=>well, spoken Brazilian Portuguese has lost inflection<=
-Is it genderless?!
-Is it written as phonetical portuguese?!
-Does the sytax differ?!
-Do the verbs?!
You can't compare this to Dutch and Afrikaans!
For me Bportu and reg. portu. is like American and British English...
Wanessa : That's a "phonetical" transcription of a dialectal form of Brasilian Portuguese (NorthEastern I guess). I can read it as Portuguese:
Tem uma coisa (de) que eu gostei muito,
E de madrugada comecei a pensar,
como ia ser interessante,
Escrevinhar uns tais ditos populares.
Tem uns que já são mais conhecidos,
como ajoelhou tem que rezar,
e também aqueles que diz,
sabeneu usa não vai fartar.
Uns até viraram moda,
e correram o Brasil inteiro,
que diz, quem gosta de homem é veado,
mulher gosta me'mo é de dinheiro.
Tem uns que são profundos,
e dá até me'mo reflexão,
Deus me livre dos amigos
porque os inimigos eu sei quem são.
Tem água mole em pedra dura,
tanto bate até que fura,
os anjinhos do pé sujo e santinho do pau oco,
e tem até uma no cravo e outra na ferradura.
Tem aquela da galinha,
que as velhas que dão cardo bom,
e a panela velha que faz comida boa,
que virou até moda de violão.
E as tais de lei de Morfe [Murphy],
que é coisa séria de pensar,
diz mais ou menos assim,
se tiver que dar errado, a cobra vai fumar.
Mas p'ra resumir p'ra vocês,
se conselho fosse bom nós vendia(mos),
o único conselho que presta é de mãe.
Que diz p'ra nós não anda(rmos) em má companhia.
SURELY NOT ANOTHER LANGUAGE ACCEPT IT!
Does the educated upper classes in Brazilian capital cities speak a variety that would be closer to International Standard Portuguese?
NO. EVEN UPPERCLASS PEOPLE SAY ''EU VI ELE'' (instead of '"VI-O'' or ''O VI'') I saw him; or ''EU FUI NA CASA DELA'' (instead of FUI A SUA CASA) I went to her home/house. Even upper class Americans say I'VE GOTTEN MYSELF INTO A MESS instead of I'VE GOT MYSELF INTO A MESS. Brazilian vernacular is shared by all Brazilians, no person in Brazil has standard Portuguese as their native tongue. We learn it at schools as it were a foreign language!
[and there is no such thing like ''international standard portuguese'']
Does the Brazilian Government and Brazilian Universities agree in making a different language?
Well, first steps have been done. Brazilian characteristics are recognized as valid, and professors have no linguistic prejudice toward our dialect. Formal Portuguese is taught, but only in a written form. It is as useful as Latin for an Italian-speaker. And as distant.
What is the % of Brazilians with a High School Diploma? It might be an awful lot but I don't know, so I ask.
I don't know, but, according to Azevedo and other linguists, even Brazilians with high school diploma use Brazilian forms when they speak, and when they write in not formal situation. Lisbon-based norms are used only in formal writing (laws, political magazines like VEJA, science papers and so on).
Are there strong regional differences between different Brazilian regions?
Not many. In Rio and the South they use the pronoun TU: tu falou (you say), se tu for comigo (if you come with me)...while in the rest of the country we use the pronoun VOCÊ: você falou, se você for comigo...
In Brazilian vernacular both TU and VOCÊ are used, and with the 3rd person singular verb.
Which spoken variety would be taken as "central" for the new language?
There is, in fact, the spoken variaty used for GLOBOtv news: Brasília's accent, the most neutral accent in Brazil (along with Vitória's one).
I imagine you'd be interested in having the one, which is most evolved from Portuguese.
Well yes. In Brasília they say VOCÊ FALOU (you say) and not TU FALOU (you say) as in Rio. TU in Rio is remnant of Continental Portuguese arrival in the 19 century. Rio's accent is normally avoided in dubbing and news thing since it is very S-palatalizing and 90 % of Brazilians who pronounce S as S and not SH don't find it pleasant.
Will you translate all the archives and literature written in Portuguese in the past thousand years (including Brazilian works, of course, to this new language?)
No, there are prejudices toward Brazilian dialect, but we won't do the same. It's like in English. You don't necessarily translate Shakespeare into American English. If you want to use a more American form I JUST SAW you are free to use it. If you want to chose the more British form I'VE JUST SEEN you are free to chose it.
New Brazilian grammars are becoming more flexible: older forms are explained (ARCHAIC AND CONTINENTAL USAGE) but new forms are recommended and encouraged.
tchauzim!
OH! so now Brazillian Portuguese and Portuguese are like US english and British english?!A moment ago you compared them to dutch and Afrikaans...are you confused?!
MJD: "Give it up. Go read a book by Jorge Amado and tell me it's not Portuguese."
MJD: That's not the point Brazilians are refuting. What they say is that they may write portuguese but they speak only Brazilian. And to be honest, when I hear brazilians speaking it doesn't sound like Portuguese as spoken in Portugal and in Africa.
Some basic things Portuguese people don't understand:
feito um camundongo na garoa = like a mouse in the drizzle
um baita tchã = great charm
a guria espiou o boto = a girl spotted a dolphin
eu fui pego por uma vitaminada = a wonderful girl got me
a onça fez um guaxinim pifar = the jaguar make a raccon die
=>a girl spotted a dolphin<==>the jaguar make a raccon die <==> a wonderful girl got me <=
These are basic things?!
Well yes, it is basic vocabulary here in Brazil
http://www.brazzil.com/p47sep98.htm
A nice article explaining everything
According to many Portuguese people 160 million Brazilians speak the language wrongly. Are all Brazilians illiterate? Would they all be bilingual if they had to learn Portuguese?
A. Fabres (a Brazilian linguist who lives in London)
Wanessa: "Some basic things Portuguese people don't understand....."
The only words I do not understand are: tchã und guria (Brasilianisms). With the other words and sentences I have no trouble getting their meaning. They are even written in grammatically correct Portuguese.
Sander : it's no use, logic has nothing to do with all this. Brasilians hate speaking Portuguese, so they do their best to change it as they speak. That's the thing.
Wanessa : what about the poem, isn't it Portuguese or what? And I see you agree with me - at last - , Brasilian will exist as the sole language in Brasil, someday, God knows when. Unless you all give up writting, and then the problem would be solved.
It's a pity that this post-colonial conflict persists almost 200 years after Brasil's independence. Basically we all say the same things, but many of you use language issues as a weapon of revanche, which is sad.
Well TCHÃ AND GURIA are pretty basic. There is even a popular band called É O TCHAN which is loved even in Italy. Even Italians know what the word TCHAN mean.
Cê num saca bulhufas!
Wanessa : Who doesn't understand a thing? Me?
A nice example of real-life Brazilian Portuguese:
No avião:
Mamãe, cê quer que eu sento na janela ou no corredor?
-Senta na janela que eu vou sentar no corredor.
In the plane:
Mom, would you like me to sit by the window or by the aisle?
-Sit by the window and I will sit by the aisle.