Thirty-Fourth Edition - Brazilian and European Portuguese

Brazilian and European Portuguese

Portuguese is one of the world’s ten most frequently spoken languages. It is also one of the languages of the European Union, and the official language of the following seven countries:

Angola (population 11 million): located in Southern Africa, between Namibia and Democratic Republic of the Congo, Angola is a former Portuguese colony that became independent in 1975. Portuguese is the official language of Angola; Bantu and other African languages, such as Chokwe, Kongo, Kwanyama are also spoken.
Brazil (population 183 million): Brazil occupies 48% of South America and is the leading economic power in the region. Colonized by the Portuguese in the 16^th century, Brazil declared its independence from the mother country in 1822. Portuguese is the official language of Brazil, other languages are Spanish, English and French.
East Timor (population 997,853 ) : Located in Southeastern Asia, the Portuguese colony of Timor declared its independence from Portugal on November 1975, but was promptly invaded by Indonesia in December of that same year and incorporated into Indonesia in July 1976, as the province of East Timor. The official languages of East Timor are Tetum and Portuguese, other languages are Indonesian and English. There are 16 indigenous languages.
Guinea-Bissau (population 1.4 million): Located in Western Africa, between Guinea and Senegal, Guinea-Bissau is a former Portuguese colony that became independent in 1974. The official language is Portuguese, other languages are Crioulo and African languages, such as Balanta-Kentohe, Mandinka, Pulaar.
Mozambique (population 17.5 million): Located in South-eastern Asia, between South Africa and Tanzania, Mozambique had been a Portuguese colony for five centuries when it declared its independence in 1975. The official language of Mozambique is Portuguese, other languages are indigenous dialects, such as Lomwe, Makhuwa, Marenje.
Portugal (population 10.1 million speakers): Located in Southwestern Europe, west of Spain. Portugal enjoyed wealth and status as a world power during the 15th and 16th centuries. The destruction of Lisbon in the earthquake of 1755, the occupation during the Napoleonic Wars, and Brazil's independence in 1822 caused Portugal to lose much of its wealth and status. In 1978, Portugal granted independence to all its African Colonies. Portugal has been a member country of the EU since 1986.
São Tomé e Príncipe (population 175,883): Islands located in the Gulf of Guinea, Western Africa, became a colony of Portugal in the late 15th century. São Tomé e Príncipe declared independence from Portugal in 1975. The official language is Portuguese.

Portuguese is also one of the two major languages of Cape Verde; located in Western Africa, west of Senegal. Colonized by the Portuguese in the 15th century, Cape Verde became independent in 1975. The other major language of Cape Verde is Crioulo, a blend of Portuguese and West African). It is also one of the two major languages of Macau, the first European settlement in the Far East in the 16^th Century. On December 20, 1999 the former Portuguese colony became the Macau Special Administrative Region (SAR) of China. The other major language in Macau is Chinese (Cantonese).

For purposes of this newsletter, we will focus on Brazilian and European Portuguese, emphasizing the differences between these two language versions.

Brazilian Portuguese is an offshoot of the language of the mother country, Portugal. With eighteen times the population of Portugal and 5,254,630 square miles (8,456,510 km²), Brazil is significantly larger than Portugal, which is approximately the size of the State of Indiana, in the United States (57,136 square miles, 91,951 km² ). Brazilian music is popular around the world and Portuguese speakers in many countries tune in to Brazilian soap operas (telenovelas), a fact that may explain why European Portuguese have an easier time understanding spoken Brazilian than the other way around.

Actually, this is similar to the situation that exists between the United States and the United Kingdom: American English derived from the language of the mother country, the UK. With five times the population of the UK, and an area equivalent to half of South America, the US is slightly larger than Brazil, while the UK is a bit smaller than the State of Oregon in the United States. US music and films are exported worldwide, which may also explain why Britons are able to understand spoken American English better than Americans understand some varieties of British English.

