'Brazilian Portuguese' (''português brasileiro'' in Portuguese) is the group of
dialects of
Portuguese written and spoken by virtually all the 190 million inhabitants of
Brazil and by a couple million Brazilian immigrants, mainly in the
United States,
Portugal,
Canada,
Japan, and
Paraguay.
The differences between
European and Brazilian Portuguese are comparable to those one might find when comparing
British and
American English, though some claim they are much greater, especially considering the differences in Brazilian and European grammar. The Brazilian formal written standard, which is defined by law and international agreements with other Portuguese-speaking countries, is very similar to the European one; but there are nevertheless many differences in spelling, lexicon, and grammar. European and Brazilian writers also have markedly different preferences when choosing between supposedly equivalent words or constructs.
Nevertheless, the cultural prestige and strong government support accorded to the written standard has maintained the unity of the language over the whole of Brazil and ensured that all regional varieties remain fully intelligible. Starting in the 1960s, the nationwide dominance of TV networks based in the southeast (
Rio de Janeiro and
São Paulo) has made the dialect of that region into an unofficial standard for the spoken language as well.
History
The Portuguese legacy
The existence of Portuguese in Brazil is a legacy of
Portuguese colonization of the Americas. The first wave of Portuguese-speaking immigrants settled in Brazil in the
16th Century, yet the language was not widely used then. For a time Portuguese coexisted with
Língua Geral, a
lingua franca based on
Amerindian languages that was used by the
Jesuit missionaries; as well as with various
African languages spoken by the hundreds of thousands of slaves brought to the country between the 17th and 19th centuries.
By the end of the
18th century, however, Portuguese had affirmed itself as the national language. That status was further consolidated with the arrival in Brazil of over 1.4 million immigrants from Portugal during the 19th and 20th centuries. The aborted colonization attempts by the
French in
Rio de Janeiro in the 16th century and the
Dutch in the Northeast in the 17th century had negligible effect on Portuguese. Even the substantial non-Portuguese-speaking immigration waves of the late 19th and early 20th century — mostly from Italy, Spain, Germany, Japan, and Lebanon — were linguistically integrated into the Portuguese-speaking majority within a couple of generations.
Influences from other languages
The evolution of Brazilian Portuguese has certainly been influenced by the languages it supplanted: first the Amerindian tongues of the natives, then the various African languages brought by the slaves, and finally the speeches of the European and Asian immigrants. The influence is clearly detected in the Brazilian lexicon, which today is full of words of
Tupi-guarani and
Yoruba origin, among others.
From
South America, words deriving from the
Tupi-Guaraní family of languages are particularly prevalent in place names (''
Itaquaquecetuba,'' ''
Pindamonhangaba,'' ''
Caruaru'', ''
Ipanema''). The native languages contributed the names for most of the plants and animals found in Brazil, such as ''arara'' ("
macaw"), ''jacaré'' ("South American
alligator"), ''tucano'' ("
toucan"), ''mandioca'' ("
manioc"), ''pipoca'' ("
popcorn"), ''abacaxi'' ("
pineapple"), and many more. Many of these words entered the Brazilian Portuguese lexicon in the 16th century, and some of them were eventually borrowed by European Portuguese and later even into other European languages.
The African languages provided many words too, especially related to food, such as ''
quindim'', ''
acarajé'', ''
moqueca''; and household concepts, such as ''cafuné'' ("caress on the head"), ''curinga'' ("
joker card"), and ''caçula'' ("youngest child").
Capoeira,
marimba, and
samba are also African (
Bantu) words borrowed by Brazilian Portuguese that gained popularity, and these were also gained by European Portuguese and English.
There are also many borrowings from other
European languages such as
English (especially words connected to technology and finance),
French (food, furniture, and luxurious fabrics and concepts),
German and
Italian, and, to a lesser extent, Asian languages such as
Japanese. The latter borrowings are also mostly related to food and drinks or culture-bound concepts, such as ‘’quimono’’, from Japanese
kimono.
The influence of these languages in the phonology and grammar of Brazilian Portuguese have been minor. Also, it is claimed that the virtual disappearance of certain verb inflections in Brazil, such as the past
pluperfect and second person plural, and the Brazilian's marked preference for compound tenses, recall the grammatical simplification that is observed in the formation of pidgins. However, the same or similar processes can be verified in the European variant. Regardless of these borrowings, it must be kept in mind that Brazilian Portuguese is not a
Portuguese creole, since both grammar and vocabulary remain real Portuguese.
Written and spoken languages
The written language taught in Brazilian schools has historically been based on the standard of Portugal, and Portuguese writers have often been regarded as models by Brazilian authors and teachers. Nonetheless, this closeness and aspiration to unity was in the 20th century severely weakened by nationalist movements in literature and the arts, which awakened in many Brazilians the desire of a true national writing uninfluenced by standards in Portugal. Later on, agreements were made as to preserve at least the orthographical unity throughout the Portuguese-speaking world, including the African and Asian variants of the language.
On the other hand, the spoken language suffered none of the constraints that applied to the written language. Brazilians, when concerned with pronunciation, look up to what is considered the national standard variety, and never the European one. Moreover, Brazilians in general have had very little exposure to European speech, even after the advent of radio, TV, and movies. The language spoken in Brazil has evolved largely independently of that spoken in Portugal.
