Talk:Portuguese language/Archive 4

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Please add new archivals to Talk:Portuguese language/archive5. (See How to archive a talk page.) Thank you. - Ekevu (talk) 16:34, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Mesoclisis (Mesóclise)
The example of mesoclisis happens to use a irregular verb (trazer). Its future tense always starts with "trar" (rather than "trazer"): trarei, trará, traremos, etc. So, the example should say "trar-vos-emos", right? I'm Brazilian, i was going to edit it directly, but i noticed that it was a citation (don't know who is Dupondt, i'm sorry). So, i thought it was better to ask here before editing.

Also, if people are interested (and this is not explained later in the article), an explanation of the origin of mesoclisis may be given: Originally, the future tense was formed by the main verb (infinitive) plus the verb "haver": comer+hei, comer+há, comer+hemos. Later, the verbs were joined (and "H" was dropped). But the pronouns may still appear right after the main verb (or before both), then the result is a mesoclisis (this explanation would need a better wording). However, as every Brazilian knows, it's much easier to use always "ir"+"main verb"... (vou comer, vai comer, etc.) :-)

Portuguese vs. French
The statements on Portuguese being related to French are untrue. The only phonological similarity is nasalization, which was probably a separate, unrelated development in each.

Benwing 03:47, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)
 * you can't tell it is a coincidence. It probably isn't. But I think it is really unnecessary to have so much text on it. If you can decrease it, please do. That is too controversial, so do has you want, but less text on it. I also disagree on your edits on hello and yes in the examples for Brazil, it makes a very wrong idea of things, because it is not the same has banheiro, or a difference. That section is not only for turist help but examples of the language. But overall, thanks for your edits, especially on the evolution of the language! ;)-Pedro 11:00, 30 Apr 2005 (UTC)


 * Under 'hello' in Collins Pratico Dicionario, you see "oi! (BR), ola! (PT)". Also, i'm not sure what you mean by "Gali~a".  the first vowel was nasalized; the ~ should not go between them. Benwing 02:12, 1 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Buy a new one, I suggest Dicionário Houaiss if you speak Portuguese, it brings all the regional lexicon from several countries. Good if you want to study it. It has examples and word origin. The only problem: it is expensive. Oi is a brasileirismo (Brazileism !?!? lol). It is also used in Portugal. Olá is used for Hello, while oi for hi. "olá" is used in both countries. You are right about that on the nazalization, but for the example, the best is to keep in there to help people to understand, and because it was displaying incorrectly. Please reduce the info on French.-Pedro 10:34, 1 May 2005 (UTC)
 * I like your style, Pedro. If it helps, a literal translation of brasileirismo would be brazilianism. It sounds like natural english, though I've never heard it used, and it has a nice ring to it, I think. I'll work on slimming down the french bit right now.  Let me know what you think. Tchau! ThePedanticPrick 16:14, 1 May 2005 (UTC)


 * Brasileirismo in Portuguese is the name given to Brazilian origin words in the language. The section on French is great now. Really!!! thx.;) -Pedro 17:20, 1 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Pedro, have you ever been to Brazil? I've spent months there.  No one says "Olá".  Please don't impose Portugal-centric POV's on Portuguese. Benwing 22:05, 1 May 2005 (UTC)


 * OMG - I'm not imposing nothing. Then go to the Portuguese language wiki and ask people! You are surely one more that read VBS. -Pedro 23:13, 1 May 2005 (UTC)


 * please register on the port.lang. wikipedia. and send me a messege in there, and I'll try to get a person to talk to you. yes, oi is very common has I said, it means hi. That doesnt mean the word doesnt exist or used. Oi is Oi; Olá is Olá; Adeus is Adeus; Tchau is Tchau. 1 is 1; 2 is 2! mixing both is stupid. -Pedro 23:22, 1 May 2005 (UTC)


 * As a brazilian myself, I should say that the common use for these words are "oi" or "bom dia" (informal, formal) for "hi" or "hello". Less common, but not strange, is the spoken use of "olá", for "hello". But it's use in informal written form (emails and internet) is quite common. However, the spoken use of "Adeus" for "goodbye" is indeed quite rare, since it's associated with a sad feeling of permanent separation ("dei adeus ao meu país"), unlike the almost universal spoken use of te jovial "Tchau", both formally and informally. The use of "até logo" for "see you soon" or "goodbye" is not rare in spoken language but common in written language, although corruptions of the expression ("até", "inté", "té") are used informally. -Moret 13:33, 3 May 2005 (UTC)


 * i don't want to get in a big argument over this. it's just that every page i've seen related to portuguese has a heavy portugal-centric bias (for example, the list of "famous portuguese-speaking authors" omits machado de assis, considered the best brazilian author); much of it is simply wrong for brazil, based on my experience living there.  i assume you wrote this stuff; that's why i'm saying this.

no one in brazil says any of 'ola' or 'adeus' or 'a vossa'. (and go tell a brazilian you are waiting "na bicha" and see what their reaction is!) the collins dictionary that you dismiss was written by brazilians and from everything i've seen in brazil it's highly accurate for brazilian portuguese. under "goodbye" is has "ate logo" (BR), "adeus" (PT); tchau is informal but most brazilians would say it in contexts that americans say "goodbye". Benwing 03:36, 2 May 2005 (UTC)

You are completly out of your mind. Do you know what "bom dia" is? or "até logo"? you dont even know how to say "dicionário pratico". \&#638;\ is not marginal there, especially in São Paulo, prefered for use in TV for instance. \&#626;\ is not marginal in Brazil, also, but more marginal than \&#638;\. \w\ is not a consonant. You've completly destroyed the sound table, putting enourmous and biased info on it (are you trying to explain all the Brazilian dialects in it)??. You are... forget it! \&#619;\ also exists in Brazil, specifically in Piaui and other regions of the northeast. But the \w\ is seem has the caracteristic of the Brazilian dialects.

I think reverting is not a god thing.


 * olá in Brazil: 1.260.000 hits just for the country.
 * adeus: 314.000.

in fact, à vossa is not very much used. the most common in tchin-tchin.


 * "bom dia" means "good morning"

"até logo" means "see you later" (more used in Portugal than in Brazil) I think you just need an oscar for the linguist of the year. -Pedro 11:38, 2 May 2005 (UTC)


 * BTW the sounds for european Portuguese in the article are only for standard Portuguese, including the accepted regional sounds has standard by the Academia de Ciências de Lisboa. We need the same for Brazil.