A few examples of differences between Brazilian and European Portuguese

Vocabulary: Distance and immigration have contributed to lexical differences between Brazilian and European Portuguese. Italians, Germans, Japanese and their Spanish speaking neighbors have introduced new words into the language. Other words have entered through contact with foreign products and technologies. However, some experts attribute the greatest differences between the languages to the influence of Amerindian languages, such as Tupian, or Tupí-Guaraní, which was the language used by the natives to communicate with Portuguese traders, missionaries and adventurers, and which continued to be used in the Amazon and Western Brazil until the 19^th century. Take for example, the word for pineapple. In European Portuguese, it is ananas, similar to other European languages, but in Brazilian Portuguese it is abacaxi, as in Amerindian.

The Tupian influence is also found in the differences in pronunciation between European Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese. The latter is more nasal and Brazilians speak more slowly, pronouncing all the vowels. On the other hand, European Portuguese has been influenced also by its neighbors, particularly Spain and France, as evidenced by words like tejadilho (from the Spanish tejadillo) used in Portugal for “roof” and estore (from the French store) used in Portugal for roll-up curtains.

Brazil has accepted more US technical terms into the language. Words such as software, mouse and site remain in English in Brazil, but in Portugal they are translated to: logicial, rato and sitio. On the other hand, the term for screen in Portugal is écran or ecrã (from the French écran), but in Brazil, it is tela.

Overnight (as in A volta do overnight, a sudden change, or as a travel term: Grand Canyon Overnight 4 dias / 3 noites) is commonly used in Brazil, but not in Portugal.

Some differences could cause misunderstandings, such as the word bizarre, which a Portuguese interprets as galhardo, gentil, nobre (gallant, gentle, noble), but to a Brazilian means bizarre, weird. Also, Drogaria: A Brazilian would expect to find medicine in such an establishment, but a Portuguese would go there in search of household items, such as cleaning and painting supplies.

Spelling: Brazilian and European Portuguese differ slightly, but the two countries have made efforts to standardize the rules of spelling, so the written word is mutually intelligible. For example, Brazilian Portuguese tends to suppress surplus letters and consonant doublings that are common in European Portuguese. The following are a few examples:

English	Portuguese (EU)	Portuguese (BR)
stockholder	accionista	acionista
fact	facto	fato
subtle	subtil	sutil
action	acção	ação
actual	actual	atual
selections	selecções	seleções
optimum	óptima	ótima

Grammatical Differences:

a. Use of the infinitive vs. the gerund: In European Portuguese I am working is estou a trabalhar and I am writing is estou a escrever, but in Brazilian Portuguese the gerund is used instead estou trabalhando, estou escrevendo. Both forms are understood in Brazil and Portugal, but while Brazilian form is used in certain regions of Portugal and is considered correct in some situations, the Portuguese form is not used in Brazil.

b. Position of object pronouns: Brazilians use the object pronoun before the verb, even in formal writing, but the Portuguese do not. Examples:

English	Portuguese (EU)	Portuguese (BR)
Someone told me	Alguém disse-me	Alguém me disse
Someone saw me	Alguém viu-me	Alguém me viu

Are two different versions of Portuguese a requirement?

This is one of the questions that we, as most other translation companies, often have to answer. Linguistically, the two written versions of Portuguese are mutually intelligible. Ideally, a translation should meet the cultural and linguistic requirements of the target market, i.e., it should sound natural to the native reader. However, the pursuit of this goal would require that the websites, manuals, software, etc. be translated into every language and version thereof of the intended target audience, such as Canadian and European French, US and UK English, Castilian and different varieties of South American Spanish, and so on. This is not always possible from the standpoint of budget and logistics (for example, not enough space on a label of package insert).

The selection of the language version appropriate for your requirements should also take into consideration whether the overriding factor is to meet the requirements of the larger target market, or to comply with the language requirement of the European Union (EU). In the case of Portuguese, European Portuguese is one of the languages of the EU, therefore it might be a requisite for export into Europe.

A cost-saving alternative for those who would like to offer two versions of Portuguese on a limited budget, is to translate into one of the two versions (Brazilian or European), and then edit as needed to meet the requirements of the other. If you select this option, you should keep in mind that most translators prefer to start from scratch, because edited versions rarely sounds equally as natural to a native speaker as an original translation.

References:

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/br.html

http://www.nationmaster.com/encyclopedia/Differences-between-Brazilian-and-European-Portuguese-varieties

http://www.orbilat.com/Modern_Romance/Ibero-Romance/Portuguese-Brazilian/Brazilian.html