Formal written Brazilian Portuguese
The written Brazilian standard differs from the European one to about the same extent that written
American English differs from written British English. The differences extend to spelling, lexicon, and grammar. Several Brazilian writers were awarded with the highest prize of the Portuguese language. The
Camões Prize awarded annually by Portuguese and Brazilians is often regarded as the equivalent of the Nobel Prize in Literature for works in Portuguese.
João Cabral de Melo Neto,
Rachel de Queiroz,
Jorge Amado,
Antonio Candido,
Autran Dourado,
Rubem Fonseca and
Lygia Fagundes Telles are Brazilian writers recognized for writing the most outstanding work in the Portuguese Language.
Spelling differences
The Brazilian spellings of certain words differ from those used in Portugal and the other Portuguese-speaking countries. Some of these differences are merely orthographical, but others reflect true differences in pronunciation.
A major subset of the differences relates to words with ''c'' and ''p'' followed by ''c'', ''ç'', or ''t''. In many cases, the letters ''c'' or ''p'' have become silent in all varieties of Portuguese, a common phonetic change in Romance languages (cf. Spanish ''objeto'', French ''objet''). Accordingly, they stopped being written down in BP, but are still written in other countries. For example, we have EP ''acção'' / BP ''ação'' ("action"), EP ''óptimo'' / BP ''ótimo'' ("optimum"), and so on, where the consonant is silent both in BP and EP, but the words are spelled differently. Only in a small number of words is the consonant silent in Brazil and pronounced elsewhere or vice versa.
However, BP has retained those
silent consonants in a few cases, such as ''detectar'' ("to detect"). In particular, BP generally distinguishes in sound and writing between ''secção'' ("section" as in ''anatomy'' or ''drafting'') and ''seção'' ("section" of an organization); whereas EP uses ''secção'' for both senses.
Another major set of differences is the BP usage of ''ô'' or ''ê'' in many words where EP has ''ó'' or ''é'', such as BP ''neurônio'' / EP ''neurónio'' ("neuron") and BP ''arsênio'' / EP ''arsénio''. These spelling differences are due to genuinely different pronunciations. In EP, the vowels ''e'' and ''o'' may be open (''é'' or ''ó'') or closed (''ê'' or ''ô'') when they are stressed before one of the nasal consonants ''m'', ''n'' followed by a vowel, but in BP they are always closed in this environment. The variant spellings are necessary in those cases because the general Portuguese spelling rules mandate a stress diacritic in those words, and the Portuguese diacritics also encode vowel quality.
Another source of variation is the spelling of the [] sound before ''e'' and ''i''. By Portuguese spelling rules, that sound can be written either as ''j'' (favored in BP for certain words) or ''g'' (favored in EP). Thus, for example, we have BP ''berinjela''/ EP ''beringela'' ("eggplant").
Formal versus informal registers
The linguistic situation of Brazil can be described as one of extreme
diglossia, the intimate coexistence of two varieties or "registers" of the language — formal and informal — which are used simultaneously, mixed in continuously varying proportions depending on the speaker and occasion. While diglossia inevitably develops in every literate society, it is much more striking in Brazil than in English or in European Portuguese.
The formal register of Brazilian Portuguese has a written and spoken form. The written formal register (FW) is used in almost all printed media and written communication, is uniform throughout the country, and is the "Portuguese" officially taught at school. The spoken formal register (FS) is basically a phonetic rendering of the written form; it is used only in very formal situations like speeches or ceremonies, by educated people who wish to stress their education, or when reading directly out of a text. While FS is necessarily uniform in lexicon and grammar, it shows noticeable regional variations in pronunciation. Finally the informal register (IS) is almost never written down (basically only in artistic works or very informal contexts such as adolescent chat rooms). It is used to some extent in virtually all oral communication outside of those formal contexts — even by well educated speakers — and shows considerable regional variations in pronunciation, lexicon, and even grammar.
For example, consider the following sample of formal written Portuguese (FW), as it would be written by a secretary, and its formal spoken version (FS) in the São Paulo dialect and semi-literal English translation (EN):
:'EN:' "We need to inform everybody that there won't be power in the elevators."
:'FW:' ''Precisamos informar a todos que faltará energia nos elevadores.''
:'FS:'
Here is how the same person could deliver the same message orally, in informal spoken register (IS):
:'IS (as it would be written):' (A gente) tem que falar pra todo mundo que vai faltar luz nos elevadores.
:'IS (IPA):'
:'EN:' "(We) have to tell 'all the world' that there won't be light in the elevators."
This example shows that FS and IS can differ in
:lexicon: ''precisamos'' ("we need to")→ ''temos que'' ("we have to"), ''informar'' ("to inform")→ ''falar'' ("to talk") - in IS there won't be a big difference between "falar" (talk/speak) and "dizer" (say). ''energia'' ("energy")→ ''luz'' ("light")
:change of grammatical person: ''temos'' (verb "ter" conjugated in the first person plural) → ''(a gente) tem'' (the expression "a gente" (lit. "the people"), in this case ommited, replaces the pronoun "nós" (we) in IS; also, the verb shall be conjugated in the singular (which in general causes confusion among uneducated speakers)
:choice of verbal form: ''faltará'' → ''vai faltar'' (the form "ir" (go) + infinitive is used in IS rather than the simple future);
:contractions: ''para os'' → ''pros'' ("for the");
:loss of final ''-r'': → .
★ Plural: it may also disappear depending on the level of education of the speaker "os elevadores" >> "os elevador". But it is considered inappropriate even in IS.
