Monday, September 19, 2011

Portuguese: The Language of the Future

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Now that Brazil is the new black, everyone, including your Mother, is talking about it. Hell, people have even started to figure out that Brazilians don’t speak Spanish! Good for you!

Anyway, I am bringing you a post by some people who not only know that Spanish is not Brazil’s native language but they can also TEACH you Portuguese! Whoo Hooo! Anyway, without further ado, I am going to subject you to a little sponsored post. Give them chance, they have something interesting to say:

There are many reasons to learn Portuguese

            Portuguese as a second language is gaining more and more ground against other languages, which explains why everyday more students travel to take Portuguese lessons in Sao Paulo. They also study at the place they live, but there is a new trend that consists in travelling and studying a second tongue at the place it is spoken. Portuguese as a second language is gaining significant ground against other languages. While studying in the city where you live has been common practice, travelling and studying a second tongue at the place where it is spoken is becoming the new trend. Every day more and more students are arriving in São Paulo to study Portuguese.

But why are people choosing Portuguese? This is a question that simply arises given that not many years ago this language went unnoticed to many people. Well, the truth is that there are many reasons as to why people believe that learning Portuguese is beneficial.
         
To begin with, the Portuguese speaking country of Brazil has been experiencing a dramatic economic growth lately. According to the experts, Brazil’s economy increased 7.5 percent in 2010. Brazil experienced the highest GDP expansion registered since 1986, attributing the high growth rate to the increase of domestic demands in the country. Brazil’s local industry expanded 10.1 percent in 2010. Besides that, Brazil had the third highest expansion as regards GDP, after China and India. This explains why so many companies and investors are trying to do business with Brazil.

No one can afford not to get involved with an industry with such huge development. Nowadays, many companies are hiring either Portuguese speaking employees or Portuguese teachers who can teach the language to their workers.
         
However, Portuguese is not only about business. There is something else encouraging people to learn this language which might result in more fun: travelling. Brazil is one of the favorite destinations worldwide. There is just a unique atmosphere that can’t be explained with words, you have to feel it yourself.

What can be said about this is that Brazil is a perfect destination for a vacation, whether you travel with friends, with your partner, family, etc. There’s something very romantic about the weather, music, dance, etc.  that everyone can enjoy. Brazilian people are friendly and always in a good mood. The good thing about this is that their joy is contagious! Just speak with a Brazilian and you’ll start smiling, which explains why we think that every country should have at least a little bit of Brazil. In order to do so, many people take Portuguese lessons in Rio de Janeiro, where the Brazilian Carnival celebration takes place every year.
         
This article gives you a few great reasons to learn Portuguese. Can you think of more?

** For More info on Portuguese for Foreigners check out this site: Language Trainers

22 comments:

  1. As much as I try, I cannot really justify learning Portuguese until I decide that Brazil has to be my next destination. Spanish is a more realistic language to learn since the rest of South America, Central America and a a number of places in the Caribbean speak it. Is it that leaerning Portuguese after learning and speaking Spanish would make it easier? (crossing fingers for affirmative response)

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  2. Brazil's GDP is bigger than all latin america combined.

    Portuguese has around 275 million speakers making it the 5th most spoken language in the world. Portuguese is the 3rd most spoken language in the Western Hemisphere, and the most spoken in the Southern Hemisphere.

    Europe: Portugal
    Americas: Brazil
    Africa: Mozambique, Angola, Cape Verde, Guiné-Bissau and São Tomé e Príncipe
    Asia: Macau, East Timor and Goa (in India)

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  4. As a brazilian, I guess it'd be a lot easier to learn portuguese after spanish (or vice-versa). I have never studied spanish, but let's say, it is not the strangest lenguage in the world to me.

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  5. I just don't understand why in US high schools Italian is taught before Portuguese. Makes no sense because only a small number of people actually speak Italian. Portuguese is much more important and I believe will only grow to be another world language, which I believe will be English, Spanish, Portuguese, Mandarin, Hindi and Arabic.

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  6. Knowing some Spanish totally confused me with Portuguese. Then again, I'm special ;)

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  7. Oi! porque a sua linguagem muito lindo!
    If not the most difficult I have ever learnt.... not to mention mastering the carioca accent!

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  8. True, it is a very difficult language and accent... but also a lot of fun when you start getting it! So many words to choose from!

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  9. Alex
    I would add Russian to your list since its a BRIC country and also a language spoken in several countries near Russia / ex-USSR.

    Learning Hindi is not necessary since all business in india is done in english and most indians do not even speak hindi. They speak their regional language. India has 22 official languages.

    Italian language is much more famous in america than portuguese. Many americans think brazilians speak spanish.

