STATUS SOCIOLINGUÍSTICO DO ALTEAMENTO DA VOGAL MÉDIA POSTERIOR TÔNICA NA VARIEDADE DO PORTUGUÊS MARAJOARA

This article intends to: i) study the recurrence of middle back vowels in stressed syllables in the variety of Portuguese spoken in the Mesoregion of Marajó; ii) examine the role of social variables gender, education and age in maintaining the phenomenon of heightening or erasing it. The theoretical-methodological assumptions of Variationist Sociolinguistics were used. The research universe consisted of the municipalities of Breves, Curralinho and Portel, located in the Marajó mesoregion. The methodological procedures included the application of an interview protocol to obtain data on the target variable – stressed back vowel – in the mold of Quantitative Sociolinguistic Research. 72 informants were interviewed, 24 by location and categorized into social variables: gender, age and education. Results of this study showed that the raising of the posterior mid vowel in stressed syllable is not a recurrent phenomenon among speakers in the investigated municipalities.