The Theory of Functions in the Nova Grammatica Analytica da Lingua Portugueza (1881), by Charles Grivet (1816–1876)

Abstract

This paper, grounded in the Historiography of Linguistics, is an excerpt from a broader research project (Almeida, 2022) in which we analyze the syntactic approach of Charles Adrien Olivier Grivet (1816–1876) in his work Nova Grammatica Analytica da Lingua Portugueza (1881). Grivet is a grammarian who stands out for understanding syntax as functions performed by words and for placing the fact (the verb) at the center of syntactic relations. In this article, we focus our analysis on the theory of functions developed by the grammarian. We identify that Grivet does not intend to break with the grammatical tradition but instead develops an analytical model that diverges from the dominant grammatical thinking of his time. Thus, this research contributes to a better understanding of 19th-century syntactic thought, which still echoes in contemporary Portuguese grammars. To describe and interpret the author's thinking, our theoretical and methodological framework draws on the theoretical and analytical categories of metalinguistics (Koerner, 2014a) and influence (Koerner, 2014b).