In this paper we discuss the phenomenon of subject topics, consisting of the movement of either a genitive or a locative constituent into subject position in Brazilian Portuguese. This construction occurs with different verb classes, shows subject-verb agreement and precludes a resumptive pronoun. The goal of the present text is to account for its distribution. To do so, we argue that the two subclasses of unaccusative verbs found with genitive and locative topics instantiate some sort of secondary predication, and that only specific configurations allow for the movement of a constituent out of the argument structure domain. Finally, we address the comparative issue involved in explaining why the derivation of such a construction is not possible in European Portuguese

Several studies have observed that older Romance languages had more frequent object-verb order than their modern counterparts. This article explores the idea that contrast is crucial to understand the shift to verb-object order, as part of a more encompassing notion of boundedness, which has been frequently associated with the V2 parameter. To do so, we first show that some fronting constructions involving demonstratives were available in Old and Classical Portuguese, but not in Modern Portuguese, as a consequence of the existence of a KP projection hosting contrastive items of different sorts acting as delimitators. Second, we present some changes between Old and Classical Portuguese: (i) a decrease in fronted objects with demonstratives; (ii) an increase in the frequency of null subjects; and (iii) a small decrease in the frequency of frame setters. We propose that these shifts are to be attributed to an information-structural change correlated with a syntactic change concerning the position of complementizers and verb movement in subordinate clauses. To wit, while Old Portuguese was a symmetrical relaxed C-V2 language, Classical Portuguese was an asymmetrical one, which is reflected in terms of a reduced left periphery of subordinate clauses in the latter, in which KP cannot be projected. The article presents some implications of this account for the derivation of basic word order patterns and of clitic interpolation in Old Portuguese and for the loss of V2 in the history of Portuguese. These results suggest that the connection between boundedness, contrast and V2 grammars can be profitably explored in Old Romance languages.

This article investigates the loss of aboutness topics in preverbal position in the history of French, using a corpus-based research on preverbal accusative objects. A comparison of Old and Middle French with Modern French reveals that new-information focalization had disappeared by the 14^thcentury, whereas aboutness topicalization had in turn vanished by the end of the 16^thcentury, along with other marked constructions. Combined with the generative premise that independent pragmatic factors should not trigger syntactic change, the results of this study suggest the reanalysis of the grammar as V-to-I in Renaissance French is responsible for blocking the derivation of aboutness topicalization. An alternative proposal based on phase extension and on Relativized Minimality, in a version affecting some types of A′-movement, relates those two diachronic shifts. The article concludes with the idea that the study of marked constructions may be recast as offering diagnostics on broader syntactic changes.

Previous studies have reported that clitic interpolation and clitic climbing change according to three stages in the history of European Portuguese. In this paper we develop the idea that these phenomena are deeply intertwined in the diachrony of Portuguese once they are related through the notion “clitic position” and reflect a general strategy for clitics to stay outside the focus domain of the clause. In order to provide a unified explanation for interpolation and climbing, we follow a quantitative methodology using the Tycho Brahe Corpus of Historical Portuguese. Moreover, developing some ideas about the Force-Fin system, in the Generative Grammar framework, we put forward a formal approach to the diachronic change having taken place between Old Portuguese and Classical Portuguese. Considering that clitic position reflects the category hosting the clitic, we argue that the availability of XP interpolation and of obligatory clitic climbing in Old Portuguese are different consequences of more basic structural principles, such as the V-to-Fin movement, which is dependent on the role of left-peripheral elements in the Old Portuguese grammar. Therefore the clitic could occur either in Force or in Fin, in order to mark the relative presuppositional nature of clitics with respect to different left-peripheral elements. In Classical Portuguese, we defend that XP interpolation paved the way for Neg interpolation because of the loss of V-to-Fin movement in embedded contexts; by then clitic climbing started to reflect a number of criteria related to topicality. Finally, in Modern European Portuguese, the gradual loss of Neg interpolation and the marked status of clitic climbing can be seen as further consequences of the loss of V-to-Fin movement.

This text analyses the here dubbed D-construction in Galician and European Portuguese, composed of a determiner phrase (DP) followed by a demonstrative pronoun and a main clause. This quite unexplored contruction is described as a strategy to promote a referent into the sentence topic and at the same time contrasting it to other salient members of a partially ordered set, by means of the analysis of its pragmatic and prosodic aspects. An existing analysis supposing an appositive role for the demonstrative is argued against, thus strengthening the idea that DP and demonstrative do not form a single constituent. By means of a series of intuition tests, the D-construction is characterised as an instance of Hanging Topic Left Dislocation of a kind found in Germanic languages. Finally, a unified account is put forward for Galician and Portuguese, whenever the structure includes a coreferent clitic in the main clause. In this case the DP is assigned a position in a Frame projection (FrameP), whereas the demonstrative is a base-generated topic in the left periphery, connected to the clitic by long-distance agreement. In European Portuguese, where the structure may also occur without a resumptive clitic, the demonstrative can move into Spec,IP. Either of these are the first part of the derivation, respectively identical to Clitic Left Dislocation or Topicalisation. The paper concludes that the D-construction must be considered a marked syntactic construction on its own terms, and considers some possible themes for future research.

Este artigo avalia a questão da emergência das clivadas reduzidas no português brasileiro, a partir de uma análise dos contextos em tal construção ocorre. Para tanto, desenvolve uma argumentação com base na Teoria da Representação do Discurso Segmentado (SDRT), por meio da comparação do seu uso textual face àquele das clivadas canônicas e invertidas, num corpus de entrevistas televisivas. Esses dois últimos tipos apresentam contextos de uso distintos em termos de Relações Retóricas, que consideramos reflexos da distinção informacional entre clivadas com foco acentuado e clivadas com pressuposição informativa. As clivadas reduzidas foram encontradas exatamente nos mesmos contextos que as clivadas canônicas, o que permite concluir que estas conformam a estrutura a partir da qual a construção inovadora foi gerada. Isso é compatível com a possibilidade de as clivadas reduzidas serem o resultado de um processo de gramaticalização, a ser explorado em maior detalhe em trabalho futuro.