 * whatever, pedro. i see that someone from brazil has basically confirmed what i have to say, but you don't seem to care.  i don't understand what your complaints are about my sound table work but you seem to care less about accuracy than someone stepping on your toes.  i've had enough of your crap, you can have your fiefdom, goodbye.  btw i am a linguistics grad student.

Benwing 00:15, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

btw pedro, looking at the archives i see various complaints about you that are similar to what i've said. i'd suggest you consider whether, when many people say the same thing, there might in fact be a grain of truth in it. Benwing 01:05, 4 May 2005 (UTC)

Well, Im brazilian and I can assure you that ola is also used. True, it is not as common as "oi", but nevertheless still a completely usable option in beggining a conversation, and not "slangish" as qualé, fala ou beleza. Also, plenty of people in Brazil say "adeus" meaning goodbye. What may have you somewhat confused is that the term is more often than not used meaning a final goodbye, to which an ordinary goodbye would be very akward to use. "A vossa" is indeed hardly ever used, but is completely understandable and correct in grammatical and lexicon views. Also, I find it very strange and somehow rude of you to say what words are used and which are not, in portuguese, if you dont live in a portuguese-speaking countryLtDoc 23:01, 2 August 2005 (UTC)

Boston link
The Boston link could do with updating to point to the appropriate Boston article, but I'm not sure which it is. --John 23:15, 11 May 2005 (UTC)

Portuguese Spelling Reforms
Hi, I've just added a bit of info about the participation of Galiza in the Portuguese spelling reform, with a link to a site with information about the reform, participants, the text of the reform itself and some pictures. Maybe we should put too a little information about the previous (and failed) 1986 reform, that took place in Rio de Janeiro. In the site I linked there's a bit of information about that, too. --SugarKane 03:06, 21 May 2005 (UTC)
 * that's too much info for this article... and there's already too much. The current one isnt yet appplied. Maybe you can create a new article linking to this one Portuguese spelling reforms. There has been speeling reforms since early 20th century: the 1911 (end of the pseudo-etymological system in Portugal)/1931(end of the pseudo-etymological system in Brazil) - English uses a pseudo-etymological ortography, 1945 (it would remove the differences that were created during the change to the today's ortography, failled), 1971, 1986 (failled, the first with various countries), 1990 (changed in 1998 and 2004). So there's a lot to talk about. -Pedro 10:46, 21 May 2005 (UTC)
 * I agree that a separate article for the spelling reforms would be better, but I think I don't have much more info about them in order to make a decent article :-/ Any website with more information? --SugarKane 10:57, 1 Jun 2005 (UTC)

References to the language
To what extent can we consider Olavo Bilac's term as "a generally accepted term". I mean... are we comparing him to Camões or Cervantes? I'm sure there are many other ways of referring to Portuguese, but we should restrict ourselves to the ones that people actually use, don't you agree? Paulo Oliveira 10:38, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * we are not comparing him to noone. The name that he uses is SURELY known. I didnt even knew who gave that name, saw it in the Portuguese language article in Portuguese. -Pedro 12:01, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * you must excuse my ignorance, but I thought you were referring to a guy from a portuguese pop band, and that will surely make you laugh. Paulo Oliveira 14:02, 27 May 2005 (UTC)
 * LOL. Yes, there is a Portuguese guy with that name!!! This one is a Brazilian from the beginning of the 20th century who wrote beautiful poems. But I didnt even remembered that. I thought you didnt knew the reference "A ultima flor do lácio... bela e inculta blah blah blah". it is a beautiful reference thats why it is known and often used. And because Camoens and Cervantes are a sort of literary monsters.-Pedro 14:16, 27 May 2005 (UTC)

Machimbombo
The word comes from an abnormal construction of "Maxim" (the buses' trademark) and "Bomb" (the sound people said they made when being driven). This term was also used in Mozambique (and I'm pretty sure it was coined by natives from Mozambique) and shouldn't be regarded as an official word. It doesn't come in their dictionary and is as official as "bué" is in Portugal. Paulo Oliveira 10:45, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * official word?! -Pedro 12:17, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Reevolved
I never heard of this word... Can an English native speaker tell me if it exists... I search the dictionary and found revolved, but it has a different meaning... Paulo Oliveira 11:00, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Devolved or regressed might be better - if I understood what the original editor meant. --Sn0wflake 16:07, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

the context: ''Fewer words remained unchanged, or reevolved to the original word, such as taberna (tavern) or coxa (thigh). Due to re-influence of Latin, words like LOCALE which evolved to lugar has local as synonym.'' regressed fits well.-Pedro 16:29, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Most spoken languages
According to Atlas of the World's Languages the Portuguese language is the 7th most spoken language in the world, with a number of acbout 170 million speakers (this article refers it as the 5th or 6th most spoken with more than 200 million speakers). Where was the "200 millions 5th or 6th rank" information obtained? I agree with the Atlas when it states that Mandarin, Spanish, English, Arabic, Bengali and Hindi are the first 6 most spoken languages in the world, Hindi having about 189 million speakers. Paulo Oliveira 11:19, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * According to different rankings it has a different ranking. There are several ranking with Portuguese in the 6th position, and some even in 5. Are you ignorant enough to use a ranking that sites that Portuguese has 170 million speakers? that number makes that ranking completly useless. BTW most credible rankings cite Portuguese has 6th:ethnologue 2000; CPLP,IILP, etc... There is a problem with Arabic and you should get informed. -Pedro 12:12, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * I don't think that having the Portuguese language be the 7th most spoken language in the world is necessarily bad. I just asked where you got the information, or did you just read the first 10 words? And what's this confusion with Arabic you mention?

One of the differences may reside in the fact that the Demographics of Brazil article states a population of 177 million, not 184 as mentioned in the Portuguese language article (7 million is about 7% or 8% of Portugal's population). Paulo Oliveira 11:22, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * My friend before posting a doubt, do a little reserch, if we all do that, we didnt have all this talk with several unnedeed questions. The population numbers only uses the List_of_countries_by_population article, which is very useful for comparisions between different countries.-Pedro 12:12, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * So why don't the other country articles use it? And where can this research be made? I think we all want to help here, not offend others, right? For your information, I looked at the Brazil article and thought it was a good source. It's accepted by Wikipedians, isn't it?


