# The Future of Portuguese: Is it dying out?



## Bienvenidos

I was talking to a language professor who told me that Portuguese no longer serves any purpose, that it is an "archaic" language, and it is destined to serve no purpose in the future. She also said that it is not in a person's best interest to learn it since it is hardly used, except in Brazil and Portugal. Realistically, she mentioned that Portuguese has no distinct advantage that will make it a language that will survive for years to come.

What is your opinion on this topic? Is Portuguese one of the world's leading language, or could it be forgotten with little impact on the globe?


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## belén

I think if many people thought like your teacher, the world would be a sad place.

I don't understand how someone can say that Portuguese is not a language worth learning, not only due to the large quantity of people who speak it (not only in Brazil and Portugal, let's not forget Madeira, Cabo Verde, Angola, Mozambique...) but because if she thinks this way about Portuguese, what does she think of languages such as Dutch or Rumantsch (to say two random languages spoken by minor populations?.)


I can't understand the logics behind your teacher's diatribe.


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## panjabigator

Brazilians are one the fastest growing communities here in Florida.  While I'd say that they all are somewhat conversant in Spanish, Portuguese is definitely very important for them.  

I have never heard that Portuguese is useless.  I also don't understand the usage of the word "archaic."  How can the 6th most spoken language in the word be considered both archaic and useless.  Have they noted a change in the number of speakers?  Have people started shifting over the Spanish and regional African tongues?  

I find no reason to agree with your professor.


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## Sorcha

Please excuse my terrible ignorance, but i never knew that portguese was spoken in Africa (aside from cape verde). In what countries is it spoken?


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## faranji

Ok, then, why should anyone bother to learn German, Italian or French, each one of which has significantly less speakers than Portuguese?


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## panjabigator

Sorcha said:


> Please excuse my terrible ignorance, but i never knew that portguese was spoken in Africa (aside from cape verde). In what countries is it spoken?



Wikipedia:





> *Portuguese* (_português_ (help·info), also _língua portuguesa_) is a Romance language that originated in what is today Galicia (Spain) and northern Portugal. It is the official language of Angola, Brazil, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Portugal and São Tomé and Príncipe, and co-official with Chinese in the Chinese S.A.R. of Macau and with Tetum in East Timor.


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## Vanda

Ah, it will certainly die when the 188.227.393 Brazilian inhabitants who insist in breeding 321 babies an hour (5,36 per minute, one each 11,2 second) die! And we are not including the Portuguese, the Angolan, the people from *Mozambique*, Cabo Verde, Guiné-Bissau, São Tomé e Príncipe and Timor Leste.


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## panjabigator

faranji said:


> Ok, then, why should anyone bother to learn German, Italian or French, each one of which has significantly less speakers than Portuguese?



Perhaps it's a question of prestige?  I am unaware of any influence prestige may have on Portuguese in regards to Spanish as I do not know Portuguese, but numbers sometimes do not count if prestige the reason.  Ethnolgue.com shows that Pakistan has a significantly higher number of Panjabi speakers than Urdu, but people continue to throw their linguistic loyalties to Urdu.


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## Joca

Bienvenidos said:


> I was talking to a language professor who told me that Portuguese no longer serves any purpose, that it is an "archaic" language, and it is destined to serve no purpose in the future. As a speaker of (Brazilian) Portuguese (but even if I weren't one), I have to strongly disagree with this. To begin with, what does she think will happen to the more than 200,000,000 people speaking Portuguese in the present? Will they vanish from the planet as if it were a magician's trick? Will they substitute English for Portuguese? I think that these are pure speculations. Nothing can be said for certain about the future of a language as Portuguese. She also said that it is not in a person's best interest to learn it since it is hardly used, except in Brazil and Portugal. She was right there, but what if the person in question is fond of the language, wants to live in Brazil or Portugal, wants to read authors in the original? Of course Portuguese can't compete with English in the world of business, but I don't think it is a useless language at all. Realistically, she mentioned that Portuguese has no distinct advantage that will make it a language that will survive for years to come. What apparently makes her so angry with Portuguese? What does she base her argumentation upon? She sounds unrealistic and pessimistic. Does she have a crystal ball?
> 
> What is your opinion on this topic? Is Portuguese one of the world's leading language, or could it be forgotten with little impact on the globe? If the number of speakers tells you about the importance of a language, then yes, Portuguese is a leading language. Unfortunately, Brazil, where the majority of Portuguese speakers are, is only a developing country, having not a large economical role in the world at large. And Portugal, the cradle of Portuguese, although better-developed, is but a small country. But this can gradually change, who knows for sure? A very rich literature has been produced in Portuguese, so I can't help thinking that there would be real loss if the language were forgotten, if ever this were possible. I know, I know, as a Brazilian, I am very partial to Portuguese, so maybe the opinion of non-speakers is equally important, as long as they know something about Portuguese.


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## etornudo

Bienvenidos said:


> What is your opinion on this topic? Is Portuguese one of the world's leading language, or could it be forgotten with little impact on the globe?




No and no. Portugues is a global language with a very bright future for a plethora of reasons the most important one being Brazil.


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## Nanon

Can Portuguese be forgotten with little impact on the globe? Certainly not at this stage. And hopefully -- never.
I often travel to Brazil on business and I understood at once that speaking Spanish, even speaking Spanish well, wasn't enough. So I began to study Portuguese and my Brazilian counterparts are grateful to me for it, though I don't speak perfect Portuguese but I try hard!!! They say they are glad I show respect to them by using their language. So based on my experience Portuguese is not doomed to die yet!


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## faranji

panjabigator said:


> Perhaps it's a question of prestige? I am unaware of any influence prestige may have on Portuguese in regards to Spanish as I do not know Portuguese, but numbers sometimes do not count if prestige the reason. Ethnolgue.com shows that Pakistan has a significantly higher number of Panjabi speakers than Urdu, but people continue to throw their linguistic loyalties to Urdu.


 
I'm afraid I cannot comment on your analogy as I don't know the details of the situation regarding the Punjab. Do Punjabis somehow have the choice to opt between Panjabi and Urdu? I thought the usual dilemma in northern India was between Urdu and Hindi, anyway. Surely I'm at a loss here.

I think numbers do count in this particular case. We're talking language survival. Please check Vanda's figures. Add to their sheer scale the fact that Brazil's is an incredibly vibrant and resourceful society, one of whose most creative and adaptable features is precisely the use of the language. I don't see prestige playing any role in all this, but should it eventually play any, my feeling is it'd tilt the balance in Portuguese's favour, as Brazil is bound to become the dominant, looked-up-to country in the region. 

I can picture Portuguese eventually mingling with Spanish and becoming a single language in South America. But wholly dying out? No way. Particularly not in the lifetime of anyone wondering whether to pay heed to a Cassandraish misinforming professor or to study one of the most beautiful Romance languages.


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## cuchuflete

Where to begin?  There is such copious ignorance and idiocy in the professor's statements.  





Bienvenidos said:


> I was talking to a language professor  What language might that be?
> Something like APL or esperanto?
> 
> 
> who told me that Portuguese no longer serves any purpose,
> 
> Among the noble purposes it serves are-
> —communication among over 200 million people, not a small thing at all;
> —the maintenance and creation of marvelous literature;
> —lyrics for some of the finest music of the current age.
> 
> that it is an "archaic" language, More archaic than other widely spoken languages?  It continues to evolve, just as do all living languages.
> and it is destined to serve no purpose in the future.
> See the noble purposes notes.
> 
> She also said that it is not in a person's best interest to learn it since it is hardly used,
> Her ignorance cannot be embelished with kind words.  My life is much richer for knowing a little of the language of Camões, Vinicius, Eça de Queirós, Pessoa and many more.
> except in Brazil and Portugal.
> 
> Realistically, she mentioned that Portuguese has no distinct advantage that will make it a language that will survive for years to come.  Realistically, by this contorted logic, many other languages such as Italian will disappear sooner.  But both Portuguese and Italian will survive, despite the ignorant protestations of the "language professor".
> 
> What is your opinion on this topic? Is Portuguese one of the world's leading language, or could it be forgotten with little impact on the globe?


My opinion on this topic, speaking bluntly, is that the "language professor" is an ignorant jerk.


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## Macunaíma

faranji said:


> I can picture Portuguese eventually mingling with Spanish and becoming a single language in South America.


 
Where do you see signs of that happening, faranji? It's a well known fact that a considerable percentage of Paraguay's population already use Portuguese as their first language due to the huge economical influence of Brazil in that country, but, apart from that, I don't think Spanish and Portuguese will ever 'mingle'. 

As for Portugueses being called 'archaic' is probably because it still retains some verbal tenses that are disappearing in other romance languages ( future subjunctive, for example ), and the personal infinitive, which only exists in Portuguese, and that makes it particularly complicated to learn. The teacher who said Portuguese is not worth learning must have had a bad experience trying to learn it, and due to frustration he/ she must have chosen to give up and say it's something not worth anybody else doing. 

There are economic reasons why Portuguese will survive, but, anyway, even if Brazil were not a fast developing economy (well, okay, it could be faster...), Latin America's largest economy and an important global player, there are demographic reasons why Portuguese is definitely not a threatened language, so the teacher mentioned was just talking nonsense.


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## winklepicker

Whilst I agree with all the quantitative arguments above, I'd like to add a qualitative one. IMHO Portuguese is the most beautiful spoken (and especially sung) language in the world. 

And before, my dear fellow foreros, you hasten to disagree, please listen to at least two of the soundclips here.  




_Then rush to disagree...!_


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## cuchuflete

winklepicker said:


> Whilst I agree with all the quantitative arguments above, I'd like to add a qualitative one. IMHO Portuguese is the most beautiful spoken (and especially sung) language in the world.
> 
> And before, my dear fellow foreros, you hasten to disagree, please listen to at least two of the soundclips here.
> 
> View attachment 4288
> 
> _Then rush to disagree...!_


Maria Bethânia, Cesaria Evora and Milton Nascimento, among others, help explain Winklepicker's irrational, but totally justified, enthusiasm.


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## Macunaíma

Yes, it would be a pity to see the language in which THIS was sung disappear, but the language that expresses the history, culture and feelings of approximately 230 million people is surely not bound to vanish.

This link might interest you: the Portuguese language on Wikipedia.

.


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## Lombard Beige

This is a link to an Indian site in Portuguese / English based in Goa:

http://www.supergoa.com/pt/

 Also, we should not forget the 4-5 million speakers of Galician, which for some is an independent language, but for others is "Português de Galiza". For more details, see the Portuguese language forum.  
 