★ Change of existential verb: ''há'' → ''tem'' (both can be transalated as "there is/are", but the second one uses the verb "ter"(have)in a sense of existence, whereas it is not possible in the in FW);
This example is somewhat extreme and hypothetical: the speech of most people will be some mixture of the informal (IS) and formal (FS) spoken registers, the proportions varying according to the speaker's education and the situation. Thus, for example, the same person may deliver something close to the FS version when speaking in a TV interview. The adjustment is largely unconscious, and it is not unusual to hear informal and formal constructs mixed in the same speech, or even in the same sentence. As is usually the case in diglossic communities, an educated person who has to write down a spoken text (e.g. a secretary taking dictation) will unconsciously translate IS into FW, and back again when delivering the message in person.
Lexicon
The vocabularies of Brazilian and European Portuguese also differ in a couple of thousand words, many of which refer to concepts that were introduced separately in BP and EP.
Since Brazilian independence in 1822, BP has tended to borrow words from English and French. However, BP generally adopts foreign words with minimal adjustments, while EP tends to apply deeper morphological changes. However, there are instances of BP
transliterating English words, whereas EP retains the original form - hence ''estoque'' and ''stock''. Finally, one dialect often borrowed a word while the other coined a new one from native elements. So one has, for example
:BP ''mouse'' ← English "mouse" versus EP ''rato'' ← literal translation of "mouse" in Portugal, but means "rat" in Brazil
:BP ''esporte'' (alternatives: ''desporto'', ''desporte'') ← English "sport" versus EP ''desporto'' ← Spanish ''deporte''
:BP ''jaqueta'' ← English "jacket" versus EP ''blusão'' ← EP ''blusa'' ← French ''blouse''
:BP ''concreto'' ← English "concrete" versus EP ''betão'' ← French ''beton''
:BP ''grampeador'' ("stapler") ← ''grampo'' ← German ''Krampe'' versus EP ''agrafador'' ← ''agrafo'' ← French ''agrafe''.
A few other examples are given in the following table:
| 'Brazil' | 'Portugal' | 'English' |
| abridor de latas | abre-latas | can opener |
| água-viva | alforreca, água-viva | jellyfish |
| AIDS | SIDA | AIDS |
| alho poró | alho-porro | leek |
| aquarela | aguarela | watercolor |
| aterrissagem | aterragem | landing |
| banheiro, lavabo, sanitário | casa de banho, lavabos, sanitários | bathroom |
| breque, freio | travão, freio | brake |
| brócolis | brócolos | broccoli |
| câncer, cancro (mostly rural) | cancro | cancer |
| carona | boleia | hitchhiking |
| carteira (or "carta") de motorista | carta de condução | driving licence |
| carteira de identidade | bilhete de identidade | ID card |
| telefone celular ( or just "celular" | telemóvel | cell phone (US), mobile phone (UK) |
| Cingapura | Singapura | Singapore |
| dublagem | dobragem | dubbing |
| durex | fita-cola | clear tape |
| Band-Aid, adesivo | adesivo,
penso rápido | plaster (UK),
Band-Aid (US) |
| time, equipe | equipa, equipe | team |
| favela | bairro de lata | slum quarters |
| ferrovia | caminho de ferro | railway |
| fila | bicha, fila | line (US), queue (UK) |
| fones de ouvido | auscultadores,
auriculares, fones | headphones |
| gol | golo | goal |
| Irã | Irão | Iran |
| Islã | Islão | Islam |
| jaqueta, blusão | blusão | jacket |
| locatário, arrendatário | arrendatário | tenant |
| maiô | fato de banho | woman's swimsuit |
| mamadeira | biberão | baby bottle |
| metrô | metro,
metropolitano | subway |
| nadadeiras, barbatanas | barbatanas | swimming fins |
| ônibus | autocarro | bus |
| perua (obsolete), van | carrinha | station wagon (US), estate car (UK) |
| rúgbi | râguebi | rugby |
| requeijão, queijo cremoso | queijo creme | cream cheese |
| secretária eletrônica | atendedor de chamadas | answering machine |
| trem | comboio | train |
| uísque | ''whisky'', uísque | whisk(e)y |
Some of the words shown in only one column (like ''comboio'', ''atendedor de chamadas'', and ''mamadeira'') do exist in the other dialect, but are rarely used. For example: "abacaxi" and "ananás" designate two kinds of pineapple; "grama" often refers to any kind of grass in a garden or urban area whereas "relva" or "relvado" refers to natural grass of forests, etc.
Some of the words shown in only one column (like comboio, atendedor de chamadas, and mamadeira) exist in the other dialect, but are rarely used.
Grammar
Syntactic and morphological features
The progressive
Portuguese makes extensive use of verbs in the progressive tense, almost as in English.
BP seldom has the present continuous construct ''estar a'' + infinitive, which, in contrast, has become quite common in EP. In BP, the present continuous must be expressed by ''estar'' +
gerund. Thus Brazilians will always write ''ela está dançando'' ("she is dancing"), never ''ela está a dançar''. The same restriction applies to several other uses of the gerund: BP always writes ''ficamos conversando'' ("we kept on talking") and ''ele trabalha cantando'' ("he sings while he works"), never ''ficamos a conversar'' and ''ele trabalha a cantar'' as is the case in most varieties of EP.
It must be noted, however, that BP retains the combination ''a'' + infinitive for uses that are not related to continued action, such as ''voltamos a correr'' ("we went back to running"), and that some dialects of EP will also tend to use ''estar'' +
gerund in the same way as Brazilians.