 * It wasnt to offend you. Using a reference that uses a 170 million number, is not a very bright thing to do. Is not a bad thing putting in 7th, but it not very correct, just because you saw in a dubious source, it doesnt mean this article should include all the dubious info you saw. Problem with Arabic you can see in the arabic article. About the demography, I dont know, all info was research by someone. The one from that article was used because it is based on credible sources. Obviously the real number is different, (ouch it got different from the previous message) but that's not our problem. In Portugal at least, the number is very good. Oops, one more little Portuguese is born. Maybe in Brazil it seems too much, and in Angola too small. That's why I think the best is to use that article, which is spefically for that subject. 7 million is a lot of people for Portugal, but for a country were a single city has more population than Portugal has a all, it isnt. -Pedro 13:58, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

BTW the Port.language article in Brazil pt:Brasil in 2004 cites: 182,552,942. The English articles uses the 2005 population, that is also used in this article. And the most credible sources of all, IBGE states: População Estimada 183.734.370 (http://www.ibge.gov.br/) If I were you I'ld think again. -Pedro 14:16, 23 May 2005 (UTC) 183.734.409 at the moment I'm correcting my previous message. -Pedro 14:23, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Correction suggestion
"In the first period of "Old Portuguese" - Portuguese-Galician Period (from the 12th to the 14th century), the language came gradually into general use in the following centuries, after gaining popularity in the Christian Iberian Peninsula as a language for poetry." needs to be re-written. This isn't correct English. The portuguese translation would be, more or less the following: "No primeiro período de Português Antigo - ..., a língua foi gradualmente aceite para uso geral nos séculos seguintes após ganhar popularidade, ...". The problem is in "came gradually into use in the following...". It doesn't make sense to me! Paulo Oliveira 11:45, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * Honestly It also doesnt make much sence to me. "Old Portuguese" is translated to "Português Arcaico". I wrote the original history section, a Brazilian with very good English rephrased it. Maybe he used that word from the original that stated that the language became firstly used in poetry, law, notaries, etc. Probably it is that. -Pedro 12:07, 23 May 2005 (UTC)
 * It's not only the expression you mention, its also the syntax of the phrase. It's not correct. Paulo Oliveira 13:15, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

To me it makes sense, but it can be rephrased to "the language gradually came into general use in the subsequent ceturies. Previously it had mostly been used on the Christian Iberian Peninsula as a language for poetry." I am making that change, if you disagree feel free to revert it. --Sn0wflake 15:59, 23 May 2005 (UTC) EDIT: Wait, now I see what you mean. I am changing the sentence further.

Rotating flags
I dont like much of the rotating flags in an encyclopedia article although they are usual in Lusophone-tematic websites - but this is an article. it would be nice a picture of the 8 flags in a circle with a globe in the middle. Or maybe we can email the IILP and ask them for permition to use their logo... I dont know their email. I searched in the site but I couldnt find, neither the copyright issues. Their logo is very nice. -Pedro 20:56, 23 May 2005 (UTC)


 * I've mailed the Cape Verdian company that created their website. -Pedro 21:11, 23 May 2005 (UTC)

Errors in IPA
Hi,

A couple errors in the IPA transcriptions which I fixed, but which were immediately reverted:

As a courtesy to those using Internet Explorer, IPA transcriptions like should be bracketed as , at least for special IPA characters. Otherwise they may appear as gibberish.

Phonetic notation should be enclosed in square brackets,, not between slashes, , unless you are making a theoretical (and often POV) claim that the sound is a phoneme. Slashes are not used for broad transcription. shows the reader how to pronounce the vowel; does not indicate pronunciation. A pronunciation guide should always use brackets.

Portuguese has a traditional use of phonetic symbols that does not match the IPA. English has the same problem: for example, the symbol is used for  in English (as in nut). In Portuguese, the letter schwa has traditionally been used for unstressed e, probably because it looks similar. (This may be the same reason that the letter schwa is used in transcribing French, even though French does not have .) The IPA letter schwa would more accurately be used to transcribe unstressed a, but since it has already been taken, the symbol is used instead. This is also inaccurate phonetically.

According to Madalena Cruz-Ferreira at the University of Singapore, as recognized and published by the IPA in their Handbook, unstressed e is an unrounded in Lisbon. If you wish to be precise and indicate the lack of rounding, you could transcribe pegar as or. In the Handbook the diacritics are left off for a less precise. Although Cruz-Ferreira retains the traditional symbol for unstressed a, it is clear from the vowel chart in the Handbook that this is actually a mid central vowel  in Lisbon. (It is higher than or, but lower than  or .)

Without such a vowel chart for clarification, transcribing this as is inaccurate and misleading. Portuguese speakers may feel more comfortable with the inaccurate traditional usage, but this article is not targeted to them. It is written for the English speaker (or maybe English reader) who does not know Portuguese. By using incorrect transcriptions without clarification, you are doing a disservice to your readers. (If the symbols are correct for dialects outside Lisbon, than this should of course be noted as well.) kwami 22:17, 2005 August 17 (UTC) I don't know but I think English speakers would like to pronunce a perfect Portuguese so, the ɨ is the sound they should use. About the phonetic notation, I'm really sorry. :S I didnt knew that. -Pedro 23:53, 17 August 2005 (UTC)
 * That symbols are the ones that are used in the reference bellow, and are the ones that are always found. Honestly I never saw an author using ʊ (and the sounds doesnt seem that common, although it can occur). About the ɯ I saw one author using it, and it more close to the more common sound. But the big majority uses ɨ for Lisbon and everywhere. Most publications in Portugal uses it, and the one that I used are from people related to the Science Academy of Lisbon (so very serious). I remember using a dictionary by a Lisbon-centric, and even in that one, he used the same sounds (in this case). Often only ɨ is used, note it is related to the "i", a sound that rural Portuguese dialects in Portugal use (these dialects lack the ɨ).


 * But this is just the problem: Portuguese authors do not use these symbols according to their IPA values! They use them according to traditional Portuguese values. It is not international usage; it is a provincial Portuguese usage. Imagine if you looked up English pronunciation in the encyclopedia, and the encyclopedia said that the word my was pronounced [mī], because that's the traditional symbol used in English dictionaries. You would not be able to pronounce the word correctly from this description. At the very least, the article should say that "[ī] is the traditional symbol used for this sound used by English authors. In the standard IPA it is [aj]".


 * That's the situation we have in Portuguese. Unstressed a is not IPA [ɐ]. It doesn't matter if every Portuguese linguist who ever lived used this symbol, they are not the same sound. [ɐ] is the symbol in the Portuguese Phonetic Alphabet. In the International Phonetic Alphabet, it is [ə]. Likewise, unstressed e is not IPA [ə]. Nor is it IPA [ɨ]. Those are provincial Portuguese usage, but not international usage. In the actual IPA, the value is [ɯ̽]. (Note that this is not the same as [ɯ]. There is no separate symbol in the IPA for this Portuguese sound, so the diacritic [ ̽] is used.)


