Flags of Brazil and Portugal
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Centuries ago, the Portuguese crossed the seas and expanded the domains of their empire, colonizing Brazil, Macau, Cape Verde and other places. One of the main hallmarks of this era continues to become more alive, pulsating and adaptable every day: the Portuguese language, celebrated this May 5th.
In the opposite direction, today it is Brazilians, the descendants of the former colony, who cross the Atlantic in search of more opportunities. The numbers are significant: 400,000 documented Brazilians live in Portugal, which represents 40% of the foreign population in the country, according to data from the Foreigners and Borders Service (SEF) from 2023.
The Brazilian presence in Portuguese lands, added to the strength of the cultural impact that Brazil has on other Portuguese-speaking countries, with soap operas, music, literature and digital influencers, makes the Brazilian language increasingly ‘popular’. There is no shortage of reports of Portuguese people “scared” by the use of “Brazilian” on Portuguese soil — this is how they refer to the Portuguese spoken in Brazil.
Post-doctorate in Applied Linguistics and professor at PUC-SP, Neusa Barbosa Bastos remembers that language changes and fighting against it is a losing battle.
“Latin has been modified into several neo-Latin languages, as well as other languages. There is no point trying to stop this, because these changes are constant and gradual. It is the people who change the language. Therefore, saying that European Portuguese is pure is inadequate, there is no purity. We are a mixture of races, of people and these groups were altering our language in a new way”, he says.
An ocean of differences
All it takes is a dialogue with a Portuguese person or the subtitles of a film in European Portuguese for the differences between Brazilian Portuguese and the Portuguese spoken in Portuguese lands to become evident. This occurs in different orders: orthographic, phonological, morphosyntactic and, perhaps, the one that causes the most unusual situations, the lexical difference, when the same words or expressions have different meanings.
‘Bicha’ loses its negative connotation and becomes just ‘queue’ in Portugal. ‘Bala’ becomes ‘candy’, ‘bathroom’ becomes ‘bathroom’ and so on.
In speech, more changes.
“Tonic syllables are very marked in European Portuguese and this does not happen in Brazilian Portuguese. In general, we tend to give a more similar amount of force, there is no such marked difference”, explains Valquíria Carvalho, PhD in Linguistics and professor from PUC-MG.
In general, Brazilian Portuguese has more rhythmic speech, with more evidence in the pronunciation of vowels. European Portuguese, on the other hand, tends to ‘eat’ unstressed vowels and speak faster.
Other differences are worth highlighting:
In Brazilian Portuguese, the pronoun comes before the verb (proclisis). In European Portuguese, the pronoun occurs after the verb (enclisis).
PT-PT: Tell me what to do / lend me the pen / give me a piece of bread
PT-BR: Tell me what to do / lend me your pen / give me a piece of bread
The gerund (when verbs end in ndo) indicate an action in progress. In Brazil, it is used frequently, in speech or writing. In Portugal, the preference is to use the a + the verb in the infinitive.
PT-PT: I’m walking / I’m talking / Are you waking up?
PT-BR: I’m walking / I’m talking / Are you waking up?
In general, the use of you in Brazil it is more common in the extreme south of the country and in some regions of the north. However, it tends to mix between the second and third grammatical person. An example would be the phrase: “Are you going to travel tomorrow?“. The verb go appears conjugated in the third person (vai), but, according to educated Portuguese, the correct option would be “vais” (second person) or changing the pronoun to “Você”.
In Brazil, “you” is used informally. Neusa explains that, in European Portuguese, “tu” is used in informal treatment between people.
“For them, ‘you’ indicates a distance, it is a more formal form”, he adds.
Sweet, cool or pica: what do these words mean in Portugal?
After all, why are we different?
What makes Brazilian Portuguese different from European Portuguese is precisely the process of formation of Brazil. Portuguese was strongly influenced by indigenous languages, languages of African origin and also by other languages brought by other immigrants (Italians, Japanese, Arabs, etc.).
“We have this enormous distance, an ocean between us, and we have the influence of indigenous languages, in addition to languages of African origin, mainly of Bantu origin, which left very characteristic marks on our language. These influences shaped Brazilian Portuguese” , explains Valkyrie.
Furthermore, the expert highlights that Portuguese came to be effectively spoken in Brazil in the 18th century, when gold was found in Minas Gerais. Thus, more and more Portuguese came to the country.
“Before that, what existed were general languages that were of indigenous origin”, he adds.
Another important aspect is Brazilian independence, in 1822, led to a decrease in the ‘presence of the colonizer’. This would help to explain why Mozambican and Angolan Portuguese, for example, are closer to European Portuguese.
“We were colonized from 1500 until 1822. We were 153 years ahead of these other countries, which had the independence process in 1975. There were 153 [a mais] for Portuguese to develop in Brazil”, concludes Neusa.
Source: Redação Terra
