Ordem de palavras em exclamativas com demonstrativos em Português Europeu

Abstract

This paper focuses on the study of the syntactic position filled by the demonstrative determiner (este, esse, aquele) in nominal wh- exclamative sentences in European Portuguese (EP) like ‘Que menina esta!’. We draw on works on Spanish and Catalan (Castroviejo Miró 2006 a,b; Alonso Cortés 1999) and develop a hypothesis capable of explaining why the demonstrative in EP can occupy such a position, which apparently is a post-nominal one. We defend the hypothesis that in this type of exclamative the post-nominal position of the demonstrative is the result of an elliptical predicative clause. In order to understand the position of the demonstrative, we also analyse the structures of wh-exclamatives, of predicative clauses and of degree phrases.