Ter instead of haver
In a few compound verb tenses, BP uses the auxiliary ''ter'' (originally "to hold", "to own"), where EP would normally use ''haver'' ("shall, will"). In particular, the EP construction ''há-de cantar'' ("he will sing" or "he shall sing") is hardly ever used in BP. BP also uses ''ter'' in existential sense, whereas EP would use ''haver'', hence "não tem dinheiro" instead of "não há dinheiro" ("there is no money").
Personal pronouns
Main articles: Portuguese personal pronouns
Informal spoken BP has the particular construction "2nd person singular personal pronoun (tu) + verb in 3rd person singular (ele)", to represent a possible future situation (like a conditional situation - "Tu vai cair se não se segurar direito" - ''You'll fall down if you don't hold yourself properly'') or to ask somebody to do someting ("Tu vende o livro pra mim?" - ''Do you sell the book for me?''). Formal BP seldom uses the personal pronoun "tu", using the pronoun "você" instead. In most regions the use of "você" is hegemonic, both informally and in formal writing.
Syntax
Brazilians normally place the
object pronoun before the verb (
proclitic position), as in ''ele me viu'' ("he saw me"). In many such cases, the proclisis would be considered awkward or even grammatically incorrect in EP, in which the pronoun is generally placed after the verb (
enclitic position), namely ''ele viu-me''. However, formal BP still follows EP in avoiding starting a sentence with a proclitic pronoun; so both will write ''Deram-lhe o livro'' ("They gave her the book") instead of ''Lhe deram o livro.''
Contracted forms
Even in the most formal contexts, BP never uses the contracted combinations of direct and indirect object pronouns which are sometimes used in EP, such as ''me'' + ''o'' = ''mo'', ''lhe'' + ''as'' = ''lhas''. Instead, the indirect clitic is replaced by preposition + strong pronoun: thus BP writes ''ela o deu para mim'' ("she gave it to me") instead of EP ''ela deu-mo''. But this form is practically used only in Portugal.
Mesoclisis
The
mesoclitic placement of pronouns (between the verb stem and its inflection suffix) is viewed as archaic in BP, and therefore is restricted to very formal situations or stylistic texts . Hence the phrase ''Eu dar-lhe-ia'', still current in EP, would be normally written ''Eu lhe daria'' in BP. Incidentally, a marked fondness for enclitic and mesoclitic pronouns was one of the many memorable eccentricities of former Brazilian President
Jânio Quadros, as in his famous quote ''Bebo-o porque é líquido, se fosse sólido comê-lo-ia'' ("I drink it [liquor] because it is liquid, if it were solid I would eat it")
Reflexive verbs
Brazilian Portuguese often treats as intransitive certain verbs that in EP are reflexive, and therefore would require a reflexive weak pronoun. Thus, for example, BP would often say ''ele lembra'' ("he remembers") instead of ''ele se lembra'', or ''eu deito'' "I lie down" instead of ''eu me deito.'' An exception to the rule may be the state of Rio Grande do Sul, where such verbs are often used as reflexive, possibly because of influence from Spanish as spoken in neighboring Argentina and Uruguay.
Preferences
There are many differences between formal written BP and EP that are simply a matter of different preferences between two alternative words or constrictions that are both officially valid and acceptable.
Simple versus compound tenses
A few synthetic tenses are usually replaced by compound tenses, such as in:
:future indicative: ''eu cantarei'' (simple), ''eu vou cantar'' (compound, "ir"+infinitive)
:conditional: ''eu cantaria'' (simple), ''eu iria/ia cantar'' (compound, "ir"+infinitive)
:past perfect: ''eu cantara'' (simple), ''eu tinha cantado'' (compound, "ter"+past participle)"
Also, the spoken BP usually uses the verb ''ter'' ("have", sense of possession) and never ''haver'' ("have" or "there to be"), esp. as an auxiliary (as it can be seen above) and as a verb of existence.
:written: ''ele havia/tinha cantado'' (he had sung)
:spoken: ''ele tinha cantado''
:written: ''ele podia haver/ter dito'' (he might have said)
:spoken: ''ele podia ter dito''
BP/EP differences in the formal spoken language
Phonology
In many ways, compared to
European Portuguese (EP), Brazilian Portuguese (BP) is conservative in its phonology. This also occurs in
Angolan Portuguese,
São Tomean Portuguese, and other
African dialects.
Vowels
Brazilians generally pronounce vowels more clearly and distinctly than Europeans. In the syllables that follow the stressed one, BP generally pronounces ''o'' as , ''a'' as , and ''e'' as . Some dialects of BP also follow these rules for vowels before the stressed syllable. In contrast, EP
elides some unstressed vowels, or reduces them to a very short, near central unrounded vowel , a sound that does not exist in BP. Thus, for example, the word ''setembro'' is in BP but in EP.
Consonants
One of the most noticeable tendencies of BP is the
palatalization of and in some regions, which are pronounced as and , respectively, before . The word ''presidente'' "president", for example, is pronounced in these regions of Brazil, but in Portugal. This pronunciation began in Rio de Janeiro and is often still associated with this city, but is now standard in other major cities such as Belo Horizonte and Salvador, and has spread more recently to some regions of São Paulo (due to the migrants from other regions), where it is common in most speakers under 40 or so. It has always been standard among Brazil's
Japanese community, since this is also a feature of
Japanese.
