Euphemisms and dysphemisms in The old man of the orchard (1512), by Gil Vicente: an analysis out in the light of Historical Sociolinguistics

Abstract

This work is the result of research carried out in the light of Historical Sociolinguistics (Faraco, 2005; Sousa's Passion, 2006; Count Silvestre, 2007; Mattos and Silva, 2008; Romaine, 2009; Meillet, 2016), in which we studied euphemisms and dysphemisms based on two corpora, the play O velho da horta (The old man of the orchard) by Gil Vicente, a representative text of the 16th century, and monolingual dictionaries of the Portuguese language, from the 18th to the 21st centuries. The analysis was based on the perspective of linguistic change through euphemistic and dysphemistic processes. We discuss the concept of euphemism and dysphemism, as well as the relationship between euphemism and synonym, euphemism and taboo, euphemism and political correctness, and the views of other scholars over time. In the dictionaries, we checked the etymology, entries, prototypical meaning, structure, grammatical classification, meanings and usage marks that characterize the words consulted. In the play, we analyzed linguistic and extralinguistic variables and found that dysphemisms occur more frequently than euphemisms. Regarding the variable euphemisms, we found the following results: male characters, age group III are the ones who use euphemisms the most; similarly, male characters, age group III lead in the creation of euphemistic processes with the variable stylistic field; the analysis of the variable semantic field shows that euphemisms of the field rejection of old age/delicacy occur more frequently among female characters, age group I. In the analysis of the variable dysphemisms, we obtained the following results: contrary to what happens with euphemisms, female characters are the ones who use dysphemisms the most; the analysis of the dysphemistic processes category showed that characters in age group III create a greater number of dysphemisms through linguistic deformation; the amount of the mechanism (deformation) was equal between male and female characters, age group III. In the observation of the semantic field variable, the category offense leads among women. The study of euphemisms and dysphemisms in The old man of the orchard (1512) referred us to a socio-historical context in which an old and current theme predominates among the characters, old age and its ramifications, rejection, caducity and proximity to death.