Lesson number one
Lição numero um
GreetingsThe first thing to know when learning a language is to say hello! You'll also need to say goodbye, and of course, to wish people a good day. These expressions are the most common in Portugal, but there are many others.
Olá - Hello, Hi
Oi - Hello, Hi (used mainly in Brazil)
Bom dia - Good morning
Boa tarde - Good afternoon
Boa noite - Good evening, Good night
Chau, Adeus - Goodbye
Simple WordsBeing limited to saying hello is quite frustrating. To expand your vocabulary, here is a list of some simple words. They might not be very useful, but we'll need them for lesson 2, when we will start making some short sentences.
Some Verbs:Ser - To be (permanent form)
Estar - To be (transient form)
Ter - To have
Cantar - To sing
Comer - To eat
Partir - To break, to leave
Some Nouns:Mulher - Woman
Homem - Man
Rapariga - Girl
Rapaz - Boy
Gato - Cat
Cão - Dog
Some Adjectives:Bom / Boa - Good
Mau / Má - Bad
Belo / Bela - Beautiful
Feio / Feia - Ugly
Novo / Nova - Young, New
Velho / Velha - Old
As you may have noticed, there are two forms for each adjective: the masculine and the feminine. In portuguese, the adjective must agree with the noun in both gender and number. For those of you who are getting scared and thinking that this is too complicated, just look at the above examples. In most cases it is very straightforward to turn the masculine into feminine: just change the final o to an a. Want to make it plural? Even more simple: just add an s.
The NumbersThere are people who collect numbers. Really, the first thing (and very often the only thing...) they learn in a foreign language are the numbers. Why people like them so much? I don't know, but I don't want to make anyone sad, so here are the numbers in Portuguese:
0 - Zero
1 - Um
2 - Dois
3 - Três
4 - Quatro
5 - Cinco
6 - Seis
7 - Sete
8 - Oito
9 - Nove
10 - Dez
11 - Onze
12 - Doze
13 - Treze
14 - Catorze (also "Quatorze" in Brazil)
15 - Quinze
16 - Dezasseis (also "Dezesseis" in Brazil)
17 - Dezassete (also "Dezessete" in Brazil)
18 - Dezoito
19 - Dezanove
20 - Vinte
30 - Trinta
40 - Quarenta
50 - Cinquenta
60 - Sessenta
70 - Setenta
80 - Oitenta
90 - Noventa
100 - Cem
101 - Cento e um
110 - Cento e dez
200 - Duzentos
300 - Trezentos
1000 - Mil
1001 - Mil e um
2000 - Dois mil
5000 - Cinco mil
etc
This was mostly basic info
This is going to be much harder from now!
Lesson number two
Lição numero dois
Pronunciation!!!
Vowels There are 4 defined ‘qualities’ of Portuguese vowels, known as open, close, reduced, and nasal. These are not really hard-and-fast rules of pronunciation, more a categorisation of the ranges of sound that the vowels can represent. It is important to recognise these distinctions, because certain words rely on them to make their meaning clear.
For example, the word ‘jogo’ can mean ‘game’ or ‘I play’, depending on whether the pronunciation of the first ‘o’ is open or close. The basic ranges of sounds for these vowel qualities are set out in the following table:
Knowing when to use what type of vowel is to a large extent dependent on practise, but there are some rules that can help you. If a vowel has a circumflex over it (^), it must be pronounced using the close quality. If it has an acute accent (slanting upwards like this: ´ ), you must use the open quality – usually the acute é is pronounced as more of an ‘ay’.
A tilde (~) over a vowel indicates a nasal pronunciation, as does the letter m or n following the vowel (note that an ‘n’ or ‘m’ can follow a vowel which has an acute or circumflex accent over it – in which case both the nasal and open or close qualities should be evident in the way you pronounce it).
When a word ends with a vowel, or starts with an ‘e’, you would normally use the reduced quality unless there is an accent to indicate otherwise – however, an ‘e’ at the end of a word, followed by a vowel at the start of the next word, normally requires the ‘e’ to become more ‘close’ – like the ‘e’ in ‘people’ (this is for ease of articulation).
So bearing in mind these principles, the following is a rather rough guide to get you started on pronouncing Portuguese vowels. With listening practise, you will be able to hone your pronunciation skills and will hopefully improve naturally as time goes by.