BP tends to break up clusters where the first sound is not , , or by the insertion of (although clusters ending in or are allowed, as are and sometimes ), and similarly to eliminate words ending with consonants other than , , or by the addition of . Syllable-final is pronounced , and syllable-final is weakened in most regions to or or dropped (especially at the ends of words). This sometimes results in rather striking transformations of common words. The brand name "MacDonald's", for example, is rendered , and the word "rock" is rendered as . (Initial and doubled 'r' are pronounced in BP as , as with syllable-final .) Combined with the fact that and are already disallowed at the end of syllables in Portuguese (being replaced with nasalization on the previous vowel), this makes BP have a phonology that strongly favors open syllables.
Nasalization is much stronger in BP than EP. This is especially noticeable in vowels before or followed by a vowel, which are pronounced in BP with nasalization as strong as in phonemically nasalized vowels, while in EP they are nearly without nasalization. For the same reason, open vowels (which are disallowed under nasalization in Portuguese in general) cannot occur before or in BP, but can in EP. This sometimes affects the spelling of words. For example, EP, ''harmónico'' "harmonic" is BP ''harmônico'' . It also can affect verbal paradigms—for example, EP distinguishes ''falamos'' "we speak" from 'falámos' "we spoke", but BP has ''falamos'' for both.
Related to this is the difference in pronunciation of the consonant written ''nh''. This is in EP but in BP, a nasalized , which nasalizes the preceding vowel .
BP did not participate in many sound changes that later affected EP, particularly in the realm of consonants. In BP, , , and are stops in all positions, while they are weakened to fricatives , , and in EP. Many dialects of BP maintain syllable-final and as such, while EP consistently converts them to and . Whether such a change happens in BP is highly dialect-specific. Rio de Janeiro is particularly known for such a pronunciation; São Paulo is particularly known for ''not'' having it. Elsewhere, such as in the Northeast, it is more likely to happen before a consonant than word-finally, and varies from region to region.
Another change in EP that does not occur in BP is the lowering of /e/ to before palatal sounds (, , and ) and in the diphthong ''em'' , which merges with the diphthong ''ãe'' in EP but not BP.
An interesting change that is in the process of spreading in BP, probably originating in the Northeast, is the insertion of after stressed vowels before at the end of a syllable. This began in the context of —for example, ''mas'' "but" is now pronounced in most of Brazil, making it
homophonous with ''mais'' "more". The change is spreading to other vowels, however, and at least in the Northeast the normal pronunciations of ''voz'' "voice" and ''Jesus'' are and . Similarly, ''três'' "three" becomes , making it rhyme with ''seis'' "six" ; this may explain the common Brazilian replacement of ''seis'' with ''meia'' ("half", as in "half a dozen") when spelling out phone numbers.
[1]
BP/EP differences in the informal spoken language
There are various differences between
European and Brazilian Portuguese, such as the dropping of the
second person in everyday usage and use of subject pronouns (ele, ela, eles, elas) as direct objects. Portuguese people can understand Brazilian Portuguese well. However, some Brazilians find
European Portuguese difficult to understand at first. This is mainly due to the fact that European Portuguese tends to compress words to a greater extent than in Brazil -- for example, tending to drop unstressed /e/ -- and to introduce greater allophonic modifications of various sounds.
Grammar
Spoken Brazilian usage differs considerably from European usage in many aspects. Between Brazilian Portuguese, particularly in its most informal varieties, and European Portuguese, there can be considerable differences in grammar as well. The most prominent ones concern the placement of clitic pronouns and use of subject pronouns as objects in the third person. Nonstandard inflections are also common in colloquial Brazilian Portuguese.
Affirmation and negation
Spoken Brazilian Portuguese rarely uses the affirmation adverb ''sim'' 'yes' in isolation. Instead the verbal form ''é'' 'is' is preferred:
:EP:
:''—Já foste à câmara municipal?''
:''—Sim, fui ontem.''
:BP:
:''—Você já foi na prefeitura?''
:''—É, fui ontem.''
:"Have you gone to the City Hall yet?"
:"Yes, I went there yesterday."
It is common in spoken BP to negate statements twice, with ''não'' 'no' at the beginning and end of the sentence:
:BP:
:''—Você fala inglês?''
:''—Não falo, não.''
:"Do you speak English?"
:"I don't speak [it], no."
In some places, however, like Northeastern Brazil, the ''first'' of these two ''não's is being viewed as redundant, resulting in a word order for negation opposite to the one still prevailing in European Portuguese:
:EP:
:''—Você fala inglês?''
:''—Não falo.''
:BP (Northeastern variant):
:''—Você fala inglês?''
:''—Falo, não.''
:"Do you speak English?"
:"No, I don't."
The imperative
Classical Portuguese inflected the imperative according to the grammatical person of the subject (the being who is ordered to do the action). Thus one should use different inflections when that subject is treated as ''tu'' ("you", grammatical 2nd person) or ''você'' ("you", grammatical 3rd person):
:''tu és burro, cal'a' a boca!''
:''você é burro, cal'e' a boca!''
:"you are stupid, shut up!"
Currently, many dialects of BP have largely lost the 2nd person subjects, but the same dialects might still use the 2rd person imperative, even with ''você'':
:BP: ''você é burro, cal'e' a boca!'' OR
:BP: ''você é burro, cal'a' a boca!'' (in this case, sometimes people join "cala" + "a" + "boca", resulting in ''você é burro, 'calaboca''' in Brazilian Informal Speech.)
