Talk:Portuguese dialects

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[edit] Accents versus dialects

To start with, it’s difficult to distinguish between accents and dialects. I think what’s being mentioned is closer to accents that dialects, but that a rather subjective call that I don’t intent to pursue.

When it’s said "The most prestigious dialects in Portugal are those of Lisbon and Coimbra for Portugal”, it represents a very narrow view of the country. It's well known all over Portugal that the major cities and some regions have very distinct accents/ dialects and some even say that the “truest” Portuguese is spoken in Coimbra’s region.

I don’t know how to evaluate a dialect/ accent in order to be able to call it “prestigious”, but I think it’s important to state that the easiest dialects/ accents to recognize are from Alentejo (some regions), Azores (some islands), Madeira and Oporto, followed by Algarve, Lisbon and Nordic interior regions (Beiras, Minho, Trás-Os-Montes and so).


According to the definition given in the Dialect article, "A dialect is distinguished by its vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation (phonology, including prosody). Where a distinction can be made only in terms of pronunciation, the term accent is appropriate, not dialect (although in common usage, 'dialect' and 'accent' are usually synonymous). As far as I know, there are dialects in the proper sense in Portugal, but not in Brazil, in spite of the wide variety of accents in the country. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 201.1.152.87 (talk) 22:14, 18 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] "Igreja" and "hoje"

I'm not sure that the pronunciation of "igreja" and "hoje" as "igreija" and "hoije" is an exclusive characteristic of northern accents. This diphthongation of stressed "e" before "j" seems widespread in Portugal, although the spelling does not show it. FilipeS 15:49, 27 June 2006 (UTC)

  • Maybe "igreja" is not a good example, but "hoije" surelly is a feature of Northern Portugal. Without a doubt.--Pedro 10:04, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] "vs" por "bs"

having merged /v/ with /b/ (like in Spanish) It is indeed true that this happens in northern portuguese. But does it happen so frequently that it should be seen as characteristic? Many people in the North (and i dare to say the vast majority of them) do not make such merging. Shouldn't that assertion be rephrased to something like: "a seen feature" or "feature of some speakers"?

Only speakers who force themselves to imitate the standard southern accents (Lisbon or Coimbra; take your pick) lack this merger. The natural northern pronunciation makes no distinction between "vela" and "bela", for instance. See Lindley Cintra's article. FilipeS 19:40, 27 December 2006 (UTC)
and that's not true, most Northern Portuguese still merge, some (not most!!) don't merge in "social" occasions (but many sure do at home) as most people are aware of that issue. Most people in the north don't make distinction between "vejo" and "beijo", and that's peculiar :P. "Eu te vejo" (I see you) "Eu te beijo" (I kiss you). -Pedro 22:19, 27 December 2006 (UTC)

I must disagree. I've always lived in Oporto and I don't merge. And I have what people call "a very strong northern accent". Most people of my acquaintance don't merge either. I'd vote for "a seen feature" or "a common feature" but definitely not for "a characteristic". It's quite rare actually... Especially in the younger generations! And btw Pedro, I can assure you that even with the merger they're able to distinguish between those two. ;) --LeRobert 21:04, 1 January 2007 (UTC)

What do you mean, "even with the merger they're able to distinguish between those two"?! "Merger" means no distinction. FilipeS 12:38, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

Nahh I was joking! :) --LeRobert 14:25, 2 January 2007 (UTC)

  • MY POV: The city of Porto, its municipality, has a specific problem, it has virtually no middle class, it has upper classes in regions of the city and lower in the rest, saw a map of Greater Porto when I did a research to make my town's article. Its neighbouring towns, most of it, are middle class cities, without neighbourhoods, with some exceptions, that can be classified as upper or lower classes. maybe that is why you have that view of things, maybe you live among the upper class with their social behaviour and linguistic tendencies. Because most people in Porto, really speak Portuguese in Northern Portugal way, at least in my experience, even young people, obviously there are the TV influences and the TV generation, especially socially. Now we are in the Internet generation, and even local tv channels where even tv hosts pronounce the local dialect, I recomend you to watch their vox populi programme, I don't know the name of that show, but it will be good to you to get in touch with the local reality, because they deal with simple people, people that don't care about that social linguistic tendencies. A lot of people pronounce \v\ in the street, but when relaxed or at home, things are a bit different. People in Lisbon say you have a very northern accent because there are many other things that are not so advertised as the \b\, so you are not aware in order to change your social linguistic behaviour, but a person from Lisbon will spot your region immediately. I even know people that only pronounce \v\, because they don't know where to use a \b\ or \v\, that is a sort of "diglossia". The other day, I even had a problem understanding a man, because of that, he pronounce V instead of B, my 5 yr old niece also had that problem. That is so dumb. But let's not talk about our personal experiences in the article, because wikipedia has a NPOV policy, let's keep our opinions in talk pages.--Pedro 15:54, 2 January 2007 (UTC)
I don't agree with you. Have a look at [1]. The majority of those people don't merge. And is it reasonable to advocate that people "force themselves in social conditions"? I know some people merge!!! But most don't... I'll try to find more scientific evidence to corroborate what I'm saying. Cheers! --LeRobert 19:24, 4 January 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Comment

When and if I learn Portuguese, it will be my second language. I actually want to learn both versions of Portuguese so I can be most effectively understood in the Portuguese-speaking world. This article is particularly interesting concerning dialects. It would be cool if someone had audio samples along with the text samples. I am an American college student.

learnportuguese 20:30, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

[edit] tone in Portuguese

I think that there should be a section on how tone plays a role in the Portuguese language. It would be very interesting to have Wikipedians contribute information about how perhaps different dialects of Portuguese use tone differently (compare, for example, some English English dialects use a falling tone at the end of a questions, whereas American English dialects use a rising tone). Sometimes when I'm listening to a webcast in Portuguese, I cannot tell whether they are making an exclamation or asking a question. It would be interesting to compare the differences of Portuguese tone to other languages. :-) learnportuguese (talk) 02:05, 27 January 2008 (UTC)

While interesting, that kind of information is not essential (tone is not phonemic in Portuguese), and it's also quite variable with dialects and difficult to come by. Take a look at the various articles on the English language -- I don't think any of them mentions tone more than in passing. FilipeS (talk) 12:46, 29 January 2008 (UTC)

[edit] my comments

Someone once told me that there are different dialects in Portugal, notably Lisboa, Oporto, Alentejo, north, south, and other ones too. What are people on Wikipedia thinking? learnportuguese (talk) 20:47, 21 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] list of dialects

In the list of dialects, the links for gaucho and paulistano don't link to articles about these dialects. I may do this when I have more time, but someone needs to creat articles about these dialects or needs to remove the wiki markup for links on these two items. Thanks. learnportuguese (talk) 16:11, 14 March 2008 (UTC)