Adeus


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## cuchuflete

Bienvenidos,

In the spirit of fair play, why don't you invite the profe to participate in this thread.  It doesn't seem fair for
us to castigate her so strongly without hearing the other side of the argument.


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## Pedro y La Torre

Bienvenidos said:


> I was talking to a language professor who told me that Portuguese no longer serves any purpose, that it is an "archaic" language, and it is destined to serve no purpose in the future. She also said that it is not in a person's best interest to learn it since it is hardly used, except in Brazil and Portugal. Realistically, she mentioned that Portuguese has no distinct advantage that will make it a language that will survive for years to come.



I would very much disagree. Portugese is the most spoken language in South America and with Brazil having a population of approaching 200 million it will be a major language in years to come (if it isn't already). It also has a rich literary tradition, and to me is a very nice language, definitely worth learning.


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## Londoner06

faranji said:


> Ok, then, why should anyone bother to learn German, Italian or French, each one of which has significantly less fewer speakers than Portuguese?


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## karuna

Any language will continue as long as its speakers want it to be. Number of speakers are not really so important unless it is really small (< 1000). I don't know much about Portuguese but is it really in such a bad shape that native speakers tend to avoid Portuguese and prefer speaking in Spanish or other languages instead? Hard to believe that it is the case.

Actually when I first read the title I thought that it is about the future tense that is disappearing from Portuguese language. Because I know that Spanish future tense is considered not to be a real tense by linguists but there could be a real future tense in parent languages.


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## Bienvenidos

Sorry for not responding, guys; I didn't mean to offend anyone, and these certainly aren't my opinions. The woman was an associate professor of Indo-European studies, and she does a lot of research about the growth of languages. She cited the fact that American schools do not teach Portuguese as a reason why Portuguese as a secondary language will not survive. 

I will send her a link to WR and see what she says. Until next time, my friends.


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## Joca

karuna said:


> Any language will continue as long as its speakers want it to be. Number of speakers are not really so important unless it is really small (< 1000). I don't know much about Portuguese but is it really in such a bad shape that native speakers tend to avoid Portuguese and prefer speaking in Spanish or other languages instead? Hard to believe that it is the case. As a Brazilian, I can say that we will only choose to speak another language in an international environment, where Portuguese has no chance of being understood. We mostly resort to English or in some cases to Portuñol, which is an amusing mixture of Spanish and Portuguese as spoken in Latin America. That is to say, Portuguese is not at all in a bad shape. True enough, we accept many new words from English in the technological context, but I believe this is happening with all the languages in the world. This doesn't mean Portuguese is losing ground.
> 
> Actually when I first read the title I thought that it is about the future tense that is disappearing from Portuguese language. Because I know that Spanish future tense is considered not to be a real tense by linguists but there could be a real future tense in parent languages. Very funny. Indeed this would be a more appropriate subject, I believe.


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## Joca

Bienvenidos said:


> Sorry for not responding, guys; I didn't mean to offend anyone, and these certainly aren't my opinions. The woman was an associate professor of Indo-European studies, and she does a lot of research about the growth of languages. She cited the fact that American schools do not teach Portuguese as a reason why Portuguese as a secondary language will not survive. Oh dear, I am not sure that I want to hear what this lady has to say further. I think she would be better to stay within the limits of her province.
> 
> I will send her a link to WR and see what she says. Until next time, my friends.


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## cuchuflete

Bienvenidos said:


> Sorry for not responding, guys; I didn't mean to offend anyone, and these certainly aren't my opinions. The woman was an associate professor of Indo-European studies, and she does a lot of research about the growth of languages. She cited the fact that American schools do not teach Portuguese as a reason why Portuguese as a secondary language will not survive.
> 
> I will send her a link to WR and see what she says. Until next time, my friends.



Not so very long ago, American schools taught mostly French and German, and Spanish was hard to find in the curriculum of most public schools.  Just look at the astonishing results.

Please warn your teacher that her logic will be as closely scrutinized as whatever facts she may bring.


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## jess oh seven

Vanda said:


> Ah, it will certainly die when the 188.227.393 Brazilian inhabitants who insist in breeding 321 babies an hour (5,36 per minute, one each 11,2 second) die! And we are not including the Portuguese, the Angolan, the people from *Mozambique*, Cabo Verde, Guiné-Bissau, São Tomé e Príncipe and Timor Leste.


Hehehe 

Perhaps his logic is based on the fact that it is not as widely-taught as some other languages? I would like to see it being taught in more institutions. Our Portuguese "department" consists of only two people! It's a sad state of affairs and we don't receive a very high quality of teaching because of it.

Edited to add: I hadn't read through all the posts, so I didn't notice that my little theory was already mentioned!


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## boardslide315

Maybe the professor has a point...After all, most people in the world are not of the same opinion as those that inhabit this forum, many of whom harbor a passion for languages. The sad truth is that the average person out there will only learn a language if he/she absolutely has to, or if there is a strong promise that it will give him/her an advantage for success in the future. 

That being said, if someone is going to go through the time, effort, and money to learn a language, why not choose one with more practical uses, such as Spanish? (Or whichever second language would be of greatest use in your country.) It seems the professor was likely just of this opinion, albeit she might have expressed it a little too strongly (especially in the setting of a group of language enthusiasts, although remember it seems that she was quoted without her permission.) 

By the way, I myself love Portuguese and think it is well worth the effort of studying...I just hate one-sided arguments


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## Bienvenidos

boardslide315 said:


> although remember it seems that she was quoted without her permission.)



She has spoken about this topic before at lectures in New York City, etc, so I don't think she minds that I have quoted her.


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## modus.irrealis

Bienvenidos said:


> I was talking to a language professor who told me that Portuguese no longer serves any purpose



This is the part of the comments that gets to me the most, since I don't understand what "purpose" could mean here. Like others have said, is being the everyday means of communication for almost two hundred million people not enough? And if it's not enough, what does that say about the what, 98% of languages that have fewer native speakers? It seems to me that she is judging purpose on the basis of whether non-Portuguese speakers would want to learn it as second language, but for me, I'd rank that criterion fairly low when deciding whether a language "serves any purposes."


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## winklepicker

Macunaíma said:


> the language in which THIS was sung


 
Thank you *thank you* Macunaíma - this is *fab*. 



> She cited the fact that American schools do not teach Portuguese as a reason why Portuguese as a secondary language will not survive


 
- and if that's the criterion for survival, 6,799 of the world's 6,800 languages are in BIG trouble!

_(I can say that: the only people as bad as the Americans at learning foreign languages are the Brits!)_

EDIT: I also want to mention Camoes and Marisa. Catholic tastes...!


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## Lombard Beige

Far from dying out, I think Portuguese has a number of opportunities for expansion, at least as a SECOND LANGUAGE. I can think of at least 3 examples:

1) In India, as a second language in the ex Portuguese areas, where as you can see from the link I posted above, there is a revival of interest 50 years after their incorporation in the state of India.
 2) In Paraguay, as was already mentioned in this thread, and also in Uruguay, for the same reasons.  
 3) In Spain, where Castillian is certainly not menaced by Portuguese.
 In the video that I have sinced attached to the part of my message that has been moved to the Portuguese language forum, it is mentioned that, in the Spanish Autonomous Community of Extremadura, there are 6,000 students of Portuguese as a SECOND LANGUAGE. [This A.C. also contains groups of native speakers of “galego-portugués" as well as the city of Olivenza, where Portuguese is still spoken to some extent after centuries of incorporation into Spain]. It is also explained that there is great room for expansion of the teaching of STANDARD PORTUGUESE, as a SECOND LANGUAGE, in Galicia [regardless of the status of the Galician language, for which see the message moved to the PT language forum, but facilitated in any case by the closeness of the two “linguistic entities” (the PC term for “languages”)].

Hoping that, this time, I have not strayed too far away from the straight narrow theme.

 regards and adeus


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## olivinha

boardslide315 said:


> Maybe the professor has a point...After all, most people in the world are not of the same opinion as those that inhabit this forum, many of whom harbor a passion for languages. The sad truth is that the average person out there will only learn a language if he/she absolutely has to, or if there is a strong promise that it will give him/her an advantage for success in the future.


Boardslide, these are typical statements/attitudes one hears/sees in the US: speaking English is enough (why learn another language when English is the international lingua franca?) and doing something only when it involves some sort of advantage or success in the future. There is more to learning a language than advantage or success (see other posts), and you know that. 
I think when you say the average person you mean the average American.




boardslide315 said:


> By the way, I myself love Portuguese and think it is well worth the effort of studying...I just hate one-sided arguments


 
Having said that, I also do not like one-sided arguments, and as much as I love Portuguese, I did read somewhere that the future of all the languages in the world is to be reduced to about 300, and, by then, Portuguese will have been absorbed by Spanish. 
So maybe that is what the professor was refering to: if Portuguese is indeed to be swallowed by Spanish, why should one invest their time learning a language which is doomed to disappear? I am not justifying what the teacher said, I am just trying to understand why a professor would say something of this sort.

Long live, Portuguese!  

O


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## Lombard Beige

olivinha said:


> ... ... if Portuguese is  indeed to be sllawoed by Spanish, why should one invest their time learning a language which is doomed to disappear? ...



But, if in some remote future, Portuguese is absorbed by Spanish, in the meantime that Spanish will have been heavily influenced by Portuguese ... 

regards and Adeus


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## Pedro y La Torre

boardslide315 said:


> That being said, if someone is going to go through the time, effort, and money to learn a language, why not choose one with more practical uses, such as Spanish?



Portugese dosen't have practical uses? Being the fifth-most spoken language in the world I would say it has plenty of uses, and if anything Spanish speakers in South America are learning it, not the other way around.


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## Lombard Beige

Pedro y La Torre said:


> Portugese dosen't have practical uses? Being the fifth-most spoken language in the world I would say it has plenty of uses, and if anything Spanish speakers in South America are learning it, not the other way around.



Edited version (two branches were opened in the meantime) 

That's not quite true, because the Centro Cervantes, which is the official Spanish language institute, is investing heavily in Brazil (Rio, S. Paulo, Brasilia, Curitiba, Porto Alegre and Salvador de Bahia) and Portugal. I think both sides are learning each other's language, which is a good thing.

And as confirmation of this the Instituto Camões, the Portuguese equivalent of CC, has branches in Barcelona, Madrid, Cáceres (Extremadura), Vigo (Galicia), and also in Argentina, Mexico and Venezuela.

regards


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## cuchuflete

What if the merchants of doom are correct, and thousands of languages will eventually disappear?  Is it likey that the largest (in terms of numbers of current speakers) will go first?   Maybe the esteemed professor meant that you should tell your great great great grandchildren to be selective in their choices of languages to study.
The death of the novel has been widely advertised for over a century.


