Portuguese language

The Portuguese language (Portuguese português) is a language from the Romance branch of the Indo-European language family and forms the closer unit of Ibero-Romance with Spanish (the Castilian language), Catalan and other languages of the Iberian Peninsula. Together with Galician in northwestern Spain, it goes back to a common language of origin, Galician-Portuguese, which developed between late antiquity and the early Middle Ages. After the formation of the statehood of Portugal, the two present-day languages developed from it. Today, Portuguese is considered a world language.

It is spoken by over 240 million native speakers; including second language speakers, the number of speakers is about 270 million.

The Portuguese language spread around the world in the 15th and 16th centuries as Portugal built its colonial empire, which lasted in parts until 1975 and included what is now Brazil as well as territories in Africa and coastal Asia. The last to pass from Portuguese possession to China was Macau. As a result, Portuguese is now the official language of several independent states and is also spoken by many people as a minority or second language. In addition to Portuguese proper, there are about twenty creole languages on a predominantly Portuguese basis. Due to emigration from Portugal, Portuguese has become an important minority language in several states in Western Europe and in North America in recent decades.

Relationship with other languages

Portuguese, as a Romance language, has parallels with Spanish, Catalan, Italian, French, Romanian and the other Romance languages, especially in terms of grammar and syntax. In particular, it is very similar to Spanish in many aspects, but there are significant differences in pronunciation. However, with some practice, it is possible for a Portuguese to understand Spanish. If you consider the following sentence:

Ela fecha sempre a janela antes de jantar. (Portuguese)

Ela pecha sempre a fiestra antes de cear. (Galician)

Ella cierra siempre la ventana antes de cenar. (Spanish)

Almost all words in one language have very similar cognates in the other language, but these may be used very rarely.

Ela encerra sempre a janela antes de cear. (Portuguese, with little use of words)

(The phrase means, 'She always closes the window before dinner.')

(Latin: 'Illa claudit semper fenestram ante cenam.')

However, there are also a number of words where there is no relationship between the languages, causing problems for the respective speakers in the other country. Examples:

German	Spanish	Portuguese	Portuguese (Brazil)
raw ham	jamón (serrano)	presunto	presunto (cru)
Cooked ham	jamón dulce (York)	fiambre	presunto
Car repair shop	taller	oficina	oficina
Office	oficina	escritório	escritório
Train	tren	comboio	trem

There are places where Spanish and Portuguese are spoken side by side. Native speakers of Portuguese can usually read Spanish and often understand spoken Spanish relatively well; conversely, the latter is usually not the case due to the phonetic peculiarities of Portuguese.

Dialects

Standard Portuguese, also known as Estremenho, has changed more frequently throughout history than other variations. All forms of the Portuguese language of Portugal can still be found in Brazilian Portuguese. African Portuguese, especially the pronunciation of São Tomé and Príncipe (also called Santomense), has many similarities with Brazilian Portuguese. The dialects of southern Portugal have also preserved their idiosyncrasies, which include the particularly frequent use of the gerund. On the other hand, Alto-Minhoto and Transmontano in northern Portugal are very similar to Galician.

Standard Portuguese from Portugal is the preferred pronunciation in the former African colonies. Therefore, two forms can be distinguished, namely European and Brazilian; where it is commonly distinguished four major standard pronunciations, those of Coimbra, Lisbon, Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo, these are also the most influential pronunciations.

The most important pronunciations of Portuguese are the following, each with an audio example as an external link:

Dialect	Audio sample	Spoken in
Portugal
Açoriano	Audio sample	Azores
Alentejano	Audio sample	Alentejo
Algarvio	Audio sample	Algarve
Alto Minhoto	Audio sample	North of the city of Braga
Baixo-Beirão; Alto-Alentejano	Audio sample	Inner Central Portugal
Beirão	Audio sample	Central Portugal
Estremenho	Audio sample	Regions around Coimbra
Lisboeta		Regions around Lisbon
Madeirense	Audio sample	Madeira
Nortenho	Audio sample	Regions around Braga and Porto
Transmontano	Audio sample	Trás-os-Montes
Brazil
Caipira		Brazilian hinterland, including a large part of the state of São Paulo, Paraná, Mato Grosso do Sul, Goiás and southern Minas Gerais
Capixaba		State of Espírito Santo
Fluminense	Audio sample	State of Rio de Janeiro
Baiano		Bahia and Sergipe
Gaúcho		Rio Grande do Sul and Uruguay
Mineiro		State of Minas Gerais
Northestino	Audio sample	Northeastern States of Brazil
Nortista		Amazon Basin
Paulistano		Between megalopolis São Paulo in the west to do border with Rio de Janeiro state in the east
Sertanejo		States of Goiás, Mato Grosso and Mato Grosso do Sul
Sulista		State of Santa Catarina and central-southern State of Paraná
Africa
Luandense (Angolano)	Audio sample	Angola - region of the capital Luanda
Benguelense	Audio sample	Angola - Benguela Province
Sulista	Audio sample	Angola - South of the country
Caboverdiano	Audio sample	Cape Verde
Guineense	Audio sample	Guinea-Bissau
Moçambicano	Audio sample	Mozambique
Santomense	Audio sample	São Tomé and Príncipe
Asia
Timorense	Audio sample	East Timor
Macaense	Audio sample	Macau, China
Audio samples from Instituto Camões, Portugal: www.instituto-camoes.pt