 * If English speakers use the sound represented by IPA [ɨ], they will not be speaking "perfect" Portuguese. They will be making a sound that no Portuguese ever makes. If you want them to be able to pronounce the language correctly, you need to do one of two things:


 * Change the article to agree with international usage (that is, the IPA).
 * Leave the article the way it is, and explain that it is not really in the IPA. Then explain that Portuguese [ɐ] stands for IPA [ə], and that Portuguese [ə] stands for IPA [ɯ̽].
 * kwami 00:32, 2005 August 18 (UTC)


 * Why are you saying that the Portuguese never use? Because someone from a university in the other side of the world says so? I said that the most common sound is ɨ, and it isnt similar to what is written, and it is in IPA.  See it exists. Believe me the sound in  book (english) isnt pegar (Port.). That Miss is not an authority in the language. Portugal is very far from having a linguistic authority in Singapore. Oh well, maybe we should do that. An American linguist student said in here that "é" means "yes" and Hello is "bom dia", because his dictionary was made by some supposed Brazilian linguists and it said so. Well... maybe our dictionaries should be made outside, by emigrant Portuguese or other linguists. Wikipedia is not English as she is spoke. Just k/d, because all your remarks are credible. But these sounds are not mainstream, many sounds occur, especially these ones that are so similar, but with a very different depiction. Maybe she pronunces that way.--Pedro 01:09, 18 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Dr Cruz-Ferreira did her research as a member of the International Phonetic Association, and they chose her to illustrate the Portuguese language. That doesn't mean she's correct, but it does mean that she's more credible than most guides to Portuguese pronunciation, including those written in Portuguese by Portuguese linguists, because she is attempting to follow international standards, while most of them are not.


 * She based her word on "a recording made by a female native speaker of Lisbon in her mid-forties, speaking in a style that may be described as educated colloquial." She is not going on her judgement of what the vowel sounds are; rather, she measured the vowel formants and a computer plotted them on a vowel chart. She used the symbol <ɐ>, as is the Portuguese practice. However, this is clearly [ə] on the vowel chart. That is, Dr Cruz-Ferreira is not explicitly making this claim; rather, it is the computer plot of the data itself which shows that the vowel quality is [ə] and not [ɐ].


 * Secondly, I never said that Portuguese has the vowel [ʊ]. I know that it does not. However, it also does not have the vowel [ɨ]. [ɨ] is found in Russian, for example in [mɨ] 'we'. Portuguese <ə> is not a high central unrounded vowel like Russian [ɨ]. Instead, it is further back. It is near English [ʊ], but unlike English it is unrounded. That is, it is as different from English rounded [ʊ] as Portuguese unrounded i is different from French rounded u.


 * Please see if you can find a vowel chart showing the positions of the Portuguese vowels. Not one made by ear and hand, but one where the vowel formants are measured and plotted. There is one in the Handbook of the International Phonetic Association. (Unfortunately, I do not have an electronic copy to show you.) If you can find a different chart, I would love to see it. kwami 01:42, 2005 August 18 (UTC)

In this area (north) there is a tiny dialect that pronunces final a as [ɛ], which is very pecular and often others make fun of it. :). Or that sound you said ([ɯ̽]), but the ə seems clearly an ə. But not always. There's also another pronuntiation, but I never saw it written or discussed, which is a near fricative t. sort of [ boa nojts or boa nojtsɨ I believe the sound is not clearly an s...
 * You did the best thing. But I continue not agreeing. Lisbon is a transitional area, between two dialects. So, in fact, 'a' can be pronunced [ə] by some people in there, but not a standard. The majority pronunces [ɐ]. It is clearly an a! I think she used the wrong women! she should try to listen from several. There are very extremelly small differences.
 * The problem of the [ɨ] is much bigger. "boa noite" (good evening) can bee pronunced different even by the same person:
 * boɐ nojtə
 * boɐ nojtɨ
 * boɐ nojt
 * About the diacritics, i was just using crtl+v on your talk. Now I used that function in the edit, so it now will appear in my text. -Pedro 14:16, 19 August 2005 (UTC)


 * You're right, a good study would include a range of people. Maybe we should add the comment that the one person used by the IPA to illustrate Portuguese had those sound values? kwami 17:04, 2005 August 19 (UTC)


 * Yes, I think it is the best. -Pedro 09:26, 22 August 2005 (UTC)

Differences in vocabulary: Galician/Portuguese
The sentence that was removed was about the writting system, not vocabulary. While Between Brazil and Portugal the differences are very small (In the range of 3%) and even though noticed. That number was taken from the estimatives. Galician has a different writing system, so the differences are bigger. That is what was written in the article. I wouldnt dare to speak about vocabulary used by the people, that varies a lot and the difference is often only Spanish words in new objects.--Pedro 09:26, 22 August 2005 (UTC)


 * The sentence said «The differences in vocabulary between Portugal and Brazil are very small [...]». It was about the vocabulary, or so it seemed. If it was about the number of words that are spelled different due to differences in the ortography, I don't think it makes much sense to include official Galician writing system here, because it's not a Portuguese ortography. People in Galiza who think that Galician and Portuguese are the same language use a portuguese-based ortography, and there's no real consensus in what ortography to use: some people prefer a pure Portuguese ortography (so the difference would be 0%) while other people prefer a slightly modified writing system (but still based on Portuguese).


 * So, in short: "Official" Galician is a separate language, comparing its writing system to the Portuguese one doesn't fit in well here IMHO. --SugarKane 16:00, 22 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Of course it would be very interesting to have a separate page in the Wikipedia about the Galician/Portuguese problem, where this and many other issues could be addressed in detail. I could start one, but I don't have much time right now and my english is quite poor :( --SugarKane 16:04, 22 August 2005 (UTC)


 * en.wikipedia.org has an army of wikipedians that can fix poor English, don't worry about that, but it has very few people that can describe the Galican/Portuguese problem. Gronky 19:13, 18 September 2005 (UTC)


 * Yes, we are talking about the official writing system teached in the Galician schools. --Pedro 16:52, 22 August 2005 (UTC)


 * It would be useful to create a page about the linguistic/sociolinguistic situation of Portuguese and Galician: but it is a very confusing and complicated subject. BTW I've "always" knew that Pro-Portuguese Galician writing system. I know some Galicians who use it. --Pedro 21:25, 22 August 2005 (UTC)


