Sândi vocálico externo à luz da sociolinguística variacionista: uma análise da fala da Baixada Fluminense/RJ

Abstract

This dissertation investigates the configuration of external vowel sandhi in the speech of the Baixada Fluminense region, situated within the theoretical framework of Sociolinguistics and Prosodic Phonology. The study aims to analyze the linguistic and social constraints governing the strategies of elision, diphthongization, and degemination. The research proceeds from the premise that variation at word junctures is not random, but rather a reflection of ordered heterogeneity, modulated by the interface between grammatical structure and social identity. Methodologically, the study utilizes data extracted from the Amostra Baixada, a corpus linked to the Program of Studies on Language Use (PEUL/UFRJ), consisting of native speakers from Baixada Fluminense— located in the metropolitan area of Rio de Janeiro—stratified by sex, age, and schooling. The results reveal that diphthongization acts as the majority norm in the community (55%), consolidating itself as the preferred variant for maintaining syllable structure in opposition to vernacular deletion. On the structural level, the investigation refuted the classic hypothesis that the Phonological Phrase would act as the primary regulatory domain; mixed-effects logistic regression modeling demonstrated that the apparent prosodic regularity was, to a large extent, an epiphenomenon of lexical frequency. Once lexicalization was controlled for, the grammar of sandhi revealed itself to be imperatively governed by segmental constraints, confirming a cycle of phonetic feeding: the integration of clitics to the host converts final vowels into functional pre-tonic vowels which, subject to the vowel raising characteristic of the region, transform into high vowels, providing the necessary articulatory base for the formation of glides and, consequently, for diphthongization. In the social realm, the sex/gender variable emerged as the determining vector of differentiation, with women significantly leading the segmental preservation of the structures involved in sandhi and driving the consolidation of diphthongization among younger generations, whereas men favor reduction via elision, associated with patterns of covert prestige. In this context, the importance of this research lies in ratifying external vowel sandhi as an eminently variable phenomenon, demonstrating that the alternation between its strategies is not random or purely mechanical, but constitutes a structured and systematic resource of the grammar of Brazilian Portuguese, sensitive to the competition between internal and external forces.