The Orthographic (Dis)Agreement and the Portuguese Identity Threat
Published 2016-09-20
Copyright (c) 2016 Portuguese Literary and Cultural Studies

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Abstract
ABSTRACT: This article analyzes the Portuguese people’s opinion of the orthographic agreement recently implemented among the members of the Community of Portuguese-Speaking Countries. This agreement aims to make Portuguese orthography uniform. A survey was conducted about this issue in Portugal. Our hypothesis was that the Portuguese people would reject this agreement because it would be seen as an identity threat, a kind of submission by the former colonizer (Portugal) to the former colony (Brazil). As expected, the level of rejection of the agreement was very high. In this essay, the discourse of the rejection of the agreement and the kinds of motives invoked by Portuguese respondents are discussed, integrating the contributions of social representations theory.
KEYWORDS: orthographic agreement, identity threat, social representations