A STUDY OF THE IMPLEMENTATION OF SYNTACTIC CHANGES IN BRAZILIAN PORTUGUESE: THE ANALYSIS OF WRITTEN DATA

Diachronic studies have shown that the end of the 19th century is a period in which syntactic changes were implemented in Brazilian Portuguese (BP). Some of these studies were listed by Tarallo (1993), arguing that the end of the 19th century was the period that witnessed the emergence of BP grammar. We present the results of two other studies that share the same profile (CHAVES, 2006; MOREIRA, 2008), in which written samples were analysed, in order to show that the results can be interpreted in a different way. We argue that the changes evidenced by the written samples analysis had been implemented in a previous period. It is our assumption that the end of the 19th century is not the period that witnessed the emergence of BP grammar. This period corresponds to the massification of grammar in written language, since linguistic innovations manifest in written language when they are accepted in oral language by speakers.