You referred to the source of the 'archaic and useless' quote as a professor.   Shall we all cast a tear and say a prayer in memorium for the institution where this person teaches?  Whatever she may profess to profess, it seems that _intellectual curiosity_ is not it.  No doubt her hit list of languages to be ignored includes Ancient Greek, Latin and Hebrew, and all modern languages with fewer than a half billion speakers.  If she only believes in the value of learning the modern and utilitarian, as she perceives these, she must be a remarkably
fascinating conversationalist.


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## ernest_

Bienvenidos said:


> I was talking to a language professor who told me that Portuguese no longer serves any purpose, that it is an "archaic" language, and it is destined to serve no purpose in the future.



That must be a joke, alright? It is just plain stupid, with due respect to your teacher. What does she mean, no longer serves any purpose? I think it serves the same purpose it's always served: to communicate with other people. As long as there are Portuguese speakers it will be a useful language and serve a purpose.



> Realistically, she mentioned that Portuguese has no distinct advantage that will make it a language that will survive for years to come.


Good heavens. I know no language that has a distinct advantage. They all have verbs, nouns, adjectives and the like. So what? As for whether it will survive, of course it will survive as long as its speakers continue to use it. And I can't think of any reason for which they would not do so.

See you.


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## Vanda

I go with Joca. I am sure I am not interested in what this teacher has to say and I wouldn't tell her what I want to in this forum.  
If she wants to imply that Portuguese has no prestige this is a whole new story. So far it has never had, and about us, we are living with that fact without any problems. 
And this is the first time I see so many people learning it - oh yes, I had never seen people learning Portuguese before - I can assure that we are way nearer of expading than to dying!
Maybe she could research our thousands of native indians languages that have already been destroyed/smashed...


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## Outsider

Bienvenidos said:


> The woman was an associate professor of Indo-European studies, and she does a lot of research about the growth of languages. She cited the fact that American schools do not teach Portuguese as a reason why Portuguese as a secondary language will not survive.


Children say the darnest things. Some American schools (universities) do teach Portuguese. Not that we'd all drop dead if all of them suddenly decided to stop teaching it. We do have our own schools, here in the third world (two or three).



Lombard Beige said:


> But, if in some remote future, Portuguese is absorbed by Spanish, in the meantime that Spanish will have been heavily influenced by Portuguese ...


Not necessarily. We could go through a case of language suicide, with everybody switching to Spanish (Bienvenido's teacher would no doubt like that -- one less pesky foreign language to learn). However, I am very skeptical of such scenarios. Here's a funny thing: the same people who claim that Portuguese and Spanish are so alike, so alike, that they're destined to merge in the near future (nevermind their ten centuries of living apart so far) are often the same who claim that Brazilian Portuguese is so different from European Portuguese, so different, that they can't help becoming separate languages in the near future, if they haven't already. Can they say 'cognitive dissonance'?


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## olivinha

Outsider said:


> Children say the darnest things. Some American schools (universities) do teach Portuguese. Not that we'd all drop dead and croak if all of them suddenly decided to stop teaching it.


 
I studied Portuguese (Literature and Linguistics) in a university in Los Angeles, CA.
O


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## Lombard Beige

Outsider said:


> ... Not necessarily. We could go through a case of language suicide, with everybody switching to Spanish ...



But it didn't happen even when Portugal and Spain were united at the height of Spanish power and prestige under Phillip II of Habsburg (Felipe II de Austria). Portuguese writers like Gil Vicente wrote in Spanish, but used the personal infinitive (!!!), so they were doing what I would hypothesize in some far distant future ... 



Outsider said:


> ... the same people who claim that Portuguese and Spanish are so alike ... that they're destined to merge in the near future ... are often the same who claim that Brazilian Portuguese is so different from European Portuguese, ... that they can't help becoming separate languages in the near future ...



Who are the same people who say that if you write "A Corunha" instead of "A Coruña" (or better still "La Coruña") or "filho" instead of "filho" you will go directly to Hell, with no intermediate stop in Purgatory ...

regards and adeus


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## Outsider

Lombard Beige said:


> But it didn't happen even when Portugal and Spain were united at the height of Spanish power and prestige under Phillip II of Habsburg (Felipe II de Austria). Portuguese writers like Gil Vicente wrote in Spanish, but used the personal infinitive (!!!), so they were doing what I would hypothesize in some far distant future ...


Yes, but those were other times. The world today is becoming more and more globalized and centered on nation-states, and there's a strong tendency to drop languages with fewer speakers in favour of languages with more speakers (or more powerful speakers). 
So I wouldn't put the possibility of a suicidal switch to Spanish completely aside. It's a possibility, just as it's also a possibility that everyone in the world will soon choose to switch to English. But I would assign a very low probability to both possibilities.


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## cuchuflete

There are approximately one million Portuguese speakers in the Commonwealth (State) of Massachusetts in the US.  The State of Rhode Island has a large Portuguese speaking population also. Portuguese is the second most
used language in that state, after English.


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## olivinha

olivinha said:


> Having said that, I also do not like one-sided arguments, and as much as I love Portuguese, I did read somewhere that the future of all the languages in the world is to be reduced to about 300, and, by then, Portuguese will have been absorbed by Spanish.
> So maybe that is what the professor was refering to: if Portuguese is indeed to be swallowed by Spanish, why should one invest their time learning a language which is doomed to disappear? I am not justifying what the teacher said, I am just trying to understand why a professor would say something of this sort.
> 
> Long live, Portuguese!
> 
> O


 
I just wanted to clarify that I do not subscribe to such theory. Actually, I have no idea whether or not that could happen. (My only reaction when I read that article was that of sadness: "could that really happen to (my) Portuguese?")
Again, I was being the devil´s advocate in trying to make some sense out of that teacher´s statement about the future of Portuguese.

Again Long Live, Portuguese!
O


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## Joca

Outsider said:


> Yes, but those were other times. The world today is becoming more and more globalized and centered on nation-states, and there's a strong tendency to drop languages with fewer speakers in favour of languages with more speakers (or more powerful speakers).
> So I wouldn't put the possibility of a suicidal switch to Spanish completely aside. It's a possibility, just as it's also a possibility that everyone in the world will soon choose to switch to English. But I would assign a very low probability to both possibilities.


 
We no longer believe in the Babel Tower, do we? But in a way, it seems that we are heading towards the scenario that supposedly existed before Babel, that is, a one-language world. It may take a million years before it happens again (if global warming, the Bomb and asteroids etc allow life on earth to go that far). As long as nations will exist and as long as governments will hold the power, I believe the decision to drop a national language and choose another one that is more suitable must a political and legal decision. At the present time, I see no reason why we should drop Portuguese. It is a language still full of promises and blossoming. To drop it now and substitute Spanish or English for it would be totally irrational and anti-patriotic, however outdated patriotism may seem to most people.


----------



## Lombard Beige

Joca said:


> ... I believe the decision to drop a national language and choose another one that is more suitable must a political and legal decision. At the present time, I see no reason why we should drop Portuguese. ...



Particularly, if we think that a small country like East Timor has recently re-instated Portuguese as its national language along with Tetum. I think they were pleased to drop Indonesian ...

regards


----------



## Outsider

East Timor is a very special case. I wonder how long Portuguese will manage to survive there, assuming they succeed in making it a language of the country.


----------



## Lombard Beige

Outsider said:


> East Timor is a very special case. I wonder how long Portuguese will manage to survive there, assuming they succeed in making it a language of the country.



True, but you should read some of the articles on the subject by Prof. Geoffrey Hull, an Australian, who worked with Sergio Vieira de Melo, Xanana  Gusmão, etc., to understand why they chose to revert to Portuguese, alongside Tetum, which apparently has a symbiotic relationship with Portuguese. They could have chosen English, but as Timor is very close to Australia "no es todo oro lo que reluce".



But I don't want to distort Prof. Hull's thinking. You can find the articles (in English) through the PT Wiki or through the Tetum Wiki, which is Portuguese enough to orient yourself (I'm not saying to understand), a bit like Maltese and Italian.

regards


----------



## MarX

Ta bea!

This is my personal opinion, but I think calling Timor Leste a Portuguese speaking country is an exaggeration.
You can go and visit Timor and see how far you come with Portuguese. In fact, you can get by far easier using Indonesian than Portuguese there. 
The best way to communicate with the people there is of course by speaking Tetum, which is very widespread in Timor Leste.
Btw, I'm not trying to defend my language, just telling you the reality in Timor.
Perhaps that'll change in the future, but for now, calling Timor Leste Portuguese speaking is simply an exaggeration.

To answer the original question, I think Portuguese is important, I don't know which aspects your professor was talking about, but Portuguese is certainly a big, lively, evolving language which is unlikely to disappear in the near future.
Plus, it is one of the most beautiful languages I know, which has a huge impact upon many languages, especially in Indonesia. Indonesian and the regional languages/dialects are full of Portuguese words.

Grüsse,


MarX


----------



## Tagarela

Olá,

Answer to the original issue: I think that this professor only thought in economic reasons and international power - but, if it is the point, as some have said something simmilar, why should Dutch, Icelandic, Czech, Lithuanian, Quechua etc survive? 

It is very much like as if English and some four or five traditional languages such as French and German, and now rising Mandarin, would be enough to one communicates to everyworld.  

But even this would not be very well, since Portugal has ruled the world once. 

Tchau.:


----------



## e.ma

"Money" is not "prestige". You cannot speak of a language in terms of "world leading".


(This is what I wrote, but I've changed my mind. If you want to know why, look here: http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=849568)


----------



## Outsider

I'm afraid I'll have to disagree with you, E.ma. A major ingredient of prestige is indeed money.

Why is English so important and influential today, to the point where some think it might become the single language of the world in the future? One of the explanations I often see is "because it's the language of business". In other words, the language of money.


----------



## Pedro y La Torre

The only way I see Portuguese dying out is if the Brazilian and European variants eventually seperate into different languages, although one would probably still be called Portuguese.


----------



## e.ma

*quoting Outsider*: I'm afraid I'll have to disagree with you, E.ma. A major ingredient of prestige is indeed money.

* How cuold it be so? I can't agree. (If WR's dictionary is true and prestige really means prestigio in Spanish)*

Why is English so important and influential today, to the point where some think *it might become the single language of the world in the future*? One of the explanations I often see is "because it's the language of business". In other words, the language of money.

