ACCESSING THE SOCIAL MEANING OF PALATALIZATION /t, d/

Abstract

When considering language as an inherently variable system, the Theory of Variation and Change (WEINREICH; LABOV; HERZOG, 2006 [1968]) postulates that linguistic variants have the same referential meaning but tend to have different social meanings. These meanings can be associated with positive, negative or neutral values ​​in the community. In this study, we measured the social meanings associated with the palatalization process / t, d / by university students from agreste Alagoas, based on six parameters of social judgment: perception of variation in the city where they live, belief about their own linguistic use, evaluation of variation, perception of use regarding diatopic variation, regarding schooling and regarding linguistic prejudice. We adopted a direct approach (GARRET; COUPLAND; WILLIAMS, 2003) through a questionnaire of linguistic beliefs and attitudes, which was applied to 102 university students. The data show that the students' perception is sensitive to the linguistic context, revealing that, for regressive palatalization, there is a positive evaluation, indicating that it is a positive stereotype, whereas, for progressive palatalization, there is a negative evaluation, indicating a case negative stereotype in the community.