Some examples of words that are called differently in Portugal than in Brazil or Angola are given below:

Germany	Portugal	Brazil	Angola
Pineapple	ananás¹, sometimes abacaxi²	abacaxi², sometimes ananás¹	abacaxi², sometimes ananás¹
go away, leave	ir embora¹ (or bazar³ among young people)	ir embora¹ (or vazar among young people)	bazaar³, ir embora¹
Bus	autocarro¹	ônibus²	machimbombo³
Mobile	telemóvel¹	celular²	telemóvel¹
Slum, shanty town	bairro de lata¹	favela²	musseque³

¹ Portuguese origin ² Brazilian origin ³ Angolan origin (Machimbombo is probably of Mozambican origin)

Differences in the written language

Portuguese had two varieties of written languages (Port. variedades), often referred to as padrões (standards), until the Acordo Ortográfico came into force in 2009. These are:

• European and African Portuguese
• Brazilian Portuguese

The differences between these variants concern vocabulary, pronunciation and syntax, especially in colloquial speech, whereas in the language of the upper classes these differences are less pronounced. However, these are dialects of the same language, the speakers of the two variants can easily understand the other.

Some differences in vocabulary are in fact none. In Brazil, the standard expression for 'carpet' is wallpaper. In Portugal, it is more common to use alcatifa. However, in Portugal there is also the regional expression wallte, just as in Brazil there is the regional expression alcatifa. For old words this is almost generally true, while in new words these differences are in fact country-specific, such as ônibus in Brazil and autocarro in Portugal.

More significant differences existed in orthography until the Acordo Ortográfico. In words containing cc, cç or ct, the first c is omitted in Brazil; in words containing pc, pç or pt, the p is omitted. These letters are not pronounced, but rather represent remnants from Latin, most of which have been eliminated in Brazil. Compare with Italian.

A few examples are:

Latin	Portugal and Africa	Brazil	Italian	Spanish	Translation
actio	acção	ação	azione	acción	deed, action
directio	direcção	direção	direzione	dirección	Direction
(electricus)	eléctrico	elétrico	elettrico	eléctrico	electrical
optimus	óptimo	ótimo	ottimo	óptimo	great

In addition, there are some differences in accentuation for the following reasons:

1. Different pronunciation: In Brazil, the o in Antônio, anônimo or Amazônia is pronounced closed, whereas in Portugal and Africa it is pronounced open. This is why in Portugal and Africa it is written António, anónimo or Amazónia respectively.
2. Simplification of reading: The combination qu can be read in two different ways: ku or k. To make reading easier, in Brazil the u is written with a trema when the pronunciation is ku, i.e. cinqüenta instead of cinquenta (fifty). However, this is no longer provided for in the latest spelling reform (see below).

A spelling reform was adopted with the Acordo Ortográfico in 1990 to achieve an international standard for Portuguese. However, it took until 2009 for the agreement to enter into force in Portugal and Brazil, having been ratified in 2008 by these two countries, as well as by Cape Verde and São Tomé e Príncipe (later followed by Guinea-Bissau; Angola and Mozambique have not ratified it to date, as of October 2014). As part of this reform, Portugal largely dropped the aforementioned c in cc, cç or ct and p in pc, pç or pt, alongside minor standardizations and attempts to agree on a coordinated approach to new loan words from other languages. Since then, spelling in Brazil and Portugal has been largely identical, with differences only for a few exceptions.

Languages derived from Portuguese

When Portugal began to build its colonial empire in the Middle Ages, the Portuguese language came into contact with the local languages of the conquered territories and mixed languages (pidgins) emerged, which were used as a lingua franca in Asia and Africa until the 18th century. These pidgin languages expanded their grammar and lexis over time and became colloquial languages of ethnically mixed populations. They exist under the following names in the following areas:

Cape Verde:

• Barlavento (Criol)
• Crioulo Sotavento (Kriolu)

Equatorial Guinea:

• Fá d'Ambô

Guinea-Bissau and Senegal:

• Crioulo / Kriol

India:

• Creole language of Diu
• Creole language of Vaipim
• Kristi
• Língua da Casa

Macau:

• Macaista

Malaysia, Singapore:

• Cristão/Papiá Kristang

Netherlands Antilles and Aruba:

• Papiamentu

São Tomé and Príncipe:

• Angolar
• Forro
• Lunguyê

Sri Lanka:

• Burgher

Suriname:

• Saramaccaans

Some hybrid dialects exist where Spanish and Portuguese meet:

• A Fala in Spain
• Barranquenho in Portugal
• Portuñol in Uruguay

Distribution of Portuguese dialects in Portugal


Distribution of Portuguese dialects in Brazil