On Indefinite Subject in Brazilian Web-Mediated Specialized Discourse

The present research, based on a corpus of Web-mediated Talk Videos (Academic Talk Videos and TEDx Talks), illustrates the representation of subjects with indefinite reference in Brazilian Portuguese (BP). Recent studies have demonstrated a preference for nominative pronominal forms to express generic and arbitrary reference, particularly in finite sentences of both educated urban speech and popular speech. This study, grounded in the theory of language change proposed by Weinreich, Labov, and Herzog (2006), combined with the theory of Principles and Parameters (Chomsky 1981, 1995), aims to investigate subject indefiniteness strategies in specialized web-mediated speech, using two corpora: an Academic Talk Videos corpus (semi-popularizing talks) and a TEDx Talks corpus (popularizing talks). Our main hypothesis is that, depending on the corpus, we should observe a more conservative grammar, with a preference for standard strategies, in the Academic Talk Videos corpus [-popularizing], [+monitored] and [+formal], and a less conservative grammar, with a preference for innovative strategies, in the TEDx Talks corpus [+popularizing], [-monitored], and [-formal].