Brazilians speak Portuguese like in Portugal but not as the Portuguese people. In this post, you will learn about Brazil`s official language and its particularities compared with Portuguese spoken in other countries.
Can you imagine this often common scenario in Rio?
Foreign: – Do you speak English?
Carioca: – Yes!
Foreign: – Yes?!
Carioca: – No
Foreign: – What?
Carioca: – No, sorry. Mas de boa! (But don’t worry!) I will help you!
The official language of Brazil is Brazilian Portuguese. It’s called so because, although Portugal colonized Brazil, and therefore we speak Portuguese, there are many differences between the Portuguese spoken in Portugal and Brazil.
Furthermore, it’s very noticeable the differences between Brazilian Portuguese spoken by people who live in the South, the Center or the North of the country. Each region of Brazil has its accent and slangs. And sometimes, people from the South area can’t understand people from the North and vice versa.
This difference has happened because each place received different cultural influences from different people and languages of the world. We even have different accents between neighborhoods!
Even in Rio de Janeiro, the Cariocas speak in their singular way. We say it’s a “wheezing Portuguese” always emphasizing the “sh” sound. (Don’t know what Carioca is? Take a look at this post here)
But fear not, we don’t have Dialects in Brazil. Altheseis differences are mainly in Phonetics.
Moreover, we have many Slangs, and this means particularisms in Semantics. In our website, we will always use the Carioca / Rio Slang in our posts as we want you to know the Marvelous City from the citizen’s perspective.
The important thing is:
If you speak Portuguese, you’ll be able to understand everything and talk to almost everyone. When you speak slowly, we usually understand Spanish pretty well too.
However, if you don’t speak Portuguese, Spanish or any other language, you also don’t need to worry!
Most Cariocas always try to communicate and help the visitors (and this is not Marketing, it’s true!). It’s very common to see Cariocas trying to talk to tourists without knowing a word of their language. And this is why people say that Cariocas are the friendliest people in the world.
Additionally, it’s important to say that the main tourist attractions have information in English and staff who can speak English and other languages. Besides that, the central neighborhoods are full of boards with information in Portuguese and English, like this one you can see on this picture.
So, don’t worry! Come to Rio, and we’ll be glad to welcome you!
Carioca from Laranjeiras. Co-founder and content producer of Rio by Cariocas. Good humor and positivity should be your first and last name. Around here he writes about Carioca’s lifestyle.
