Visão solene da morte: uma análise da semântica global em epitáfios cristãos

Abstract

Considering Dominique Maingueneau’s (2021) concept of global semantics, this ar-ticle aims to observe the functioning of the Christian discursive formation in different discursive planes of epitaphs affiliated to such discursive formation. To do so, we adopted as corpus a sample of about 50 epitaphs collected at the Cemitério dos Inocentes, one of the oldest cemeteries in the city of Porto Velho, capital of Rondônia, state located in the Brazilian Amazon. We understand the Christian discourse as that which is essentially based on the belief that Jesus of Nazareth would be the “Christ”, the son of God prophesied in the ancient biblical scriptures, whose life and whose teachings are presented in the New Testament. We analyzed six planes of the global semantics of the statements of the sample – vocabulary, intertextuality, themes, typography, enunciative deixis and mode of enunciation. From this, it was possible to observe how a solemn vision of death, claimed by the discursive formation in question, functions in these different planes, being mainly associated with the conception of eternal life, which is central to Christianity.