Audio
(click the letters to listen the portuguese pronunciation)
A -like ‘a’ in ‘cat’ except when on the stressed syllable, when it is more like the ‘a’ in ‘father’.
ã - similar to ‘an’ in ‘angry’
e - like ‘e’ in ‘net’ except when used as a word on its own without an accent or at the end of a word which is followed by a word that starts with a vowel, when it is pronounced like ‘e’ in ‘people’, or if it is followed by another vowel (in the same word), when it is more like the ‘e’ in ‘chalet’ (more of an ‘ay’ than an ‘e’).
ê - like ‘e’ in ‘net’, or a cross between the ‘ea’ of ‘ear’ and the ‘ai’ of ‘air’.
é - like ‘e’ in ‘net’, or like the ‘e’ in ‘chalet’.
i - like ‘i’ in simple, but with a very slightly longer sound (tending towards the ‘ee’ of ‘free’).
o - usually like ‘o’ in ‘hot’ when stressed, but when on its own or at the end of a word, it is like a weak version of the ‘o’ in ‘who’. Use of the close pronunciation (like the ‘oa’ in ‘coal’) is often impossible to determine except by careful listening practise – unless of course the circumflex (^) is used.
ô - like ‘oa’ in ‘coal’
u - like the last ‘u’ in ‘kung fu’.
DiphthongsAny pair of vowels that is pronounced as a single syllable is a diphthong. Not all diphthongs have accents on them – so don’t be fooled into thinking that accents have anything to do with whether a vowel is part of a diphthong. Where two vowels have one sound, they form a diphthong. That’s it.
Note: In all the following examples, 'ow' should be pronounced as in 'cow', not as in 'throw'
Audio
(click to listen)
ão - ow[ng]
au - ow
ao - ow (there is no discernable difference between the pronunciation of 'au' and 'ao')
õe - oi[ng]
oi - oi
ãe - aye[ng]
ai - aye (note, 'ai' is not always a diphthong. It is not a diphthong if it appears before a 'z' at the end of a word, before an 'nh' anywhere in a word, or before 'l', 'r', 'm' or 'n' if the consonant does not start a new syllable – don’t worry too much about that though, I’m just being pedantic!)
ou - ‘o’ like in ‘hot’, but a little bit more drawn out (tending towards the 'o' in 'flow'). Note: This is very often mispronounced by the English! The temptation is to pronounce it like ‘oo’ in ‘food’, but this is wrong!
ei - ‘a’ like in ‘hay’
The following two diphthongs are only used to affect the pronunciation of a preceding consonant 'g'; or 'q'. Where a different consonant precedes the vowel pair, or a diaeresis (2 little dots) is used over the 'u', they are not diphthongs – both vowels must be pronounced.
ui - same as the pronunciation of the Portuguese vowel 'i' (only a diphthong when used straight after a 'g', or 'q')
ue - same as the pronunciation of the Portuguese vowel 'e' (only a diphthong when used straight after a 'g', or 'q')
Note: Any other vowel pairing is not really a diphthong – both vowels must be pronounced (eg. ‘eu’ is pronounced ‘ayu’). Some reference works list ‘eu’, ‘iu’ and other pairings as diphthongs, but personally I prefer to think of them as 2 separate vowels because they do require 2 separate syllables - albeit they are slurred together.
The following words include some vowel pairs which are not diphthongs – to give you practise in both.
então - entow[ng] - so
foi - foi - was
mãe - my[ng] - mother
mau - mow - bad
mão - mow[ng] - hand
Paulo - Powlu - Paulo is a 1st name
pai - pie - father
falei - falay - i talked
outro - ohtru - other
rainha - rainya - queen
raiz - raeezj - root
The words ‘rainha’ and ‘raiz’ use the ‘ai’ pairing, but are not diphthongs (were you paying attention?!). There are not many words like that, so I’m being a bit mean really by throwing those two in! Most of the time that you come across ‘ai’, it will be pronounced like the ‘ie’ in ‘pie’.
The Portuguese language also contains a few triphthongs – three vowels pronounced as a single syllable. Usually this is in the form of ‘uei’ following a ‘g’ or ‘q’ (eg. ‘queijo’), where the sound is the same as the diphthong ‘ei’.
Consonants (on progress)