Moreover, BP speakers rarely use the subjunctive for the Negative Imperative; instead they will employ the Imperative inflexion. This never occurs in EP, except for some jocular contexts or when scolding or giving incisive orders to a child.
Note that 3rd person subjunctive verb forms are nevertheless frequently used in Brazil, both as Negative and Positive Imperatives, in written signs and public announcements (e.g. ''Não jogue papel na grama''; ''Não fume'', ''Dê a descarga após usar a privada''), or in (printed, Internet, TV, or radio) advertising (e.g. ''Pague um e leve três'', ''Emagreça dez quilos dormindo''). The subjunctive form of the verb "ser" (''seja'') is also always used to form the Imperative, even in informal spoken language (e.g. ''Seja um bom menino''; ''não seja bobo, garoto!'').
Deictics
EP demonstrative adjectives and pronouns and their corresponding adverbs have three forms corresponding to different degrees of proximity.
:''Este'' 'this (one)' [near the speaker]
:''Esse'' 'that (one)' [near the addressee]
:''Aquele'' 'that (one)' [away from speaker and addressee]
In spoken BP, the first two of these adjectives/pronouns have merged into the second:
:''Esse'' 'this (one)' [near the speaker] / 'that (one)' [near the addressee]
:''Aquele'' 'that (one)' [away from both]
Example:
:''Esta é a minha camisola nova.'' (EP)
:''Essa é minha camiseta nova.'' (BP)
:This is my new T-shirt.
Personal pronouns and possessives
Main articles: Portuguese personal pronouns and possessives
''Tu'' and ''você''
In most dialects of BP, 'você' (formal "you" in EP) replaces ''tu'' (informal "you" in EP). The object pronoun, however, is still ''te'' , and other forms such as ''teu'' (possessive), ''ti'' (postprepositional), and ''contigo'' ("with you") may still remain in some regions of Brazil, especially when ''tu'' is still used. Hence, the combination of object ''te'' with subject ''você,'' for example, ''eu te disse para você ir'' "I told you that you should go". The imperative forms, however, look like the EP second-person forms, although it is argued by some that it is the third-person singular indicative which doubles as the imperative.
The forms ti/tu and contigo are replaced with você and com você. Either você (following the verb) or te (preceding the verb) can be used as object pronoun: Hence a speaker may end up saying "I love you" in two ways: Eu amo você and/or eu te amo.
In the South (
Rio Grande do Sul,
Santa Catarina, parts of
Paraná) and the cities of
Santos (in
São Paulo), and
Recife (in
Pernambuco), the distinction between semiformal ''você'' and familiar ''tu'' is still maintained; object and possessive pronouns pattern likewise. In Rio Grande do Sul and Santa Catarina, for instance, ''você'' is almost never used in spoken language - ''o senhor/a senhora'' is employed whenever ''tu'' may sound too informal. In
Rio de Janeiro, parts of the Northeast (interior of some northeastern states and some speakers from the coast), and the North, both ''tu'' and ''você'' (and associated object and possessive pronouns) are used with no difference. Most Brazilians who use ''tu'' use it with the 3rd person verb: ''Tu vai ao banco." ("Tu vai" is wrong , but people use it anyway.) ''Tu'' accompanied by the second-person verb can still be found in Maranhão, Piauí, and Santa Catarina, for instance, and in a few cities in Rio Grande do Sul near the border with Uruguay, with a slightly different pronunciation in some conjugations (''tu vieste'' pronounced ''tu viesse''), which also is present in Santa Catarina and Pernambuco.
In Brazil’s biggest city,
São Paulo, the use of “tu” in print and conversation nowadays is practically nonexistent; “você” is used instead.
Third-person direct object pronouns
In spoken informal registers of BP, the third-person object pronouns 'o', 'a', 'os', and 'as', common in EP, are virtually nonexistent -- they are simply left out, or (when necessary, and usually only when referring to people) replaced by stressed subject pronouns (e.g., ''ele'' "he" or ''isso'' "that"); for example, ''Eu vi ele'' "I saw him" rather than ''Eu o vi''.
''Seu'' and ''Dele''
Standard BP tends to use the third-person possessive 'seu' to mean "your" and uses 'dele', 'dela', 'deles', and 'delas' ("of him/her/them" and placed after the noun) as third-person possessive forms. In situations, however, where no ambiguity arises (especially in narrative texts), 'seu' may be used as well to mean 'his' or 'her'
(e.g. ''O candidato apresentou ontem o seu plano de governo para os próximos quatro anos'').
It must be noted, though, that both forms ('seu' or 'dele(s) /dela(s)') are considered grammatically correct in EP and BP.
Syntax
| European Portuguese | Brazilian Portuguese |
|---|
'placement of'
'clitic pronouns' | ''Eu amo-te.''"I love you." | ''Eu te amo.''"I you love". |
| ''Responde-me!''"Answer me!" | ''Me responde!''"Me answer!" |
'use of personal'
'pronouns' | ''Eu vi-a.''"I saw her." | ''Eu vi ela.'' (colloquial)"I saw she". |
'inflection of nouns,'
'adjectives and verbs' | ''As moças1 voltaram ontem.''"''The'' [plural] girls ''came back'' [plural] yesterday." | ''As moça voltaram ontem.'' (very colloquial)"''The'' [plural] girl [singular] ''came back'' [plural] yesterday". |
1Although the word ''moças'' is not often used in modern European Portuguese, the intent here is to compare the morphology.
