Why is European Portuguese SO hard?! [3 Tips All Beginners Need]

[@PD55_]

Someone once said: "Learning a language is an act of friendship". Friendship takes effort. Thanks!

[@TalktheStreets]

Beautiful!

[@speakeuropeanportuguese]

As a teacher myself, I would not say that Portuguese is hard to learn. It is actually one of the easiest languages in the world to learn. The problem many students do face is understanding the spoken language. To be able to gain good comprehension skills, you need to listen to 'a lot' of Portuguese. When I learned Portuguese I had no idea about grammar. I couldn't tell a verb from an adjective and I learned fairly quickly! I am not even that smart (finished school at 15) But I managed to learn. I also learned alone, I never went to school to learn, I never had a teacher. Well. Actually to say I never had a teacher would be a lie. Portugal and the Portuguese were my teachers. I watched soap operas, that gave me a good grasp of the Brazilian (which is much easier to understand). I listened to Portuguese music, I watched Portuguese quiz shows, the news on the TV, and films with portuguese subtitles - that gave me a good grasp of the word order, which does not actually differ too much from the English. Especially when we get into the compound tenses. This is a latin based language, you would be amazed how many words you already know. So how did I learn so quickly. Because you need to listen at least (at least) an hour a day, to unadulterated spoken Portuguese. If you don't listen enough, you will never be able to get the melody and the rhythm of the language. If you are learning Portuguese - don't give up!

[@Phillip_Reese]

Yes, you have to surrender to the language. Read my comment above, you surrendered, I rejected. Odd!

[@speakeuropeanportuguese]

@@Phillip_Reese I had a partner that told me I would never learn Portuguese. I just had to prove him wrong. I scared the life out of him when I starting speaking. 😆

[@Brunão-t4n]

Comentário cirúrgico. O português é um idioma onde é praticamente impossível de conseguir a fluência, pois é um idioma com muito vocabulário, declinação, gramática, e é o idioma com mais regras verbais. Além de que eu aprendi russo e húngaro (considerados difíceis para falantes de idiomas românicos) e simplesmente quando percebi que aprendi, depois de muito tempo, (não percebi que aprendi, simplesmente parei para pensar que falava naturalmente, fazia pesquisas propositais nesses idiomas, e etc) vi que isso é algo subjetivo, com seu método de estudo, vontade, e idioma nativo. Então não existe idioma "fácil" ou "difícil". Espero ter ajudado-te com minha experiência.

[@speakeuropeanportuguese]

@@Brunão-t4n Não é mais difícil do que outra língua...

[@Brunão-t4n]

@@speakeuropeanportuguese Tecnicamente não existe dificuldade, mas o português é o idioma que há mais estudantes nativos, do que de estrangeiros, como no caso do inglês e alemão. Isso faz com que as universidades aqui em Portugal, normalmente, contem cursos de letra, de linguística, e língua estrangeira. Em comparação ao um idioma considerado mais difícil, o russo, eles estudam apenas do 1° ao 8°, sendo que maior parte das vezes é revisão, já que no 7° já tem uma base gramatical. Ou seja, é muito exagerado considerar o nível de dificuldade dos idiomas por motivos tão inúteis, como o alfabeto, e fonética; o mandarim tem tons nas palavras, que são três, e também cada palavra têm um caractere, mas temos que lembrar que não existe gramática, além de que com o conhecimento básico sobre sufixos no mandarim, faz com que forme muitas palavras. Ou seja, um idioma pode ter dificuldades, mas pode ter coisas mais simples comparado aos outros, por exemplo, o tempo verbal em russo é simplesmente 3, passado; futuro; presente, mas temos que saber que no português tem várias formas do passado, futuro e presente, já no russo é só colocar a preposição que indica algo mais específico, ex "pa" em russo "por" aí caso queira colocar "estive" usa "pa" no início, ou "s" como em sdelaiu.

[@UltimateMoralizer]

É verdade que Portuguese é um idioma muito difícil e complicado, mas estou tentado e estou progredindo devagar. Eu moro em Londres mas eu falo com os brasileiros frequentemente. É muito útil.

[@michelipires2240]

I'd say brazilian version is syllable timed whereas portuguese version is stressed timed. There´s an interesting fact when portuguese people open the vowels, brazilians tend to closed them and vice-versa.

[@TalktheStreets]

Yes, that's exactly right, EU PT is stress-timed :)

[@Krka1716]

I would put it in another way. PT-PT is globally more stress-timed than BR-PT but it depends on various factors (dialect, speed, speaker etc.). This seems to be a word by word feature. Sometimes there are BR-PT varieties, in which the pronunciation of certain words can be more stressed-timed than continental PT ones. The main difference is, I believe, the higher 'tonic contrast' of PT-PT compared to BR-PT, i.e. in global terms, PT-PT opens the tonic vowel more than BR-PT and closes the unstressed ones more than BR-PT. This may be amplified by the higher diversity of unstressed vowels of PT-PT, allowing a higher level of 'elasticity' (in terms of vowel reduction) without meaningful loss of clarity for a PT-PT native.