*Well, what does this all have to do with prestige? (And who might be thinking that?)*


 (This is what I wrote, but after Outsider's answer I've changed my mind. If you want to know why, you can look here: http://forum.wordreference.com/showthread.php?t=849568)


----------



## merquiades

There might well be languages in the world on their death bed but Portuguese is not one of them.  Perhaps it lacks the prestige of English, but in the countries it is official it won't die out, and people moving there will have to learn Portuguese.
The only Portuguese-speaking place I think might be lost is Macau, just because it will be drowned in Chinese now that it has reverted to China. "O português é só dominado por cerca de 2,4% da população e falado correntemente por cerca de 0,6% da população."

Otherwise it is still growing in the former Portuguese colonies in Africa where it is currently replacing the native African languages.  Such is the case of Angola where the "younger urban generations are moving towards the dominant or exclusive use of Portuguese."


----------



## funnyhat

Bienvenidos said:


> Sorry for not responding, guys; I didn't mean to offend anyone, and these certainly aren't my opinions. The woman was an associate professor of Indo-European studies, and she does a lot of research about the growth of languages. She cited the fact that American schools do not teach Portuguese as a reason why Portuguese as a secondary language will not survive.
> 
> I will send her a link to WR and see what she says. Until next time, my friends.



Sigh . . . I can't say I'm surprised that an American would say this.  I love my country, but my countrymen can be pretty ignorant when it comes to the subject of languages and linguistic acquisition.

Americans are generally mystified by the notion that a person can speak more than one language at a time. We are one of the world's most monolingual societies; around 80% of the U.S. population speaks only English.  What's more, of the remaining 20%, most are either immigrants or the children of immigrants, some of whom don't speak English well, so we tend to mistakenly believe that bilingualism is a sign of linguistic weakness, when it's just the opposite.  Many people in this country literally believe that foreign-language instruction hurts students' ability to speak English, despite countless studies to the contrary.  (Speaking for myself, I found that studying French helped me understand English grammar much more thoroughly, and also enlarged my English vocabulary considerably.)

We also have a very hard time understanding that it's possible for a person to want to use one language for one purpose (such as doing business) and another for other purposes (like chatting with friends/family), even though this is exactly the case in many, many parts of the world.  When we hear that a Swedish person uses English when doing business and then speaks Swedish with friends, it just doesn't register in our minds; we don't understand how such a thing can be possible.  

So, when we hear that English is increasingly studied around the world as a second (or third) language, we assume that it must be causing people around the world to actually lose their native languages.  Americans generally assume that most of the world's languages are thus in decline, not just Portuguese (there is a widespread belief here that French is "dying" as well).


----------



## palomnik

A large number of cultural reasons have been cited in the posts. Let's not neglect the economic reasons.

I am a professional legal and financial translator working in  Portuguese, Russian and Spanish. I have seen the amount of work coming  my way in Portuguese almost triple in the last year, and I am being  offered twice as much work in Portuguese as in the other two languages  combined.

Brazil has been experiencing major economic growth for fifteen years. It is not perceived any longer as a sick man with astronomical inflation. It has become a dominant economic force in several South American countries. Paraguay has practically become a province of Brazil, and its economy has never done better. Countries with relatively sophisticated economic infrastructures as Mexico and Venezuela are hiring Brazilian technicians and consulting companies instead of Americans to work on major projects. To turn around the old joke, maybe Brazil won't be the "land of the future" any more.

And in case you don't read the trade pulps, the world's largest deposit of natural gas has been discovered off the coast of Mozambique. It won't be a backwater much longer. It could end up as economically crucial as Saudi Arabia and Iran. And this, in turn, will only be to the benefit of those Brazilian consulting firms, which can provide, and are providing, technical assistance there and in Angola, with its rich mineral deposits.

Portuguese is on a roll! I expect that in another 50 years it will be the most important language in the world, after English - or maybe even ahead of English.


----------



## More od Solzi

palomnik said:


> Portuguese is on a roll! I expect that in another 50 years it will be the most important language in the world, after English - or maybe even ahead of English.



I think Portuguese will be out of the top 10 most spoken languages in the next 30 years, unfortunately.
In Europe more people study Mandarin (and even Japanese) than Portuguese.


----------



## Fernando

I am making a list of the foresable '10 most spoke kanguages in the next 30 years' which have better perspective than Portuguese. To me, only Chinese and English are out of the question. Please complete:

1. English
2. Chinese
3. Spanish?
4. Arabic (all varieties)?
5. French?
6. Hindi/Urdu?
7. ???
8. ???
9. ???
10. ???


----------



## Fernando

More od Solzi said:


> In Europe more people study Mandarin (and even Japanese) than Portuguese.



So, do you mean that more than 10 million Europeans can speak Mandarin or Japanese? Everybody can 'study'. Learning is other thing.


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## Vanda

I don't agree, Portuguese survived centuries with just a minority population of natives speaking it in eras without internet, globalization and so on. Now with a nation with more than 200 millions inhabitants in my country that keeps growing and being the 2nd language most used in internet, the chances grow as never before!


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## merquiades

According to this site, Portuguese would be the 7th most influential language in the world, Japanese is 9th, and the Mandarin form of Chinese is 5th.  It's absurd to think Portuguese will die out soon.


----------



## gentilhom

Languages may have lots of users but have no cultural or political influence at all. Today only English as the language of International Money and Business has influence. Just see what happens with Chinese or Hindi : so many users but no political or cultural influence worth mentioning...


----------



## Vanda

> Languages may have lots of users but have no cultural or political influence at all.


REally? One of the languages increasing in number of students in Europe and USA is Portuguese. The influence is called ''money'' because one of the few countries with lot of jobs and many opportunities to earn money today - considering Europe and USA that are all undergoing an economic crisis - is Brazil- where they speak Portuguese!

*Where the jobs are: Brazil (http://money.cnn.com/2012/05/30/news/economy/brazil-jobs/)*

This year, Brazil overtook the United Kingdom as the world's sixth largest economy, fueled in part by big growth in domestic consumption as millions of people climbed out of poverty into the middle class.

And in  a language magazine:


> As language departments are downsized, or cut altogether in U.S.  universities, the demand for Portuguese is growing. Although Portuguese  has always been an important world language, it has only recently been  recognized as an important language for business and international  relations.


http://languagemagazine.com/?page_id=3630

So, nothing like money to make a language important Gentilhom!


----------



## Guajara-Mirim

Bienvenidos said:


> I was talking to a language professor who told me that Portuguese no longer serves any purpose, that it is an "archaic" language, and it is destined to serve no purpose in the future. She also said that it is not in a person's best interest to learn it since it is hardly used, except in Brazil and Portugal. Realistically, she mentioned that Portuguese has no distinct advantage that will make it a language that will survive for years to come.
> 
> What is your opinion on this topic? Is Portuguese one of the world's leading language, or could it be forgotten with little impact on the globe?



I think your teacher is stupid, but it does not surprise me... I guess your teacher does not know that in 2030 in your "beautiful" america, almost half of the people will speak spanish. Latin languages are more and more presents hehehe.



Vanda said:


> REally? One of the languages increasing in number of students in Europe and USA is Portuguese. The influence is called ''money'' because one of the few countries with lot of jobs and many opportunities to earn money today - considering Europe and USA that are all undergoing an economic crisis - is Brazil- where they speak Portuguese!
> 
> *Where the jobs are: Brazil (http://money.cnn.com/2012/05/30/news/economy/brazil-jobs/)*
> 
> This year, Brazil overtook the United Kingdom as the world's sixth largest economy, fueled in part by big growth in domestic consumption as millions of people climbed out of poverty into the middle class.
> 
> And in  a language magazine:
> http://languagemagazine.com/?page_id=3630
> 
> So, nothing like money to make a language important Gentilhom!



Você sabe! Eles vêm no Brasil somente para *sobreviver* fugir a crise porque o Brasil se tornou um país em desenvolvimento. O que me irrita o mais é que não prestam atenção em falar bem português (porque a maioria já fala castelhano ou inglês), quê vergonha!


----------



## Pedro y La Torre

Guajara-Mirim said:


> I think your teacher is stupid, but it does not surprise me... I guess your teacher does not know that in 2030 in your "beautiful" america, almost half of the people will speak spanish. Latin languages are more and more presents hehehe.



The teacher is undoubtedly a fool, but I'm afraid the figure you've cited there is nonsense. Where are you getting such a figure from?


----------



## gentilhom

I think I was wrong in assuming that influence is only related to money. I think the decisive thing is cultural influence. Hollywood and cars is probably the key to the success story of English. The Romans were powerful, rich and arrogant, but they took the culture of the Greek, who had nothing but their brilliant ideas and civilization. 

Brazil is now plunging into a crisis. I'd rather look to Angola and Mozambique for new capitalist 'miracles'.

I studied Portuguese for many years. It is a wonderful language, but sorely lacks good dictionaries and treatises on language. In this respect, French has a big advantage, there is such an abundance of books on grammar, spelling, history of the language, etc. It shows that people in general are rather indifferent to matters of language. Let us have three or four dictionaries like the Aurelio Buarque, and Portuguese will get a new breath.

I think that all languages are in danger of dying out because of English-Globish. It is not a question of counting the people who speak one language. If they keep borrowing words and concepts (which is even worse) from Globalized English, that will not guarantee the vitalty and future of the language. In French things have gotten to the point that the only new things that appear in the language are all related to English in some way or other. Let one Frenchman invent something, he will give it some fancy English name and I am pretty sure the same happens in Brazil or elsewhere. When people stop doing that, well, this world will become different.

Let one nation say 'I will wage a war against English and promote my language at all costs' (as the Anglo-Saxons have done) and there will be hope. I am waiting to see Brazil or China ban English in schools, airports and business contracts to begin to feel optimistic about the future of linguistic diversity.


----------



## Guajara-Mirim

Pedro y La Torre said:


> The teacher is undoubtedly a fool, but I'm afraid the figure you've cited there is nonsense. Where are you getting such a figure from?


Haga algunas investigaciones, va a encontrar muchas cosas.


----------



## Pedro y La Torre

Guajara-Mirim said:


> Haga algunas investigaciones, va a encontrar muchas cosas.



You just made it up then, as I suspected. I'll know what to expect from you in future.


----------



## Nino83

gentilhom said:


> I think I was wrong in assuming that influence is only related to money. I think the decisive thing is cultural influence. Hollywood and cars is probably the key to the success story of English. The Romans were powerful, rich and arrogant, but they took the culture of the Greek, who had nothing but their brilliant ideas and civilization.