The examples in the table are in increasing degree of colloquiality. The word order in the first Brazilian example is actually frequent in European Portuguese, too, for example in subordinate clauses like ''Sabes 'que eu te amo''' "You know ''that I love you''", but not in simple sentences like "I love you." But in Portugal an object pronoun would never be placed at the start of a sentence, like in the second example. The example in the bottom row of the table, with its deletion of "redundant" inflections, would be considered ungrammatical by most educated urban middle-class speakers of BP, but it is nonetheless widely heard in Brazil, especially in certain regional dialects like ''
caipira'' and ''
mineiro''.
Diglossia
According to some contemporary
Brazilian linguists (Bortoni, Kato, Mattos e Silva, Perini and most recently, with great impact, Bagno), Brazilian Portuguese may be a highly
diglossic language. This theory claims that there is an L-variant (termed "Brazilian Vernacular"), which would be the mother tongue of all Brazilians, and an H-variant (standard Brazilian Portuguese) acquired through schooling. L-variant represents a simplified form of the language (in terms of grammar, but not of phonetics) that could have evolved from
16th century Portuguese, influenced by
Amerindian (mostly
Tupi) and
African languages, while H-variant would be based on
19th century European Portuguese (and very similar to Standard European Portuguese, with only minor differences in
spelling and grammar usage). Mário A. Perini, a Brazilian linguist, even compares the depth of the differences between L- and H- variants of Brazilian Portuguese with those between Standard Spanish and Standard Portuguese. However, his proposal is not widely accepted by neither grammarians nor academics,
Usage
From this point of view, the L-variant is the spoken form of Brazilian Portuguese, which should be avoided only in very formal speech (court interrogation, political debate) while the H-variant is the written form of Brazilian Portuguese, avoided only in informal writing (such as songs lyrics, love letters, intimate friends correspondence). Even language professors many times use the L-variant while explaining students the structure and usage of the H-variant; in essays, nevertheless, all students are expected to use H-variant.
While the L-variant may used in songs, movies, soap operas, sitcoms and other television shows, although, at times, the H-variant is used in historic films or soap operas to make the language used sound more ‘elegant’ and/or ‘archaic’. There is a claim that the H-variant used to be preferred when dubbing foreign films and series into Brazilian Portuguese , but nowadays the L-variant is preferred, although this seems to lack evidence. Movie subtitles normally use a mixture of L- and H-variants, but remain closer to the H-variant.
Most literary works are written in the H-variant. There would have been attempts at writing in the L-variant (such as the masterpiece ''Macunaíma'', written by Brazilian modernist
Mário de Andrade and ''Grande Sertão: Veredas'', by João
Guimarães Rosa), but, presently, the L-variant is claimed to be used only in dialogue. Still, many contemporary writers like using the H-variant even in informal dialogue. This is also true of translated books, which never use the L-variant, only the H one. Childrens books seem to be more L-friendly, but, again, if they are translated from another language (''The Little Prince'', for instance) they will use the H-variant only.
Prestige
This theory also posits that the matter of diglossia in Brazil is further complicated by forces of political and cultural bias, though those are not clearly named. Language has been made, apparently, into a tool of social exclusion or social choice.
Mário A. Perini, a famous Brazilian linguist, has said:
:"There are two languages in Brazil. The one we write (and which is called "Portuguese"), and another one that we speak (which is so despised that there is not a name to call it). The latter is the mother tongue of Brazilians, the former has to be learned in school, and a majority of population does not manage to master it appropriately.... Personally, I do not object to us writing Portuguese, but I think it is important to make clear that Portuguese is (at least in Brazil) only a written language. Our mother tongue is not Portuguese, but Brazilian Vernacular. This is not a slogan, nor a political statement, it is simply recognition of a fact.... There are linguistic teams working hard in order to give the full description of the structure of the Vernacular. So, there are hopes, that within some years, we will have appropriate grammars of our mother tongue, the language that has been ignored, denied and despised for such a long time."
According to Milton M. Azevedo (Brazilian linguist):
:"The relationship between Vernacular Brazilian Portuguese and the formal prescriptive variety fulfills the basic conditions of Ferguson's definition [of diglossia]...[...] Considering the difficulty encountered by vernacular speakers to acquire the standard, an understanding of those relationships appears to have broad educational significance. The teaching of Portuguese has traditionally meant imparting a prescriptive formal standard based on a literary register (Cunha 1985: 24) that is often at variance with the language with which students are familiar. As in a diglossic situation, vernacular speakers must learn to read and write in a dialect they neither speak nor fully understand, a circumstance that may have a bearing on the high dropout rate in elementary schools..."
According to Bagno (1999) the two variants coexist and intermingle quite seamlessly, but their status is not clear-cut. Brazilian Vernacular is still frowned upon by most grammarians and language teachers, with only remarkably few linguists championing its cause. Some of this minority, of which Bagno is an example, appeal to their readers by their ideas that grammarians would be detractors of the termed Brazilian Vernacular, by naming it a "corrupt" form of the "pure" standard, an attitude which they classify as "linguistic prejudice". Their arguments include the postulate that the Vernacular form simplifies some of the intricacies of standard Portuguese (verbal conjugation, pronoun handling, plural forms, etc.).