 * Yes, it's a complicated subject, and that's why I think that it's important to have a page explaining it showing all points of view :) Perhaps I could write something in the portuguese or spanish Wikipedia so anyone with a better level of english could translate it --SugarKane 01:11, 23 August 2005 (UTC)

That animated gif is pretty annoying
[] I find the flickering gif annoying when I'm reading the surrounding text. Since it doesn't add much/anything to the article, I suggest the next person that agrees with me should remove it. (Unless someone replies to this comment and explains the overriding encyclopedaic value of it.) Gronky 19:10, 18 September 2005 (UTC)

Conjuntive?
Im brazilian and I never heard the conjuntive verb mode; perhaps the author misspelled Subjunctive, which would be equivalent to Subjuntivo?LtDoc 05:20, 21 September 2005 (UTC)
 * "Conjuntivo" is the European Portuguese version for "subjunctive" (it is even accepted in English). In Brazil, the form "subjuntivo" is more common. Velho 22:25, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

Correcting last addition to Grammar
I'm going to correct the last addition to grammar. (1) It was written about the subjunctive, when even the examples regard the indicative (!!); (2) "Unique" must be replaced by "peculiar", "interesting" or something like that. There are too many languages in the world for us to make claims about uniqueness. Velho 22:26, 23 September 2005 (UTC)

Removing duplicated paragraphs
Hi, my removal of the paragraphs duplicated in History of the Portuguese language was not "unintentional vandalism", it was an edit in keeping with standard Wikipedia practice (see How to break up a page and Content forking). Wikipedia has a policy of not duplicating content between two articles, so if the information is already at History of the Portuguese language, it should not be duplicated here. Either that, or it should be left here and History of the Portuguese language deleted, but that shouldn't happen because this page is way too long (see Article size). The sections "Geographic distribution", "Dialects", "Creole", "Sounds", "Grammar", "Vocabulary", and "Writing system" also contain material duplicated in other articles and so should be shortened to brief summaries of what will be found in those articles. --Angr/undefined 04:40, 5 October 2005 (UTC)
 * I completly disagree with that view of yours, and it was previously discussed in other articles, mainly in FA article. It is already a bref summary and it makes this article useless. I'll revert again. -Pedro 11:12, 5 October 2005 (UTC)
 * It isn't my view, it's Wikipedia practice per the links provided above. I'm afraid I don't see any discussion of this issue at Featured article candidates/Portuguese language. Also, at that point the page was only 43 kb (a little long but not too bad), while today it is 64 kb long (twice as long as the recommended article length). The content under the "History" heading is not a brief summary of History of the Portuguese language, it's almost word-for-word identical to it. I think it's great that Wikipedia has so much information available on the Portuguese language, but there are limits to how long a single article can be, and it is strongly discouraged to have the same material available at two different articles. I've mentioned this issue at Wikipedia talk:Duplicate articles and at Requests for comment/Language and linguistics in hopes of getting some more opinions to help us build consensus. --Angr/undefined 20:58, 6 October 2005 (UTC)
 * 1st) the article became a FA when it was more bigger than this. It was shortened, after a "chopper" came with the same idea as you did. Please add info to wikipedia, don't destroy articles, because of people like you good articles became garbage (sorry) and some were removed from FA because of that. There are more interresting things to do than chopping down articles. Some parts are somewhat too big, but I dont think that's the case of the history section.
 * 2nd) brief information is not a paragraph. -Pedro 15:46, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Removing duplicated information is not destroying articles. I removed nothing from this article that wasn't already covered at History of the Portuguese language, and this article will still be a good article even if the duplicated material is removed--not garbage at all. But there is no point in even having the article History of the Portuguese language when everything there is duplicated here. The information can be here, or it can be there, but it should not be in both places. Would you rather History of the Portuguese language was nominated for deletion on the grounds that it duplicates material already covered here? --Angr/undefined 16:16, 7 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Angr, this is a top-level article for information on Portuguese. It should definetly be a summary, but the way you've done it is much too high-handed. There is very little point in whisking away so much information and leaving only a shadow of a paragraph as a summary. If there's a problem with duplicate material, then the sub-article should be redirected back here. I share Pedro's view of this being "chopping" rather than a sensible split-off.
 * Pedro, Angr is right about one thing; the article right now is too big. It needs to be trimmed to at least under 50 kB. That's not something I can quote policy in support of, but it's the most reasonable limit for language article in my own experience in writing Swedish language. Here's some pointers:
 * The phonology section has too many tables. All the tables should be summarized into a consonant table and a vowel chart. Sample words illustrating phonemes should be confined to the separate Portuguese phonology and should consist mainly of minimal pairs. There's a section on European Portuguese in The Handbook of the International Phonetic Association which contains a very good vowel chart and good samples. I'm willing to help out with this if don't own a copy yourself.
 * "Vocabulary" needs to be drastically reduced and the description of historical sound changes should be moved to Portuguese phonology. It may be described briefly in the history section, but it most definetly doesn't belong under "Vocabulary".
 * "Writing system" should be no more than one or two paragraphs, and pretty short ones at that.
 * "Grammar" should preferably contain no sub-sections and under no circumstances ones on separate word classes. This is way too detailed for a main article and should be covered in Portuguese grammar.
 * Comments on important Portuguese writers is relevant only within the confines of the history section. Portuguese literature should be linked to in the "See also" section or perhaps in prose, but not upheld as a separate section or sub-section in an article which is about linguistics.
 * Peter Isotalo 15:48, 12 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Those sound like great suggestions, Peter. I certainly don't insist on the summary paragraph being the one I left; on the contrary, since it's word-for-word identical to the first paragraph of History of the Portuguese language it probably shouldn't be the paragraph used here. I'm all in favor of having one medium-length paragraph summarize the history of Portuguese, and leaving the details to History of the Portuguese language. --Angr/undefined 16:05, 12 October 2005 (UTC)


 * The History section is not identifical to the History article. Angr just oversaw and in fact, the history section was done from the history article (which was a section), but with less paragraphs and "zipped" information.
 * The Grammar is now zipped (sorry I like the word "zipping")
 * Vocabulary is ok... I think. o.O Most of the vocabulary comes from latin, so it is explaining the transformations and the other origins of the lexicon. So I don't agree in this one. Maybe a little zipping?!
 * Writing system shoud really be zipped and with a better English (be my guest in here), but the section should keep informative and the literature subsection maybe moved to examples. Both are important. I dont think the Literature could be part of the history section!!! it is just an area to known the different flavours of language's literature and where you can expand your horizons.
 * About the phonology I think it is ok has it is, it is much more informative than a vowel chart, which says nothing to the common eye. Plus, you can even see some dialects' details, with was not its main objective, but it is a fair and informative deal.--Pedro 01:33, 13 October 2005 (UTC)