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  10. I have some seriously cool readers. I just have to say. I'm loving the little language discussion going on here.

    I was going to make a stab at learning German in American high schools but then I remembered something a teacher told me about it being highly spoken in Europe. I checked it out and I really had no idea how much so!

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  11. I personally love german.

    It is widely spoken in central europe nowadays but I don't think it will be one of the most important languages to learn for the future even if germany has the biggest economy in europe and that will not change anytime soon.

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  12. I guess you could add Russian to the list. The only problem with that is I can see Russians learning English way before English speakers learning Russian. It's very alien. At least Portuguese uses the same alphabet.

    I kinda don't think Brasileiros will really give into English THAT easily (thank god.) Plus the two biggest Lusophone countries have economies that are raping the rest of the world (Oi, Angola e Brasil!)

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  13. Oh, and thank you for pointing out that most people think Brazilians speak Spanish. This is probably my biggest pet peeve and makes me self implode each time I hear someone say it.

    It just sounds so.....weird. Brazil would not be Brazil if it were spanish speaking. It would just be another South American country with similar cultures to Colombia and Mexico.

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  14. ^Of course I do not want to forget that it would still be the most beautiful geographically. I do, however, think the country would be a different place people wise if it were a colony of spain. There would never be European, Japanese, Lebanese and other immigration waves to the extent as they happened in Brasil.

    Ok, sorry for the ridiculous amount of comments. I'm Done! I think....

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  15. I was just having a discussion with my cousin (who's in High School) and he's wanting to take French. My initial thought was GREAT, but then I realized he lives in California! He should be taking Spanish since it would be used to a greater extent.
    Oh well, knowing more than one language is ALWAYS a good thing.

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  16. It's really hard to find a Portuguese course here in San Francisco. I wanted to take it but they don't offer it at the public state university I go to (SFSU) nor at the community college here. At the community college they offer Spanish, Japanese, French, German, Italian, Russian, and even Tagalog. I think only Stanford, UC Berkeley, and a couple small private (expensive) language schools offer Portuguese in the bay area. Since I can only afford cheap classes, I took Spanish last semester but my heart was really not in it.

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  17. Don't know how tue this is but apparently the Brazilan and African Portuguese are closer to each other than to the European version of the language - which would make cross Atlantic trade easier....

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  18. It also irritates me when people think they speak Spanish in Brazil when people know I love Brazil and have been there. If it irritates me so, I can only imagine how it irritates Brazilians.

    I have searched my entire STATE of South Carolina for Portuguese courses and there are only TWO universities that offer it here. One is in Columbia, SC which is 1 1/2 hours from me and the other in Charleston, SC which is 3 1/2 hours from me. There are no language schools here, I called every place I could think of to try and find some type of class that was near me I could attend. NOTHING. I was so frustrated!

    Of course for me as well Spanish is a lot more useful because of the large Latino population here and I am taking it for school right now anyway. Unfortunately I made the mistake of taking it as an online course and not on campus because I don't get the speaking practice I would if I had taken it on campus.

    But I will not give up, I will learn Portuguese one day. Brazil is my future destination so I need to do this!

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  19. Ben - portuguese speakers from africa, asia, europe and brazil can all understand each other...they do have different accents and sometimes have different slangs but they are able communicate just fine.

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  20. Portuguese speakers (5th most spoken language in the world at 230 million) can all naturally understand Spanish - many can speak it too. That's the gift we get as Portuguese speakers. Portuguese in an official language of the European Union. Portuguese is soon to be an official language of the United Nations.

    Brazil is predicted to be the 5th largest economy of the world by 2030, very likely sooner than that. It's an economic giant re: oil, technology, aerospace, precious metals, coffee, etc.!!

    Thus, Brazil, Angola (becoming another economic giant re: oil, diamonds, coffee, etc.), Mozambique and Portugal all do immense trade with China. Even the Chinese are learning Portuguese! And Brazil is crucial to the economy of the whole of Latin America. Thus, Portuguese is an official language of Mercosur/sul Latin American Economic Union.

    In Asia, Portuguese is once again regaining popularity. It's officially spoken in Macau China and East Timor.

    Yes, yes, yes...the Portuguese language is growing by leaps and bounds. It is a very important language to know today, and tomorrow!

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  21. And let's not forget about the 1,000,000 Japanese who either lived in Brazil, or were born in Brazil, who speak Portuguese. as such, Portuguese is being actively taught in Japan too!!

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  22. And let's not forget about the millions of Portuguese speakers and their descendants who live all over the world i.e., USA, Canada, South Africa, Venezuela, Spain, Argentina, France, Germany, England, Australia, just to name a few.

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