Abstract

BARROSO, Henrique. <ROMPER A + INFINITIVE> IN EUROPEAN PORTUGUESE. Lingüística [online]. 2023, vol.39, n.2, pp.131-143.  Epub Oct 18, 2023. ISSN 2079-312X.  https://doi.org/10.5935/2079-312x.20230021.

<Romper a + infinitive> is a construction that focuses on the ‘beginning’ of the situation denoted by the predicate whose core is the infinitive form of the verb. However, the ‘inceptive’, his value, is not exclusive to it. In fact, and just to mention a few, começar a, pôr-se a, largar a + infinitive are constructions that also share it. Therefore, it is the aim of this study to investigate their specificities, to which – based on a corpus consisting of authentic linguistic material, collected almost exclusively from literary texts of the 20th century – I will put forth several arguments, both structurally and syntactic-semantic nature.

Among the specificities (basically, results and/or conclusions), the addition of the meaning 'suddenly and/or abruptly' to 'inceptive' and the exclusive cooccurrence with predicates that denote dynamic situations, with a clear predominance of those belonging to the semantic field of “emission of human sounds” stand out.

Keywords : <Romper a + infinitive>; verbal periphrasis; semi-auxiliary verb; inceptive + ‘abruptly and/or suddenly’; european portuguese.

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