 * The article is by definition linguistic, so talking about literature is going off-topic. Literature is only relevant in a language article in terms of how authors have affected the development of the language, not how they've used it. As a parallel, Ernest Hemingway shouldn't include information on linguistic specifics of the dialect he spoke.
 * A vocabulary section is intended to give readers a general picture from where the corpus of words of a language originates from and perhaps some general comments on morphology, not how they're pronounced or how they've once been pronounced; that's phonology.
 * Keeping full-fledged tables in a main article is too detailed. They're really big and cumbersome and the phoneme tables are intended to be summaries of these. Compare Swedish language and Swedish phonology. I'm a total phonetics nut (and I even suspect I might've focused too much on it in the Swedish article), but I still think that having huge, super-detailed tables just makes the article look bloated. Also, I really don't like any English-language approximations. They're just too general.
 * Now that you mention it, I don't think there should be a samples-section at all. Any samples should be integrated with the rest of the prose and it should under no circumstances contain tourist phrases.
 * Peter Isotalo 17:05, 15 October 2005 (UTC)


 * I've rewritten the sounds section quite a bit. The section was full of grammar errors and strange wordings. If the article is to stand a chance of getting down to a managable size, we need to summarize, and full-fledged phone-and-example templates won't cut it. There's no reason not to keep this article general and concentrate on the phonetic specifics at Portuguese phonology.
 * Peter Isotalo 08:26, 20 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Peter, you shouldnt remove information, you should at least move it to the phonology article (as you said, but you simply deleted). The prosody part is very nice and fully correct, the remaining, I disagree with some things. And it denotes lack of knowlegde about dialects in Portugal. With the language samples in the article that shouldnt occur. Vowels are lowered in standard Portuguese, and it affects other dialects because people feel that their pronunciation is rural. Plz understand that Standard Portuguese is not what is expected, standard Portuguese is much more the pronunciation of Coimbra than the one of Lisbon, a good reason: University (Coimbra had the only University until the 20th century- and until the mid-20th century it was the most prestigious university in Portugal).
 * About the examples sections well, in fact, the article is not for tourists. But I wouldnt like an article like the Swedish one, it really focus too much in some things. Plz, do the same job in Writing System. ;)--Pedro 20:57, 21 October 2005 (UTC)


 * I have barely deleted anything. Practically everything that was found in the tables is already in Portuguese phonology, but in a different format. If you like the deleted tables better, why not replace the ones in the phonology article with those?
 * I'm not really following your comments about the general lowering of vowels, though. The current wording is:
 * The vowels are generally lowered and centralized (approaching a schwa) and gives pronunciation a distinctly lax quality that is present in colloquial as well as formal speech and often results in complete reduction of vowels.
 * This information is identical to what you're telling me above, except that it doesn't explain why it's done.
 * But why would you say that "Standard Portuguese is not what is expected"? All language articles have a main focus on the standard dialect(s), even if they're not entirely limited to just that. I don't know the subtleties of Portuguese grammar, but I'm willing to bet that the info contained in the article right now is more or less entirely about standard, rather than dialectal, grammar.
 * Peter Isotalo 07:44, 22 October 2005 (UTC)


 * Yes, replacing is better, the one in phonology may contain some errors. -Pedro 23:57, 22 October 2005 (UTC)

Graciliano Ramos
Just a thought, but what does everyone think of adding Graciliano Ramos as an example of a famous and influent writer in portugese? I would imagine that he's important enough to warrant a small mention.--Vertigo200 18:13, 8 October 2005 (UTC)
 * Even though I do consider Vidas Secas to be quite an important book, I don't think that G. Ramos could be considered one of the most famous or influential writers in the Portuguese language. --Sn0wflake 22:59, 8 October 2005 (UTC)

Ok, seems that he isn't deemed important enough, I won't include him then (not that I was very hopeful).--Vertigo200 02:35, 13 October 2005 (UTC)
 * I don't know him. -Pedro 01:34, 13 October 2005 (UTC)


 * I wouldn't include Graciliano Ramos, but I think Guimarães Rosa should be mentioned in the Wikipedia article. Rosa's importance as an author is far greater than Jorge Amado's, although Amado is more popular, particularly among English-speaking readers.


 * I agree with anom on this, Guimaroes Rosa is almost certainly as important (if not more so) than Jorge Amado, despite not having the popularity of the latter.--Vertigo200 19:38, 17 October 2005 (UTC)
 * I Disagree. Amado is far more notable in other Port. speaking countries than Guimaraes Rosa. While most know Amado, almost certainly most never heard the name Guimarães Rosa. Now, in Brazil I don't know (maybe it occurs the same). But outside is not only in English sp. countries, that's for sure. So, he should not be included in that section, because: Several other authors and poets are also internationally known, such as..... There are literature articles, where one can talk about less notable authors. -Pedro 14:15, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

Proposal to delete 3.1 Dialects, due to redundancy with article "Portuguese_dialect"
Section 3.1 on dialects is redundant with the article Portuguese_dialects. The said article has been edited since the information was copied, so now we have a version-management problem. I propose that readers be given only the link, unless Wikipedia makes it possible to display information from other articles in-line. In either case, the version-management problem is unacceptable. 84.81.60.126 13:11, 25 October 2005 (UTC);


 * Lets delete the entire article! --Pedro 14:03, 25 October 2005 (UTC)

Link removed
Why was the link I posted deleted? ('The Pronunciation of the Portuguese of Portugal'), ??, 15 Nov. 2005
 * You didnt "posted" any link, you just used a link that was already in the article and wrote that. This is not a forum (there are no posts in here) or a linkage service. -Pedro 00:45, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
 * "You didnt "posted" any link, you just used a link in the articlea wrote that." Say what?! Explain in English, please. S.V. 16 Nov. 2005
 * It is a wireless keyboard. talk corrected. - Pedro 18:48, 16 November 2005 (UTC)
 * I must have made a mistake. I did have a different link to add (better now?) I don't understand your first sentence, though. What's a wireless keyboard? S.V. 16 Nov. 2005

Vowel chart
Peter, I still have the opinion the ɨ should be included. For very strong reasons: 1) there is not a single way to pronunciate a final e. 2) I doubt that the Portuguese linguists are wrong. 3) The use of a vowel chart from a middle class women does not reflect the standard pronunciation, who doesnt remember the Portuguese jet 7... and laugh at their way to talk.

