The dictionary and the imaginary behind the term golpe

Abstract

This study intends to present a theoretical and analytical discussion about the processes of signification involving the word golpe (coup) in a lexicographic history perspective in order to understand the (de)stabilized senses in the XVIII, XIX and XX century dictionaries. For this study, we articulated perspectives from the fields of History of Linguistic Ideas and French Discourse Analysis, in order to discuss the senses of the word golpe, understanding that a word has a memory and a history whose meanings evoke a knowledge and an imaginary about a language. With this study, we conclude by becoming part of the imaginary language, the dictionary, in the history of lexical practices, destabilizes the senses and marks confrontations and alliances that are forgotten or sometimes recovered and transmuted into discourses that affect the lexicographic historicity and temporality of this word: coup.