Non-canonical order in the complement of considerar: just a case of heavy DP shift?

Abstract

The object of this squib is the complement of the verb considerar ('to consider') in Brazilian Portuguese (BP). We are interested in the reduced sentence complement (without a verb) with phrases in non-canonical order, in which the phrase that denotes a property precedes the one that refers to someone/something judged as its bearer. We question whether this order arises exclusively from the phenomenon of heavy determiner phrase (DP) shift. From the formal literature, we brought parameters to measure weight and compared the behaviors of English and BP, establishing the interlinguistic scope of available explanations. Furthermore, the BP data were described considering pragmatic functions and comparing the complement in its reduced and extended versions (with a verb). We analyzed 28 data: 7 from English, extracted from the literature, and 21 from BP, collected from the literature, from the platforms X and O Pensador or created by the author. We conclude that extension, syntactic nodes and complex relations or modifications of the nucleus of a syntagm are parameters of weight that influence the non-canonical ordering of the complement, but do not motivate it exclusively. We argue that certain compositions with two DPs have an alternative explanation available (raising of the predicate). However, some of the ones that start with an adjectival syntagm and end with a DP do not fit this explanation either, indicating varied non-canonical formations.