I think that Portuguese (Brazilian Portuguese, in particular) has a great cultural influence among musicians. 
After A. C. Jobim and J. Gilberto started playing Bossa Nova Portuguese language spread in Europe and North America, through Elis Regina's voice. 
All major American and European artists sang their version of _A Garota de Ipanema, Chega de Saudade_ and so on. 
Every language has a specific cultural influence in some field. French in cooking, perfume, cosmetics, Italian in music notation, Opera, arts and cooking and so on. 

Yes, if we speak about work, business, English leads but I shouldn't go too far saying that these languages don't have future. Another fact is that Romance languages have about 800 million native speaker and that they share a lot of vocabulary with English language, the actual lingua franca. 

I think that although Portuguese (and other Romance languages) won't be the lingua franca, it can have some cultural influence in specific fields.


----------



## Guajara-Mirim

Pedro y La Torre said:


> You just made it up then, as I suspected. I'll know what to expect from you in future.



This is the truth, english will be dethroned.


----------



## Guajara-Mirim

Nino83 said:


> I think that Portuguese (Brazilian Portuguese, in particular) has a great cultural influence among musicians.
> After A. C. Jobim and J. Gilberto started playing Bossa Nova Portuguese language spread in Europe and North America, through Elis Regina's voice.
> All major American and European artists sang their version of _A Garota de Ipanema, Chega de Saudade_ and so on.
> Every language has a specific cultural influence in some field. French in cooking, perfume, cosmetics, Italian in music notation, Opera, arts and cooking and so on.
> 
> Yes, if we speak about work, business, English leads but I shouldn't go too far saying that these languages don't have future. Another fact is that Romance languages have about 800 million native speaker and that they share a lot of vocabulary with English language, the actual lingua franca.
> 
> I think that although Portuguese (and other Romance languages) won't be the lingua franca, it can have some cultural influence in specific fields.



Sono d'accordo, Nino.


----------



## Vanda

Português é a língua da moda e do emprego na China


> Português já é a segunda nota mais alta de entrada em algumas universidades chinesas. Dentro de cinco anos, depois dos países Lusófonos, será a China quem mais fala português.
> 
> "A China olha para o longo prazo. Ao perceber que havia mudanças na geopolítica começou a apostar no ensino do português, porque tem muita população jovem", disse ao Expresso, Ana Paula Laborinho, presidente do Instituto Camões.
> Carlos André confirma a "ideia de que aprender português é uma garantia de empregabilidade. Os estudantes chineses acham que lhes abre portas no jornalismo, na diplomacia e nas empresas".




Chinese people have vision of the future.


----------



## Hector9

Inglés y español, los idiomas del futuro.


----------



## L'irlandais

Pedro y La Torre said:


> I would very much disagree. Portugese is the most spoken language in South America and with Brazil having a population of approaching 200 million it will be a major language in years to come (if it isn't already). It also has a rich literary tradition, and to me is a very nice language, definitely worth learning.


Must agree with Pedro,
Anyone who wishes to run a building site here in Basel Switzerland, would do well to understand Portuguese, since the entire work force (appears) to be either Portuguese (193,000 individuals) or Albanian (350,000 ethnic Albanians here).  Less than 100,000 people speak Irish on a daily basis back home, yet none of us have written off the Irish language just yet.  An less than 1.5 million (Irish) speakers with some fluency worldwide.  But even the Irish language will still be alive and well long after I (and your professor) are dead and gone.  Though I suspect the same person most likely would talk you out of trying to learn Irish too.  Writing off a language with 220 million speakers is just down-right plain silly.


----------



## L'irlandais

Fernando said:


> ...
> 1. English
> 2. Chinese
> 3. Spanish?
> 4. Arabic (all varieties)?
> 5. French?
> 6. Hindi/Urdu?
> 7. ???
> 8. ???
> 9. ???
> 10. ???


Vast question :  Not sure how to measure prestige.  The list in terms of numbers of Native speakers is the only one that makes any sense to me.
Native speakers (in millions)

1. Mandarin 845 
2. Spanish 329 
3. English 328 
4. Arabic languages 221 
5. Hindi 182 
6. Bengali 181 
7. Portuguese 178 
8. Russian 144 
9. Japanese 122 
10. German 90.3

Source :  Lewis, M. Paul (ed.) (2009). "Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Sixteenth edition". Dallas, Tex.: SIL International.

Portuguese is right up there.  German figures rather than French, that's bound to get up a few noses.


----------



## almostfreebird

belén said:


> I think if many people thought like your teacher, the world would be a sad place.
> 
> I don't understand how someone can say that Portuguese is not a language worth learning, not only due to the large quantity of people who speak it (not only in Brazil and Portugal, let's not forget Madeira, Cabo Verde, Angola, Mozambique...) but because if she thinks this way about Portuguese, what does she think of languages such as Dutch or Rumantsch (to say two random languages spoken by minor populations?.)
> 
> 
> I can't understand the logics behind your teacher's diatribe.




I second that.

By the way,

This Japanese lady is famous as a Bossa Nova singer in Japan.
She is good.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D6nSPW3kLjM


----------



## ESustad

L'irlandais said:


> Vast question :  Not sure how to measure prestige.  The list in terms of numbers of Native speakers is the only one that makes any sense to me.



A language's prestige is obviously somewhat subjective.  I'd consider how many people use it is a lingua franca, how widely it is studied as a foreign language, in how many countries it has official status, literature, among other factors.  French still has enormous, although dwindling, prestige.  It has official status in several countries, and even more are members of Francophonie.  Persian isn't in the top ten in terms of native speakers, yet it has a vast and ancient literature which has heavily influenced languages from Turkish to Urdu and beyond.  

On the other hand, a language like Bengali may have 181 million native speakers, but little range outside of Bangladesh and West Bengal or immigrant communities in Britain.  Russian has been in steep decline too, since losing what was de facto imperial status in the USSR.

EDIT for relevance:  In the case of Portuguese, its future lies in Brazil.  The language's geographic reach and diversity should guarantee its survival.


----------



## Pedro y La Torre

L'irlandais said:


> Vast question :  Not sure how to measure prestige.  The list in terms of numbers of Native speakers is the only one that makes any sense to me.
> Native speakers (in millions)
> 
> 1. Mandarin 845
> 2. Spanish 329
> 3. English 328
> 4. Arabic languages 221
> 5. Hindi 182
> 6. Bengali 181
> 7. Portuguese 178
> 8. Russian 144
> 9. Japanese 122
> 10. German 90.3
> 
> Source :  Lewis, M. Paul (ed.) (2009). "Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Sixteenth edition". Dallas, Tex.: SIL International.
> 
> Portuguese is right up there.  German figures rather than French, that's bound to get up a few noses.



That English figure seems suspiciously low. At least 250 million Americans are native English speakers, throw in 65 million odd Brits, 4.5 million Irish, 20 million Aussies, 4.3 million New Zealanders, a few million white South Africans, 24 million English Canadians and you've well over 350 million native Anglophones, not to mention second language speakers, which makes English, by some distance, the most spoken language on Earth.

Come to think of it, French's second language speakers are substantial too and would pull it well ahead of German or, indeed, Portuguese.


----------



## Nanon

Such a recurrent topic... Every so often, we hear about the death of Portuguese, French, and... well, pretty much any language except English, Spanish and maybe Mandarin (?). Yet none of them are endangered languages.


gentilhom said:


> I studied Portuguese for many years. It is a wonderful language, but sorely lacks good dictionaries and treatises on language. In this respect, French has a big advantage, there is such an abundance of books on grammar, spelling, history of the language, etc. It shows that people in general are rather indifferent to matters of language. Let us have three or four dictionaries like the Aurelio Buarque, and Portuguese will get a new breath.


Are Portuguese speakers more indifferent to matters of language than other people? I am not certain about that. Sure, I may be biased by seeing things through the prism of the WR community  . Besides, Gentilhom, you mention numerous publications about French, but many of them are very prescriptive. I am not sure there is a direct link between such publications and the vitality of a language. Besides, I feel, and fear, that indifference to language is general. And if indifference accelerates the death of a language, then English, for one, is doomed to die... 



gentilhom said:


> I think that all languages are in danger of dying out because of English-Globish.  <...> Let one nation say 'I will wage a war against English and promote my language at all costs' (as the Anglo-Saxons have done) and there will be hope. I am waiting to see Brazil or China ban English in schools, airports and business contracts to begin to feel optimistic about the future of linguistic diversity.


I fear that wars and bans are inefficient and maybe counterproductive, but I would certainly put things into positive terms (promotion of a given local language). Let us not forget the importance of second language speakers. If we decide to go for other second languages rather than limiting ourselves to English (Globish), we certainly will contribute to linguistic diversity. Sure, that requires some efforts. Sure, we can't speak all languages: we are but human beings and we have limits. Yet I do not believe that we will be limited just to this:



Hector9 said:


> Inglés y español, los idiomas del futuro.


Ya esto me entristece... Por más que me guste el castellano, no y mil veces no. Idiomas del futuro hay más de dos, o no hay futuro. Spanish turning into a second Globish?  



ESustad said:


> EDIT for relevance:  In the case of Portuguese, its future lies in Brazil.  The language's geographic reach and diversity should guarantee its survival.


Numerically, that is more than likely. But does the 'strength' of a language mean the extinction of its variants? Quoting from Saramago: "Quase me apetece dizer que não há uma língua portuguesa, há línguas em português". Aliás, eu não teria que ter escrito este post em inglês, começando por aí. Mas tratando-se de um assunto como este, eu sou suspeita .


----------



## merquiades

gentilhom said:


> Let one nation say 'I will wage a war against English and promote my language at all costs' (as the Anglo-Saxons have done) and there will be hope. I am waiting to see Brazil or China ban English in schools, airports and business contracts to begin to feel optimistic about the future of linguistic diversity.



In this one point I agree with you.  Recently I had to catch a connecting flight at Heathrow airport in London.  Not one sign anywhere was in another language but English, really not one.  All announcements were in English, a localized version usually too, far from Globish.  And, by the way, this is a particularly difficult airport to manever about.  
I wondered if there was not a kind of war being waged against people who didn't speak English (particularly the Estuary type) as a mother tongue.  I was surprised because I had never seen such a monolingual policy before, especially in a world airport.

Anyway back to Portuguese... what does one find in Lisbon, Rio, Sao Paolo and Luanda airports?


