Frontmatter -- Contents -- Introduction -- Diachronic research on address in Portuguese and Spanish -- Forms of address in the south-western Sprachbund of the Iberian Peninsula -- Forms of address from the Ibero-Romance perspective -- Variation and change in the second person singular pronouns tu and vocãe in Santa Catarina (Brazil) -- Forms of address in Säao Paulo -- Variation in the paradigms of tu and vocãe -- Retracing the historical evolution of the Portuguese address pronoun vocãe using synchronic variationist data -- The loss of vosotros in American Spanish -- Vuestra atenciâon, por favor 'your attention, please'. Some remarks on the usage and history of plural vuestro/a in Cusco Spanish (Peru) -- Prescriptive and descriptive norms in second person singular forms of address in Argentinean Spanish -- Addressing in two presidential election debates in Mexico (1994 and 2012) -- The European roots of the present-day Americanism su merced -- Linguistic change and social transformation

The volume provides the first systematic comparative approach to the history of forms of address in Portuguese and Spanish, in their European and American varieties. Both languages share a common history--e.g., the personal union of Philipp II of Spain and Philipp I of Portugal; the parallel colonization of the Americas by Portugal and Spain; the long-term transformation from a feudal to a democratic system--in which crucial moments in the diachrony of address took place. To give one example, empirical data show that the puzzling late spread of Sp. usted 'you (formal, polite)' and Pt. vocãe 'you' across America can be explained for both languages by the role of the political and military colonial administration. To explore these new insights, the volume relies on an innovative methodology, as it links traditional downstream diachrony with upstream diachronic reconstruction based on synchronic variation. Including theoretical reflections as well as fine-grained empirical studies, it brings together the most relevant authors in the field.

funded by FWF

In English.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 25. Nov 2020).

Includes bibliographical references and index.