European Portuguese
| European Portuguese Português europeu / Português de Portugal |
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Spoken in |
Portugal (African Portuguese is strongly oriented towards European, although there are differences to the latter and also within the various PALOPs .) | |
| speaker | approx. 10.5 million (if you include the African speakers, you have to assume at least double that.) | |
| Linguistic classification |
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European Portuguese ( português europeu ), also known as Lusitanian Portuguese ( português lusitano ) and Portuguese Portuguese ( português de Portugal ) in Brazil, refers to the Portuguese language as spoken in Portugal . The pronunciation of standard Portuguese, the prestige variant based on European Portuguese, is the reference for Portugal, the lusophone countries of Africa , East Timor and Macau . The word “European” was chosen to avoid the term “Portuguese Portuguese” (“ português português ”) as the equivalent of Brazilian Portuguese .
Geographical variants
European Portuguese can be roughly divided into northern and southern variants. The standard shapes are based on two varieties, the Coimbras and the Lisbon .
Phonetically there are also differences. For example, in northern Portugal the phonemes / b / and / v / are less differentiated than in the rest of the Portuguese-speaking world (similar to other languages on the Iberian Peninsula). Another regionalism can be found in the south when the gerund is used as a progressive form in contrast to the infinitive with the preposition a .
Portuguese is used by a significant minority in Andorra and Luxembourg . Andorra has expressed an interest in joining the Community of Portuguese Speaking Countries (CPLP). There is also a large diaspora in France, Germany and Switzerland.
Galician
The Galician , which is spoken in the autonomous community of Galicia in Spain, is very closely related to Portuguese. Linguists still debate whether Galician is a dialect of Portuguese or an independent, albeit closely related, language.
Galicia has expressed an interest in joining the CPLP as an associate observer, although the Spanish government has not yet decided.
meaning
As a colonial power, Portugal retained control of its Old World regions for much longer than it did over Brazil. Thus, European Portuguese is the standard in the African and Asian lusophone countries ( Angola , Cape Verde , East Timor , Guinea-Bissau , Macau , Mozambique and São Tomé and Príncipe ). Portugal's universities continue to be a destination for the elites of those countries. In Europe, European Portuguese is still the standard variant for foreign language acquisition.
The Instituto Camões is the Portuguese cultural institution for the international dissemination of language, culture and general regional studies. This in turn teaches Portuguese Portugal as the norm.
RTP is the Portuguese public media company that also functions as a global distribution channel for content in the European version. A division of RTP Internacional is RTP África , which serves lusophone Africa .
When estimating the number of speakers in European Portuguese, one must also consider the Portuguese diaspora that can be found on every continent.
See also
Web links
- EP pronunciation rules
- Brazilian Portuguese pronunciation rules
- Tables of pronunciation of all EP vowels and consonants
- Article on variations in the EP
- To the gerund in Portuguese dialects (PDF)