----------



## Pedro y La Torre

merquiades said:


> In this one point I agree with you.  Recently I had to catch a connecting flight at Heathrow airport in London.  Not one sign anywhere was in another language but English, really not one.  All announcements were in English, a localized version usually too, far from Globish.  And, by the way, this is a particularly difficult airport to manever about.
> I wondered if there was not a kind of war being waged against people who didn't speak English (particularly the Estuary type) as a mother tongue.  I was surprised because I had never seen such a monolingual policy before, especially in a world airport.
> 
> Anyway back to Portuguese... what does one find in Lisbon, Rio, Sao Paolo and Luanda airports?




That's the norm in all British airports. It's assumed that a foreigner can understand enough to get around.
Irish airports likewise only contain signs in Irish and English, sometimes in English only.

The notion of a war against English is silly, English won that battle long ago. The best other languages can do is to stay relevant.


----------



## Stoggler

Pedro y La Torre said:


> That's the norm in all British airports. It's assumed that a foreigner can understand enough to get around.
> Irish airports likewise only contain signs in Irish and English, sometimes in English only.



I'm sure in my younger days when airports were still places of excitement for me that I often saw French alongside English at Gatwick and Heathrow airports - as a child it added to the interest of the place, seeing another language.

Such signs disappeared a while ago now though (along with my youthful exuberance at airports.  Or at anything!).  You still see French and sometimes German at the cross-Channel ports like Dover and Newhaven.


----------



## merquiades

Stoggler said:


> I'm sure in my younger days when airports were still places of excitement for me that I often saw French alongside English at Gatwick and Heathrow airports - as a child it added to the interest of the place, seeing another language.
> 
> Such signs disappeared a while ago now though (along with my youthful exuberance at airports.  Or at anything!).  You still see French and sometimes German at the cross-Channel ports like Dover and Newhaven.



I thought it would have been a requirement to add French (at least) at Heathrow for the London Olympics.  
I'm going back there today actually.  I'm going to really search out foreign languages and might speak to some people wearing uniforms in French or Spanish just to test.....


----------



## Vanda

Oh, I like this article on future languages:
The Languages for the Future report identifies Spanish, Arabic, French, Mandarin Chinese, German, Portuguese, Italian, Russian, Turkish and Japanese as the languages most vital to the UK over the next 20 years. (British council)


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## XiaoRoel

Hay una obsesión (que no es precisamente moderno) por lograr un imposible: la lengua única. Los motivos han sido muy variados, el ideal de una humanidad igual, libre y con una lengua (esperanto, por ejemplo), la necesidad de unificar el lenguaje de la ciencia (latín), la superioridad cultural (español, francés), etc.
Ahora es el _business _y la globalización informática. Pero el hecho es que las lenguas de la lista que se está manejando están vivas y bien vivas en lo oral y en lo escrito. Todas esas lenguas cuentan con una literatura y otro productos culturales de gran altura y en producción incesante. El que se está erosionando en su hinchazón descontrolada es el inglés (sólo hay que leer las intervenciones en inglés de estos foros. En muchos casos se agradecería que los foreros redactasen, *bien*, en su lengua. Incluso llegan a ser ininteligibles o anfibológicos en grado sumo.
Yo no veo la muerte del portugués, para nada. Incluso dentro del tronco lingüístico del portugués, el gallego mi lengua materna sobrevive con unos 2.000.000 de hablantes al ahogamiento que intenta la lengua y el mundo cultural oficial en español. Nuestra literatura es brillante (especialmente la lírica, a la altura de cualquier lírica en otras lenguas), en plena producción, y también la usamos en la ciencia, en la fiesta, en la vida cotidiana, en las aulas y, en la medida que permite el españolismo del Estado Español, en la justicia y en la vida oficial. Si llevamos miles de años siendo nación (cohesionada e interrelacionaada por la lengua que todos sentimos como lo nuestro, como el núcleo de nuestra identidad social) y resistimos una colonización cultural de 400 años, no creo que lenguas de brillante producción escrita y plenamente aceptadas en sus respectivos lugares como lenguas oficiales, lenguas que tienen una vida creativa en constante evolución en lo oral, en la vida de todos los días vayan a desaparecer. Incluso lo que veo es un retroceso del inglés, substituido por un _pidgin _para la comunicación por vía informática que ya no es inglés propiamente dicho.
Es imposible la lengua mundial, ya que si existiese acabaría desmoronándose y diferenciándose en nuevas lenguas o dialectos cada vez más divergentes, como sucedión con el latín y las lenguas romances.
Los que hablamos gallego y portugués no vamos a dejar de usarla para estar en el mundo y para contribuír con nuestras producciones literarias, musicales, fílmicas, teatrales, etc.
Decía uno de nuestros grandes prosistas, Álvaro Cunqueiro, mil primaveras mais para a língua galega. Y esto es una profecía que creo será cumpliada.
Las lenguas que son oficiales y están normalizadas para su uso culto y que hablen pueblos o naciones que no están en riesgo de desaparición física no tienen ningún riesgo de desaparición.
El problema que plantea este hilo es un pseudoproblema. No tiene como base datos que lo avalen, ni paradigmas científicos que lo contemplen. Es una especie de leyenda urbana:_ en unos años todos hablaremos inglés y chino (mandarín)_. Una afirmación absolutamente gratuíta.


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## Vanda

E eu amo o galego, por ser a ''mãe" do português. Me identifico muito com ele.


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## XiaoRoel

Tá certa a Vanda. Os que Vasconcelos chamava co-dialectos, o galego e o português (e semelha que também a fala dos três _lugaris _de Cáceres), os dois (ou três) vêm do galego medieval e nascem ambos os dois na velha Galiza, o que logo será galego é o dialecto do Conventus lucensis e o que logo será português é o dialecto do Conventus bracarensis, a norte do Douro, de onde se há expandir para a Lusitânia e depois a América, a Ásia e a África. Desde o 1380 começam as derivas que virão dar nos modernos galego e português, deriva cumprida antes de 1550.
Dizia Castelao: a língua galega floresce em Portugal.
Beijinhos com saudade do foro português que agora visito pouco.


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## Dymn

A language with 200 million speakers? Dying out? Are you joking?

Nowadays, it isn't as popular among foreign language learners as Spanish or French, but that doesn't mean it is dying out! Do you know what "die out" means?


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## L'irlandais

Bienvenidos said:


> ... Is Portuguese one of the world's leading language, or could it be forgotten with little impact on the globe?


Could your language professor possibly be a monolingual English-speaker?

I honestly can't think of any other reason why they might hold such an opinion, other than _“Wer fremde Sprachen nicht kennt, weiss nichts von seiner eigenen.”_
(To paraphrase He doesn't know any foreign languages​​, knows nothing of his own mother-tongue.)


----------



## Vanda

About the growing of the language, we are now more than 200 millions only Brazil, (202, 7 millions in July 2014) let aside the other countries that speak PT.  And..


> *Third most spoken European language* (after English and Spanish),* fastest growing language of Europe* (with Spanish). source





> Universities admit that they are having difficulty keeping up with the  increased interest in Portuguese. Last fall, Yale Daily News reported:  “With Brazil becoming a global economic power, more and more students  are signing up for ‘Elementary Portuguese,’ but Yale’s tiny Portuguese  program does not have enough teachers to go around — or the means to  hire new ones.”


 source


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## Nino83

O português é a língua do futuro (do subjuntivo)  

Joking apart, if one has to work in Europe, one has to know one of these languages: German, French (yes, before English), English, Italian, Spanish, Polish (all having more than 40 million of native speakers) while if one has to work in Latin America, one has to know Spanish or Portuguese.


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## merquiades

I think if the "masses" don't go for Portuguese they think of distribution and number of countries.  They say to themselves English (58 official countries), all North America,  England, Ireland, Scotland,  London, New York, LA, Australia! etc.  = yes, learn it now.  Then French (33 countries) present on every continent, very chic indeed... continental western Europe  Paris, Brussels, Geneva, Montreal, Monaco = yes learn it.   Then Spanish (26 countries) millions and millions and millions of speakers... almost all Latin America is Spanish, even parts of the US and then Spain too, of course = yes, definitely better learn that one.   But when these people get to Portuguese they think wow just 2 countries and a couple other islands and third world places infrequent on the agenda.  Well, it's kind of like Spanish and they clearly learn English and or French too in school, so we'll just wing it with them.  No need for Portuguese.
Unfortunately this thought has made it so that Portuguese is not on the school program in most places.  Pitiful and simplistic.  That's clearly the thought behind the original poster, except he acquaints this to eventually dying out.


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## Darth Nihilus

merquiades said:


> I think if the "masses" don't go for Portuguese they think of distribution and number of countries.  They say to themselves English (58 official countries), all North America,  England, Ireland, Scotland,  London, New York, LA, Australia! etc.  = yes, learn it now.  Then French (33 countries) present on every continent, very chic indeed... continental western Europe  Paris, Brussels, Geneva, Montreal, Monaco = yes learn it.   Then Spanish (26 countries) millions and millions and millions of speakers... almost all Latin America is Spanish, even parts of the US and then Spain too, of course = yes, definitely better learn that one.   But when these people get to Portuguese they think wow just 2 countries and a couple other islands and third world places infrequent on the agenda.  Well, it's kind of like Spanish and they clearly learn English and or French too in school, so we'll just wing it with them.  No need for Portuguese.
> *Unfortunately this thought has made it so that Portuguese is not on the school program in most places.  Pitiful and simplistic.  That's clearly the thought behind the original poster, except he acquaints this to eventually dying out*.



Your last sentences sum up nicely the whole thread. You nailed it. 

I beg to differ though, on two things:

- The masses don't go for English because it's the official language of 58 countries, but rather because it has become a global language; if you go to Thailand, for example, and you don't speak Thai, you could simply use English at any hotel. I don't suppose most hotel employees in Thailand could speak Portuguese though. Or Russian. Or Norwegian.
- Only women find French "chic". Among men, French has a much less..erm...positive reputation.


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## Pedro y La Torre

Darth Nihilus said:


> - Only women find French "chic". Among men, French has a much less..erm...positive reputation.



French is still the global language of refined high culture.


----------



## Angelo di fuoco

Nino83 said:


> O português é a língua do futuro (do subjuntivo)
> 
> Joking apart, if one has to work in Europe, one has to know one of these languages: German, French (yes, before English), English, Italian, Spanish, Polish (all having more than 40 million of native speakers) while if one has to work in Latin America, one has to know Spanish or Portuguese.