I don't know which vowel chart is incorrect. And there are some issues in that section that makes you think... 1) one is the standard American English, that doesnt sound very good to me. 2) the l that you are talking is the ending L or all the l? ending l in Portuguese is like in milk in English. 3) "Brazil and its former colonies", weren't all Portugal former colonies? Colonies is a thing from the past, we shouldnt talk about countries as just former colonies, each has its own identity. You mean African Portuguese speaking countries, Macau and East Timor? 4) That same sentence isnt fully correct. Remember anônimo anónimo thing and the pronunciation of Northern Portugal. Don't say these are just dialects, dialects are correct pronunciations of the language.---Pedro 13:15, 20 November 2005 (UTC)


 * 1,2,3) Cruz-Ferreira is a trained phonetician and explains that she speaks with a Lisbon accent. This seems quite representative to me even if no single speaker can ever be 100% representative of a single language. But then again, no one claims that she is. Why the pronunciation of a middle class woman (educated no less) would not be representative of standard pronunciation I don't know. You're welcome to explain that as well as what a "jet 7" is.
 * 1, 2) /l/ is velarized in all occurances according to Ferreira and "milk" is pronounced [mɪɫk]. That's a velarized [l].
 * 3) The former colonies excluding Brazil (which became independent much earlier) don't use Portuguese as a standardized national language that is used as a first language by the overwhelming majority of the population. At least not as far as I know. It's very reasonable to talk about the other former colonies as a seperate group in this context.
 * 4) I don't know what paragraphs or statements you're refering to. Please elaborate.
 * Peter Isotalo 22:17, 14 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Peter, I don't like the use of "former colonies" as you normally do with these countries, just that. Colonies are history, besides it is not NPOV, the former regime did not use the terre independent countriesm colonies, these were far sea provinces and Brazil in its finnal stage was a kingdom, and today these are independent countries, like any other.

There's a substantial problem with the pronunciation of final "e", because it is not universal (that why references use to different sounds, but never the sound that is in the article o.O), and I don't agree with some of the comments that were made, there's today a overwhelming tendency in the upper class to pronounce that reverted e. I'm not saying your source is a bad one. There were very interesting things that you wrote with that.

My reference is neutral and it is a much better source you can find it anywhere in its numerous editions, and it is pretty neutral. Why does the wikipedia article be different?! That ɯ CAN only occur in Lisbon Portuguese in situations as in pegar. The velarized l (for the common reader to understand is the medium sound between an l and a w) occurs only at the end, like in "Portugal" but never in "levar". That never occurs, you must read it again, you misinterpreted it. Portuguese is not like English, the spoken language reflects more or less the written language and vice versa.

In my source says that the l sound is an l but at the end of a syllable it has a velarized pronunciation. In fact, every source says the same and everybody knows that! Forget the Jet 7 thing then... its is a socialet. --Pedro 14:51, 15 December 2005 (UTC)


 * "Former colonies" is a completley NPOV statement and I've explained why it's perfectly reasonable to use the term in this context. Please mind your own POV on this issue.
 * The quote is "/l/ is velarized in all its occurances." It's confirmed by the statement "All vowels have lower and more retracted allophones before /l/...", which clearly hints that the tounge is retracted during the /l/, meaning that it's velarized. If you wish to criticize the finer points of Portuguese phonology, please cite sources and use references, and avoid pitting your own opinions against those of acknowledged experts.
 * Peter Isotalo 17:27, 15 December 2005 (UTC)

My own opinion is that your idea? End of conversation. I'll do it myself when I get some time. -Pedro 18:36, 15 December 2005 (UTC)


 * How am I suppose to tell the difference? You're not citing your sources, and you're only vaguely refering to a consensus in the Portuguese linguistic community (from which Cruz-Ferreira seems to be excluded).
 * Peter Isotalo 23:59, 15 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Pedro, former colonies are just that, former colonies. The present-day African countries were in fact colonies of the European powers even though Portugal might have referred to them as oversea provinces.  vogensen 0:18 16 December 2005

Cafuné
Cafune is depicted in the article as being of african origin, while I believe it is of tupi-guarani origin.LtDoc 17:24, 21 November 2005 (UTC)

Link to article in References?
One of the articles mentioned in the References---Lindley Cintra, Luís F. Nova Proposta de Classificação dos Dialectos Galego-Portugueses Boletim de Filologia, Lisboa, Centro de Estudos Filológicos, 1971--- is available online, at the site of the Instituto Camões. The link is: http://www.instituto-camoes.pt/cvc/hlp/biblioteca/novaproposta.pdf. I thought it might be a useful addition to the page, but I'm not sure if there are copyright problems. Perhaps one of the Wikipedians can figure this out.

Dialect of Piauí closest to European Portuguese?
I hate to say it but this seems absurd. In what sense is it the closest? Sounds? Vocabulary? I have heard Piauenses speak and I have heard Portuguese speak and frankly I see no connection. What is the source for this statement? vogensen 14:35, 15 December 2005
 * The Brazilian Academy of Letters. And I've also heard that and I agree.--Pedro 18:33, 15 December 2005 (UTC)
 * If you were the one who wrote that you should cite the source as many might disagree. Is it from the Academy's site or from something that they published?  Remember that the Brazilian Academy of Letters is not normally involved in linguistic studies.  That is something usually done by USP, University of Brasilia, or Unicamp. It certainly does not seem logical but then in this world there are many surprises.  Since I haven't done research in the area I can't prove or disprove the statement, but when I lived in Brasilia and had constant contact with Piauenses, who make up a large part of the working class of Brasilia, their accent certainly did not sound like Continental Portuguese.  It sounded like other Nordestino accents, which was miles away from Continental Portuguese.  Maybe your ear is better than mine. RVogensen


 * Consulting my Cunha/Cintra and the Internet, all the sites that refer to dialects have only one Nordestino dialect and do not break it up by state boundaries, which do not necessarily mean there are linguistic changes. Please see http://www.cin.ufpe.br/~rac2/portugues/dialebr.html What proof do you have that a Piauiense has a different dialect than a Pernambucano or a Rio Grande do Nortense?  It all seems a bit in the world of imagination to me. The study of dialects or varieties in Brazil is still in the beginning phase as the following states:

Do conjunto de dados elencados acima, o que poderíamos dizer dos dialetos brasileiros? O projeto de um mapa dialetológico brasileiro só recentemente teve as suas primeiras iniciativas lançadas (5). O que temos são mapas regionais que apontam para a confirmação de pelo menos uma hipótese básica de Antenor Nascentes: a de que o Brasil seria dividido em duas grandes regiões dialetais – norte e sul.