[@sandraedward7454]

Thank you am trying it’s so hard but with your lessons I have hope thank you so much

[@TalktheStreets]

You are so welcome!

[@Imjust.warmingup]

Portuguese is very different and hard, one of the reasons is because of our own way to express our toughts and emotions, leading to the use of words in a way that is intrinsic in our culture. With the right Effort, anyone can achieve a good level of Portuguese, and grow even more.

[@Phillip_Reese]

I was born in Portugal (Lisbon), studied there until I was 12 (boarding school, Colegio Militar), a little later when I was 15, just a few months, and all the other studies in Angola, and still I never learned to speak Portuguese properly. I do not know the reason, well, I know, I think, but the reality is that I have never been successful in any Portuguese exam, from primary school to high school. There seems to be no reason, but I have an idea. The same idea that made me renounce my Portuguese nationality. The fact is that I ran away from home when I was five, and again when I was seven, when I divorced my mother (in my mind), although I had to live with her for two more years. So I say you need a good Portuguese woman (or friend, or man) in your life to get the language right. I simply rejected my mother's language. The conclusion is that by fighting her through the language - I started saying a few words when I was five - I got nothing out of it. What I know now is that if you do not learn one language well, it will affect your ability to learn any other language.

[@yooo-cb4sf]

Heyy can you please teach us some small talk about peoples day e.g how was your day? what are you doing today etc

[@speakeuropeanportuguese]

Good suggestion!

[@TalktheStreets]

Hey! I cover that here: kzbin.info/www/bejne/e56Wcmydgq-ob7csi=-RaBs5HB5XpAXTIe hope you enjoy it!

[@galina3141]

Love your lessons and wish to have personal school with you

[@kareemdjerdjouri2231]

As far as I know, European Portuguese speakers combine a definite article with a person's name or a possessive + a noun - e.g O Riu, A minha casa. Brazilians optionally and usually drop off the article if I am not mistaken - e.g. Riu, Minha Casa

[@kareemdjerdjouri2231]

@@ChefeDeEstado É Verdade. Há muitos varicōes da lingua nos ambos pais. Até em Portugal Interior, têm sotaques differentes tais como os sotaques do Porto, Algarve etc.

[@NafisAhmed-r9x]

Thanks from Bangladesh

[@jdavid118]

I'm a little bummed here, I like your videos and teaching style. I need to learn Brazilian Portuguese though.. if there are any channels you could direct me to it would be appreciated. Thank you!

[@TalktheStreets]

There are a ton of videos/channels for Brazilian Portuguese, as well as apps! Way more than European Portuguese. :)

[@lxportugal9343]

It's a matter of getting use to Brazilians usually dub, but the reason is because they never broadcast anything from Portugal other than 2 or 3 soap operas (and they dubed them too). The first time I watched Snow White and the 7 Dwarfs from Brazil, I couldn't understand the dwarfs... not a single one... and they are 7

[@lxportugal9343]

RTP once broadcasted a soap opera made in Azores, people phone RTP complaining they couldn't understand. RTP wouldn't care less and didn't remove it out of the air neither subtitle it. On the other hand In Brazil, the 1st Portuguese soap opera (Morangos com açúcar) being broadcasted, started receiving complains from Brazilians and the Tv network remove it out of the air, dubb it, and put it back on. No wonder Brazilians don't understand us... *they never hear us* ... other Portuguese speakung countries have no problem understanding us

[@Krka1716]

@@lxportugal9343Yes, they seem to live in a very closed mainstream media ecosystem, largely ignoring the rest of the lusophone world media... Dubbing portuguese media contents in Brazil🤔...this renders any Portuguese person... shall we say... speechless... (pun intended) For a start, I would recommend subtitles... but no more than that...

[@msslma9318]

@@Krka1716hi, brazilian here! I’ve never seen any dubbed videos from european portuguese speakers in Brazil. Subtitles yes, it’s done a lot but not always - only when the speaker has a strong & difficult accent - and that is regardless of where the person is from (including brazilians). If they have a strong and difficult accent, their speech will come with subtitles.

[@Krka1716]

​@@msslma9318 Yes, that would be the logical thing to do... Now, let me show you two videos with the same theme - Vinho do Porto - one is from TV Globo and the other is from CNN Brasil. Regarding the use of subtitles, the first one is utterly irreproachable, kzbin.info/www/bejne/kH3ZnWWah9Odjbc the second is simply ridiculous, considering the quality of the Portuguese spoken here.... kzbin.info/www/bejne/eX3UoIueht2Ij5o

[@portugal1969]

❤

[@paulwakeling1346]

Sim, é bastante difícil 😕 mas o meu idioma é também (inglês). As vezes, consigo falar ou entender alguns frases juntos em português. Sinto com uma surfista nova que levanta-se para alguns segundos 😊

[@Krka1716]

Exactamente. A língua inglesa e o português têm esta característica em comum, uma pronúncia que muitas vezes se pode revelar pouco intuitiva e bastante complexa.😊

[@ellyvanhulst935]

1:30

[@TheAlbertso]

That plant is driving me crazy.

[@FantasyDungeonMaster]

For slavik speakers is probably the easiest foreign language to lern😂