The Brazilian Dialect, a Romance Language in Diaspora?

Abstract

This article builds on reflections first presented in the talk entitled From the Língua Brasílica to the Língua Brasileira, a Romance Language in the Making? A Debate on Glottophobia and Linguistic Prejudice from the Perspective of Historical Linguistics, delivered during the Literature and Representations session at the event Abralin em Cena 18 – Languages, Race, Gender, and Intersectionality in the Struggle for Rights, held at the Darcy Ribeiro campus of the University of Brasília (UnB) in 2025, organized by the Brazilian Linguistics Association (ABRALIN). The reflections developed here are broadly connected to the project Anchietan Studies in the 21st Century and the International Decade of Indigenous Languages (UNESCO, 2022–2032): Interfaces Between Politics and Linguistic Historiography, carried out within the Graduate Program in Language Studies at the Fluminense Federal University, with funding from the Rio de Janeiro State Research Foundation (FAPERJ), through the Cientista do Nosso Estado grant. As an object of the discussions initiated by the aforementioned event, this article brings to contemporary debate the issue of linguistic-based discrimination currently experienced by the Brazilian community in Portugal, anchoring this discussion in a historical text on the subject: O Linguajar Carioca, by Antenor Nascentes (1922 [2023]).