If the Academia de Letras states in a document that the above is a fact then you should write "according to the Academia de Letras" and give the reference where the statement is found. rvogensen 11:55 16 December 2005


 * Many of the sources can be accessed, there's even a link to that academy and I believe they also have that online. Should we put all that's written acording to this and that?! What does this issue has to due with a dialect map in Brazil? So, you say, we need a map first and then we hear. And guess what, I believe that was said in early 20th century or mid-20th century, not sure. Do you really know this specific dialect? There are dialects maps of Brazil not good ones, but there are. Any answer see the links or references first. As many links were also references at least for what I've wrote. And BTW because of people questioned everything lots of info was removed from the article. For instance, the references for Galician misteriously disappered. Just great. So NPOV :\ -23:42, 16 December 2005 (UTC)~

"A conversation between an Angolan, a Brazilian and a Portuguese from very rural areas flows very easily"
What is the source for this statement? Has anyone ever put them all together? I read this statement to a Brazilian and she had a good laugh. How would one know? Is there a machine for this sort of thing? An intelligibility meter? I would love to see the caboclos from Minas or Goiás trying to communicate with a Transmontano or a farmer from Angola,who is probably a first language speaker of a tribal language. This statement is not only POV but illogical. vogensen 14.39, 15 December 2005


 * I removed the quote along with the entire paragraph it belonged to. It consisted of mostly anecdotal or downright impressionistic fact statements.
 * Peter Isotalo 23:16, 24 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Mr Ray, I know your objective in this article. Don't you think we are all dumb old man. About Peter... Not to offend but, before something, get informed. obviously we shouldnt say that a person from a dialect understands the other, but there are languages when that doesnt occur, even in Portuguese, some dialects are hard to understand. BTW this article was reviewed by thousands of people, not just by both of you. -Pedro 03:00, 25 December 2005 (UTC)
 * Pedro, even if it's one of the better language articles it is still in serious need of improvement and both vogensen and I have more than enough argumentation and sources to support it. That it became an FA back in May (seven months ago) largely thanks to your involvement doesn't mean that it's perfect and that you're the arbitrator of what constitutes a good edit here.
 * Please explain your reverts and edits like everyone else. The non-editing of "thousands of people" is not an argument to be conservative.
 * Peter Isotalo 11:51, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

what? what argumentations? Improvements or removal of information, or more seriously information that is being hidded? information is to be given not hidded with arguments and politically correct or incorrect ideas. About the colonies, if you live in the 15th century, that's YOUR problem. -Pedro 15:00, 25 December 2005 (UTC)

Consonants chart
There's a paragraph in this article, after the consonants chart that makes few sense for me. José San Martin 23:54, 15 December 2005 (UTC)


 * /b, d, g/ are only pronounced as plosives when they occur at the beginning of the word. Following vowels, they are pronounced as the corresponding fricatives [β, ð, ɣ] a process which Portuguese shares with Catalan and Spanish. - I don't know about phonetics of European dialects, but I can assure that it does not happens in Brazilian Portuguese. They are always pronouced /b, d, g/. Moreover, it does not happens in American Spanish. José San Martin 23:54, 15 December 2005 (UTC)


 * /l/ is markedly velarized, [ɫ], which is very close to the standard American English /l/ in words such as "ball". - not in most parts of Brazil. It is normally spoken as /w/. I think is common in Portugal, isn't it? But it is just valid to the final . José San Martin 23:54, 15 December 2005 (UTC)


 * In some Brazilian dialects, especially in the dialects spoken in Rio de Janeiro, Minas Gerais and Bahia, /d/ and /t/ tend to become affricated before the unstressed phoneme /i/. - it a little is timid. In most southern Brazil dialects (exception made to Curitiba), /t/ and /d/ are strongly pronouced as /tʃ/ and /dʒ/. Not tend to. José San Martin 23:54, 15 December 2005 (UTC)


 * The information is focused mostly on European Portuguese (EP) because the source is the IPA handbook which has a section on EP. You're welcome to point out the specifics of EP where it is appropriate, but try to make statements as general as possible and focus on the standard languages and of really major dialect groups. It's impossible to cover every nuance of every dialect here. I have access to The Phonology of Portuguese, which covers both EP and BP, but I haven't had time to sit down and try to sift through it and make additions.
 * As for the velarized /l/, please read the discussion "Vowel chart" above.
 * Peter Isotalo 00:09, 16 December 2005 (UTC)


 * So, it would be better say nothing about alophones and dilects variations, since it is all written in the Phonology article, isn't it? This paragraph could be deleted. José San Martin 01:59, 16 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Deviations belong here, just not overly detailed (some repetition is unavoidable). Describe dialect groups and general differences. For example, EP vs BP or either of those in contrast to various African or Asian forms of Portuguese. Choose the most distinguishing and recognizeable features is my recommendations.
 * Peter Isotalo 02:07, 16 December 2005 (UTC)

talkin' early
somebody might discuss the earliest period (c. 1200-1350) better. And it's nonsense to say that Galician-Portuguese was first used for poetry. What the writer meant is that the oldest datable texts (not MSS, but texts) are poetic (and even this is questioned). Also, I would want to see something like «Modern Portugese and Galician had a common root in the cluster of romance dialects spoken in the NW of the Iberian Peninsula. The poetry of the earliest poets from Galicia and from Portugal does not show any significant distinctions whatsoever that would allow us to see a separation as early as the 13th century.»

r.c.

"Portuguese is considered the most standardized Portuguese dialect"
This statement doesn't sound logical. Who considers this? How can Portuguese be a dialect of itself? Do you mean Brazilian Portuguese? European Portuguese? Surely there are dialects among these categories. rvogensen| 9:42 16 December 2005


 * vogensen, it's very good that you're reviewing the article and questioning illogical statements like this one, and I think you should take the liberty of removing or rewording them without taking up the really obvious ones here. Just provide reasonably detailed edit summaries and keep up the good work.
 * Peter Isotalo 09:46, 16 December 2005 (UTC)


 * Thank you Peter. I didn't want to edit the article until others agreed or disagreed with my editing.  In other words I wanted feedback before I committed what some might consider a dictatorial action.
 * rvogensen 12:03 16 December 2005


 * To hell with pre-editorial approval, vogensen. This is Wikipedia. Be bold with obvious mistakes. The careless certainly are, and this doesn't strike me as careless edits.
 * Peter Isotalo 12:07, 16 December 2005 (UTC)