Once again, EU and Europe aren't the same thing. The language with the most native speakers in Europe is Russian, even before German.
You need Polish only if your work involves frequent contact with Poles (and even so, not always, nowadays) or if you have to go on trips to Poland. The Scandinavians (the Swedes, at least) pay full wages for several months to immigrants who are specialists in sought-after professions just so that they learn the national language before they start to work properly. Otherwise, as a tourist you get very well along with English.
Eastern Europe: if you don't know the local language, English might not be of any help to you when speaking to elder peope, so you might try (and succeed) with Russian. With the younger, go for English mostly, except maybe Bulgaria and the Baltic states.


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## Vanda

Uai, Aninha, deu pra defender o português europeu agora?! Num tô entendendo...


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## mexerica feliz

Portuguese is not dying out, except maybe in Cape Verde.
Cape Verde emigrants I met while in Holland didn't speak any Portuguese, only Cape Verde creole (it's because they were born in Holland or came as small children there,
and Portuguese is not native to Cape Verde, children need to learn it at school in order to speak it). It's even difficult to find a popular Cape Verdean song in Portuguese,
they're all in creole...Only Capeverdean immigrants in Portugal speak Portuguese, Capeverdean immigrants in other countries (like Holland, France, US) can speak only the creole.
So, the future of Portuguese is not bright in Cape Verde, if people need to learn it almost like a foreign language in order to know it. So, in a way, Portuguese in Cape Verde,
is like English in India...


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## merquiades

mexerica feliz said:


> Portuguese is not dying out, except maybe in Cape Verde.
> Cape Verde emigrants I met while in Holland didn't speak any Portuguese, only Cape Verde creole (it's because they were born in Holland or came as small children there,
> and Portuguese is not native to Cape Verde, children need to learn it at school in order to speak it). It's even difficult to find a popular Cape Verdean song in Portuguese,
> they're all in creole...Only Capeverdean immigrants in Portugal speak Portuguese, Capeverdean immigrants in other countries (like Holland, France, US) can speak only the creole.
> So, the future of Portuguese is not bright in Cape Verde, if people need to learn it almost like a foreign language in order to know it. So, in a way, Portuguese in Cape Verde,
> is like English in India...



On the other hand the future is bright for Portuguese in Angola.  Modern Angolan identity is linked to Portuguese, not at all to native languages.  Progress, urban life, a cohesive multi-ethnic national identity, literacy all demand Portuguese.  It's now becoming the true mother tongue of Angolans of all horizons.  The youth especially are Portuguese-speaking:



> ..... a maioria dos jovens em idade escolar já só fala português e não domina nenhuma língua nativa.


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## Kaxgufen

Pedro y La Torre said:


> That English figure seems suspiciously low. At least 250 million Americans are native English speakers, throw in 65 million odd Brits, 4.5 million Irish, 20 million Aussies, 4.3 million New Zealanders, a few million white South Africans, 24 million English Canadians and you've well over 350 million native Anglophones*, not to mention second language speakers, which makes English, by some distance, the most spoken language on Earth.*
> 
> Come to think of it, French's second language speakers are substantial too and would pull it well ahead of German or, indeed, Portuguese.



Quisiera poder tomarles el TOEFL a esos "second language speakers" y ver cuantos quedan.


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## rur1920

Angelo di fuoco said:


> Once again, EU and Europe aren't the same thing.


A matter of definitions, I believe… Unless you establish common definitions for the two people engaged in discussion, there is no way to make such claims. The word "EU" has a common definition, but the word "Europe" does not, it is a vague figure of speech, which, by the way, is pronounced easier than "EU+Switzerland" or even just "EU", so no wonder it tends to be used exactly in this meaning.


Pedro y La Torre said:


> That English figure seems suspiciously low.


Dunno for native English (and for Russian: there is native Russian not just in Russia), but the figure for native Mandarin is suspiciously high. As far as I know, for most Chinese Mandarin (Putonghua) is a second language. I am not even sure that it can be "native", rather it is a kind of abstract standard, applicable in certain situations of life, if I am not mistaken.


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## Hector9

Kaxgufen said:


> Quisiera poder tomarles el TOEFL a esos "second language speakers" y ver cuantos quedan.



¿Por qué? ¿Acaso si no tienen un nivel lo suficientemente bueno no calificarían como "_second language speakers_"? Podés estar seguro que los europeos en general lo hablan muy fluido* excepto nosotros en Latino América que en general tenemos un mal nivel.

*Excepto los españoles, italianos y portugueses que -para mí- también tienen un mal nivel.


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## rur1920

Hector9 said:


> ¿Por qué? ¿Acaso si no tienen un nivel lo suficientemente bueno no calificarían como "_second language speakers_"?


Only if they really speak it. (I, for one, never speak English anywhere save some forums in the Internet, and even there there is no speaking in the proper sense of the word). The qualification "the most spoken", utilised by Pedro y La Torre, also includes this condition of being used in speech, preferably spoken speech. You know, people often "learn" languages just because languages are present in curricula, and languages are present in curricula just because it makes a good tone to have them in curricula, so people never speak them afterwards.


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## merquiades

Hector9 said:


> ¿Por qué? ¿Acaso si no tienen un nivel lo suficientemente bueno no calificarían como "_second language speakers_"? Podés estar seguro que los europeos en general lo hablan muy fluido* excepto nosotros en Latino América que en general tenemos un mal nivel.
> 
> *Excepto los españoles, italianos y portugueses que -para mí- también tienen un mal nivel.



Kaxgufen tiene razón.  Mucha gente ha estudiado algo de inglés en Europa pero pocos lo hablan con fluidez y a buen seguro no tendrían buenos resultados en el TOEFL, y no solo los hablantes del sur de Europa.  Incluso los del norte cometen errores y tienen acentos fuertes.

En cambio, los que aprenden portugués suelen hablarlo muy bien con mucha soltura.


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## Vanda

You are right,Merquiades. In my several Europe trips I've found natives (French, Italians, Spaniards, German, Czech and some others) speaking as bad English as any other non native English speaker (with a few exception), and for the very few of them who speak Portuguese, they are quite good.


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## qwill

"_A civilização consiste em dar a qualquer coisa um nome que lhe não compete, e depois sonhar sobre o resultado. E realmente o nome falso e o sonho verdadeiro criam uma nova realidade. O objecto torna-se realmente outro, porque o tornámos outro. Manufacturamos realidades." (__Fernando Pessoa__, __O Livro do Desassossego_)

"Civilization consists in giving something an unfitting name, then dream about the result. And indeed the false name and the real dream create a new reality. The object really becomes another, because we turned it into another one. We manufacture realities." (Fernando Pessoa, _The Book of Disquiet_)

A language which can take pride of being spoken by one of the greatest writer in the world is a grand and precious language.


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## merquiades

qwill said:


> "_A civilização consiste em dar a qualquer coisa um nome que lhe não compete, e depois sonhar sobre o resultado. E realmente o nome falso e o sonho verdadeiro criam uma nova realidade. O objecto torna-se realmente outro, porque o tornámos outro. Manufacturamos realidades." (__Fernando Pessoa__, __O Livro do Desassossego_)
> 
> "Civilization consists in giving something an unfitting name, then dream about the result. And indeed the false name and the real dream create a new reality. The object really becomes another, because we turned it into another one. We manufacture realities." (Fernando Pessoa, _The Book of Disquiet_)
> 
> A language which can take pride of being spoken by one of the greatest writer in the world is a grand and precious language.



Genial.  É verdade. Que citação mais sabia.  Da-me vontade de ler mais deste autor.


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## qwill

Não hesita! _O Livro do Desassossego_ é uma obra-prima e, mais geralmente, toda a obra de Pessoa... A sua vida própria é fascinante…


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## Vanda

Com certeza, Merquiades. Besides, he is my favorite poet!


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## Hector9

I think everyone supports his own language. In my case, it's Spanish and I'm very proud of it as it's the second most spoken language in the world (source). I'm also glad brazilian speakers learn Spanish from a very young age  (which is not our case, in fact we don't learn it at all, not sure if I should be proud of that though but that's how it is).

In addition, I've never really had the need to learn it because when I talked to them they had a very and admirable good knowledge of Spanish or otherwise they replied me in Portuguese and I in Spanish since they are *very* close languages.



merquiades said:


> I think if the "masses" don't go for Portuguese they think of distribution and number of countries. They say to themselves English (58 official countries), all North America, England, Ireland, Scotland, London, New York, LA, Australia! etc. = yes, learn it now. Then French (33 countries) present on every continent, very chic indeed... continental western Europe Paris, Brussels, Geneva, Montreal, Monaco = yes learn it. Then Spanish (26 countries) millions and millions and millions of speakers... almost all Latin America is Spanish, even parts of the US and then Spain too, of course = yes, definitely better learn that one. But when these people get to Portuguese they think wow just 2 countries and a couple other islands and third world places infrequent on the agenda. Well, it's kind of like Spanish and they clearly learn English and or French too in school, so we'll just wing it with them. No need for Portuguese.



The blue plart is very smart and well written. But that is how some of us really think, and if you think about it carefully you realize it's true in a way, because apart from Brazil and Portugual I don't htink you would _ever_ want to visit *very poor* and/or dangerous places like Cape verde, Angola or Africa. I mean, I don't think you'd really find interesting stuff to see in those places but too much hunger and extreme poverty *everywhere*.



Vanda said:


> Now with a nation with more than 200 millions inhabitants in my country that keeps growing and _being the 2nd language most used in internet_, the chances grow as never before!



Source?

I have one, and it shows it's not.


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## Sepia

rur1920 said:


> A matter of definitions, I believe… Unless you establish common definitions for the two people engaged in discussion, there is no way to make such claims. The word "EU" has a common definition, but the word "Europe" does not, it is a vague figure of speech, which, by the way, is pronounced easier than "EU+Switzerland" or even just "EU", so no wonder it tends to be used exactly in this meaning.
> ....



Still I do wonder - Speaking of Geography, Western Europe does fine. Europe goes geographically to the Ural mountains.

Speaking about political entities I don't see anything wrong with EU+Switzerland if that is exactly what you mean. 

But if you actually mean the whole economic cooperation between the EU and a few other European countries where we have free movement of goods, services and persons, why not call it by its real name EEA - the European Economic Area? (By which it has been known for several decades.)


----------



## rur1920

Sepia said:


> But if you actually mean the whole economic cooperation between the EU and a few other European countries where we have free movement of goods, services and persons, why not call it by its real name EEA - the European Economic Area? (By which it has been known for several decades.)


