Lexical analysis of the semantic field “children’s games and play” in data from the Linguistic Atlas of Amapá

Abstract

The present study aims to analyze the lexical variation in the semantic field of children's games and play in the Linguistic Atlas of Amapá (ALAP). The study is grounded in Pluridimensional Dialectology, using Modern Geolinguistics (which incorporates linguistic cartography and the principles of quantitative Sociolinguistics) (Cardoso, 2010). The research used lexical data that had already been collected by the ALAP team. In this sense, 40 informants participated in the research, distributed across 10 locations in Amapá, according to age group and gender. In the data analysis, we identified that only in items no. 138 - ferrolho, no. 139 - gangorra, and no. 136 - cabra-cega was there a lexical predominance different from standard variants of Brazilian Portuguese, respectively referred to by Amapaenses as mãe, balanço, and pata-cega. As for the other lexical items (pipa/arraia, pega-pega, and balanço), the names that remained most prevalent were standard variants of Brazilian Portuguese, that is, they were named by Amapaenses according to the names already listed in dictionaries. Consequently, the study identified a preference among the younger generation for standardized lexical units, whereas the childhood memories of older participants reflected the use of non-standard or non-dictionary terms, such as pata-cega and balanço.