwent in the borrowing process as well as to assess the value of the final vowel.