Bagno accuses the prejudice against the vernacular in what he terms the "8 Myths":
# There is a striking uniformity in Brazilian Portuguese
# Nearly all Brazilians speak very poor Portuguese while in Portugal people speak it very well
# Portuguese is extremely difficult
# People that have had poor education can't speak anything correctly
# In the state of Maranhão people speak a better Portuguese than elsewhere in Brazil
# We should speak as closely as possible to the written language
# The knowledge of grammar is essential to the correct and proper use of a language
# To master Standard Portuguese is the path to social promotion
In opposition to the "myths", Bagno counters that:
# The uniformity of Brazilian Portuguese is just about what linguistics predicts for such a large country whose population has not generally been literate for centuries and which has experienced considerable foreign influence, that is, this uniformity is more apparent than real.
# Brazilians speak Standard Portuguese poorly because, in fact, they speak a language that is sufficiently different from SP so that the latter sounds almost "foreign" to them. In terms of comparison, it is easier for many Brazilians to understand someone from a Spanish-speaking South American country than someone from Portugal because the spoken varieties of Portuguese on either side of the Atlantic have diverged to point of nearly being mutually unintelligible.
# No language is difficult for those who speak it. Difficulty appears when two conditions are met: the standard language diverges from the vernacular and a speaker of the vernacular tries to learn the standard version. This divergence is the precise reason why spelling and grammar reforms happen every now and then.
# People with less education can speak the vernacular or often several varieties of the vernacular, and they speak it well. They might, however, have trouble in speaking SP, but this is due to lack of experience rather than to any inherent deficiency in their linguistic mastery.
# The people of Maranhão are not generally better than fellow Brazilians from other states in speaking SP, especially because that state is one of the poorest and has one of the lowest literacy rates.
# It is the written language that must reflect the spoken and not vice versa: it is not the tail that wags the dog.
# The knowledge of grammar is intuitive for those who speak their native languages. Problems arise when they begin to study the grammar of a foreign language.
# Rich and influential people themselves often do not follow the grammatical rules of SP. SP is mostly a jewel for powerless middle-class careers (journalists, teachers, writers, actors, etc.).
Whether Bagno's points are valid or not is still open to debate (especially the solutions he recommends for the problems he identifies). Whereas some agree that he has captured the feelings of the Brazilians towards their own linguistic situation well, his book (''Linguistic Prejudice: What it Is, How To Do'') has been heavily criticized by some linguists and grammarians, due to his daring and unorthodox claims, sometimes even regarded as based on biased or unproven claims.
Impact of Brazilian Portuguese
The cultural influence of Brazilian Portuguese in the rest of the Portuguese-speaking world has greatly increased in the last decades of the 20th century, due to the popularity of
Brazilian music and
Brazilian soap operas. Since Brazil joined
Mercosul, the South American free trade zone, Portuguese has been increasingly studied as a second language in Spanish-speaking partner countries.
Many words of Brazilian origin (also used in other Portuguese-speaking countries) have also entered into
English:
samba,
bossa nova,
cruzeiro,
milreis,
capoeira, and especially
marimba. While originally Angolan, the words "capoeira" and "samba" only became famous worldwide because of their popularity in Brazil.
After independence in
1822, Brazilian idioms with African and Amerindian influences were brought to Portugal by returning
Portuguese-Brazilians (''Luso-Brasileiros'' in Portuguese) [and some Amerindian Brazilians (''Índio-Brasileiros'' in Portuguese),
Afro-Brazilians (''Afro-Brasileiros'' in Portuguese),
mulatos, and
cafuzos (known as zambos in English-speaking countries)], who brought rich culture mixed with African and Native American elements.
Bibliography
★ Azevedo, Milton. 2005. "Portuguese. A linguistic introduction". Cambridge University Press.
★ Azevedo, Milton; University of California. "Vernacular Features in Educated Speech in Brazilian Portuguese" http://www.cervantesvirtual.com/servlet/SirveObras/79117399329793384100080/p0000008.htm
★ Bagno, Marcos. "Português ou Brasileiro? (Portuguese or Brazilian?)" http://paginas.terra.com.br/educacao/marcosbagno/
★ Módolo, Marcelo. "As duas línguas do Brasil.(Two languages of Brazil)" Editora FAUUSP.
★ Perini, Mário. 2002. "Modern Portuguese. A Reference Grammar." Yale University Press. New Haven.
References
1. Dicionário Houaiss da Língua Portuguesa, p. 1882
See also
★
Portuguese dialects
★
Portuguese phonology
★
Portuguese grammar
★
Portuguese personal pronouns and possessives
★
Academia Brasileira de Letras
★
CELPE-Bras
★ , on the Portuguese
Wiktionary (in Portuguese)
★
Caipira
★
Mineiro
★
Manezês
★
Spelling reforms of Portuguese
External links
★
Learn Brazilian Portuguese - Audio and Video Lessons
★
Brazilian Portuguese Grammar - Grammar specifically designed for English speakers
★
Brazilian Portuguese Grammar, by Bruno Oliveira Maroneze at Orbis Latinus
★
English/Portuguese and Portuguese/English Translator and Dictionary
★
Vernacular Features in Educated Speech in Brazilian Portuguese
★
Instituto Camões - História da Língua Portuguesa no Brasil
★
Ubaldos Travels: Web-based Training for Brazilian Portuguese
★
Brazilian Portuguese Online
★
Brazilian and European Portuguese
★
List of words which are different in Brazilian and European Portuguese
★
Portuguese vs. Brazilian
★
European Portuguese vs. Brazilian Portuguese
★
Brazilian Portuguese bilingual dictionaries
العربية
中国
Français
Deutsch
Ελληνική
हिन्दी
Italiano
日本語
Português
Русский
Español