I do not know much about these affairs, but Nino used the word Europe in this context: "if one has to work in Europe", and Angelo answering speaking of the Russian language… But, as far as I understand, "working in Europe" and "working in Russia" is not the same activity, so the meaning (if approximate) that Nino implied is readily understood, and it is not the geografical meaning (geografically, indeed, most Russians live in the European part of the country). Excessive precision is not expected in speech, 'Europe' is a word that is simply easier to pronounce and think of.


----------



## Stoggler

Hector9 said:


> ...I don't htink you would _ever_ want to visit very poor and/or dangerous places like Cape verde, Angola or Africa. I mean, I don't think you'd really find interesting stuff to see in those places but too much hunger and extreme poverty *everywhere*.



Wow!

Cape Verde, Angola AND Africa?  Damn it, and there was me thinking that those two countries were already part of Africa!


----------



## Hector9

Stoggler said:


> Wow!
> 
> Cape Verde, Angola AND Africa?  Damn it, and there was me thinking that those two countries were already part of Africa!



No need to be sarcastic. Indeed, they are. I was just trying to generalize, I should have said "Africa" as a whole. Good on you.


----------



## Sepia

rur1920 said:


> I do not know much about these affairs, but Nino used the word Europe in this context: "if one has to work in Europe", and Angelo answering speaking of the Russian language… But, as far as I understand, "working in Europe" and "working in Russia" is not the same activity, so the meaning (if approximate) that Nino implied is readily understood, and it is not the geografical meaning (geografically, indeed, most Russians live in the European part of the country). Excessive precision is not expected in speech, 'Europe' is a word that is simply easier to pronounce and think of.



Sure, one cannot always be exact in the choice of words - and in that context "working in Europe" *probably *means something like working inside the EU and the EEA where - at least till the Swiss changed the rules again - meant, as a citizen of any of these countries you could go to any of these countries. (Which ought to be common knowledge if you live in one of these countries - like knowing all other imortant rights you have as a citizen.) But Switzerland wanting to make an exception again (unlike Lichtenstein, Norway, Iceland) is what makes me oppose to "EU+Switzerland" as the alternative.


----------



## Mishe

Bienvenidos said:


> I was talking to a language professor who told me that Portuguese no longer serves any purpose, that it is an "archaic" language, and it is destined to serve no purpose in the future. She also said that it is not in a person's best interest to learn it since it is hardly used, except in Brazil and Portugal. Realistically, she mentioned that Portuguese has no distinct advantage that will make it a language that will survive for years to come.
> 
> What is your opinion on this topic? Is Portuguese one of the world's leading language, or could it be forgotten with little impact on the globe?



Sometimes, I ask myself if people really know the true meaning of the phrasal verb "to die out". For some strange reason, many people tend to overly dramatize and exaggerate things when it comes to langauges. A simple answer: surely, there is a 99% chance Portuguese is not going to die out anytime soon in the future. It will most probably remain one of the largest languages in the world.


----------



## LanguageUser1234

I think the notion that Portuguese is going to die anytime soon is ridiculous.

I do wonder sometimes, though, whether the Brazilian version and the Portuguese version are going to be two separate languages in another few generations.


----------



## merquiades

Jeff_TX said:


> I think the notion that Portuguese is going to die anytime soon is ridiculous.
> 
> I do wonder sometimes, though, whether the Brazilian version and the Portuguese version are going to be two separate languages in another few generations.


Good point. the pronunciation has diverged so much.


----------



## Nino83

No, they'll be like Chicago English and Cockney or Geordie, i.e the same language with two different pronunciations


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## merquiades

It's already like that.  Jeff means what it is to become


----------



## Sepia

Anyway, it is enigmatic to me how anybody could come up with such a theory anyway - that only because a language is "only" spoken in two highly populated countries on two different continents, it were "dying out" or useless or no longer needed.

How can anyone be taken seriously as a scientist or as a teacher with such theories? How can he take his own nonsese seriously?

First, there are lots of languages only used by less than a Million persons, an only in one tiny region or country - does that mean they are dying out?

Let's take an extreme example, Greenlandic Inuit. I don't know how much it differs from other variantions of Inuit - at least they have a good number of loanwords that Inuit from Alaska or Sibiria probably would not understand although they basically speak the same language. So let's limit it to the Greenland version. It is spoken by approx. 55.000 persons. Not much, right? Dying out? No way, it is expanding 55.000 speakers is more than ever before.


----------



## Nino83

merquiades said:


> It's already like that.  Jeff means what it is to become



The phonetic differences between Chicago English and Northern English are greater than those between Brazilian and European Portuguese.

For example, if a Mancunian says "but, bot, bat" a Chicagoen would understand "bet, but, bot".

A similar situation can't happen between a Portuguese and a Brazilian.


----------



## merquiades

Nino83 said:


> The phonetic differences between Chicago English and Northern English are greater than those between Brazilian and European Portuguese.
> 
> For example, if a Mancunian says "but, bot, bat" a Chicagoen would understand "bet, but, bot".
> 
> A similar situation can't happen between a Portuguese and a Brazilian.


If you say it just like that maybe, but every word is said in a context.  _But I bet you bought a bat_ would never be confused anywhere into nonsense like _Bet I bat you boat a but_.
What is a bot?  It reminds me of some interview I heard of people in Wisconsin speaking to people in another state, can't remember which one, maybe Virginia.  They said _boss_, the others thought manager, but when they said _I can't find a seat on the boss_ people understood immediately they pronounced _bus_ as _boss_.  Then they said _gnat_ and the second group thought mosquito, but they understood and laughed immediately when they said _the bass is gnat in the affice t'day_.  It's all about context

The Brazilian pronunciation of r as h, d as j, t as ch, e as i, l as u is daunting for novices
Also the Portuguese truncation of words into one syllable if you are not used to that.
I remember seeing something on internet with people from two different places confusing _o gato_ and _o rato_.


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## Nino83

bot = "a computer program that performs a particular task many times"
http://www.oxfordlearnersdictionaries.com/definition/english/bot?q=bot



merquiades said:


> The Brazilian pronunciation of r as h, d as j, t as ch, e as i, l as u is daunting for novices



_r_ pronounced like _h_: think about a British speaker saying _card_, which sounds pretty close to AmE _cod_. In Portuguese there isn't any phoneme /h/ so there are no problems or misunderstandings
_d_ and _t_ pronounced like _j_ and _ch_: think about the Southern British (standard?) pronunciation of _tune, deuce, assume, resume_ like _ʧune, ʤuce, aʃume, reʒume_. In Portuguese /ʧ/ and /ʤ/ don't exist, so no misunderstandings, while in English we have minimal pairs like _deuce/juice, two/chew, suit/shoot_ and so on
_l_ pronounced like _u_: what about Cockney and, in general, _l-vocalization_ in England? _little_ is not pronounced /lɪɾɫ/ but /lɪʔo/, and there are minimal pairs like _fault-fought-fort, pause-Paul's_

and we're not speaking about intervocalic /t/ in English, so the sentence _a little bit of butter_ sounds, respectively, like /ə lɪɾɫ bɪɾ əv bʌɾɹ̩/ and /ə lɪʔo bɪʔ əv bɐʔɐ/

Actually BE and AmE have an higher number of phonetic differences than EP and BP, and they are still considered the same language.


----------



## Darth Nihilus

Nino83 said:


> In Portuguese /ʧ/ and /ʤ/ don't exist



Forgive me if I misunderstood your post (sometimes it happens! ) but....what???


----------



## Nino83

Darth Nihilus said:


> Forgive me if I misunderstood your post (sometimes it happens! ) but....what???



I mean that in Portuguese /ʧ/ and /ʤ/ are not phonemes, i.e you can't find words like /*ʤ*ɔko/ and /*ʧ*ɛnto/ (in Portuguese these words are /*ʒ*ogu/ and /*s*ẽⁿtu/), they are allophones of /t, d/ before [i], so the Brazilian pronunciation doesn't make confusion or misunderstandings because there are not minimal pairs, while the Southern British (now almost standard) pronunciation of /t, d/ + yod creates confusion between _two_ and _chew_ [ʧuː] _do you_, _dew_ and _Jew_ [ʤuː], _deuce_ and _juice_ [ʤuːs], _duel_ and _jewel_ [ʤuːəɫ], _dude_ and _Jude_ [ʤuːd], _dune_ and _june_ [ʤuːn] and so on.


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## Darth Nihilus

I see. Looks like I had indeed misunderstood your post. You're right, of course. Thanks for clarifying it.


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## mexerica feliz

Nino83 said:


> I mean that in Portuguese /ʧ/ and /ʤ/ are not phonemes, i.e you can't find words like /*ʤ*ɔko/ and /*ʧ*ɛnto/ (in Portuguese these words are /*ʒ*ogu/ and /*s*ẽⁿtu/), they are allophones of /t, d/ before [i], so the Brazilian pronunciation doesn't make confusion or misunderstandings because there are not minimal pairs, while the Southern British (now almost standard) pronunciation of /t, d/ + yod creates confusion between _two_ and _chew_ [ʧuː] _do you_, _dew_ and _Jew_ [ʤuː], _deuce_ and _juice_ [ʤuːs], _duel_ and _jewel_ [ʤuːəɫ], _dude_ and _Jude_ [ʤuːd], _dune_ and _june_ [ʤuːn] and so on.



you can find words like
_tcheco_, _tchau _or _tchan_

the ''minimal pair'' thing is very relative in Brazil:
compare   *pais *e *paz  *(in Rio, Brasília, Vitória, Northeast and North) they completely rhyme_._
Many people merge *senhora *and* sem hora*,  *Júnio *and *junho *and *Júlio *and *julho*.
you can also argue there's no phonemes NH, LH in Brazil since  _ni~nhi, li-lhi_ merger is widespread.


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## Nino83

mexerica feliz said:


> you can find words like _tcheco_, _tchau _or _tchan_



What does _tchan_ mean? I've not found it.

The main point of discussion is if EP and BP should be considered different language because of the different pronunciation of /r, di, ti, l/.
I'm saying that there are more differences between AmE and BrE, so if we consider EP and BP two different languages, also AmE and BrE should be considered different.

I've found "_Aparição repentina. O momento em que uma pessoa aparece de repente na frente de outras_" but in one thread some Portuguese speakers said that _tchan_ doesn't mean anything.
_
http://www.dicionarioinformal.com.br/tchan/ _
_http://forum.wordreference.com/threads/tchan.632282/_ 

_Tchau_ comes from Italian  while _tcheco_ from the language of the noun.


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## mexerica feliz

Nino83 said:


> What does _tchan_ mean?.


Tchan/tchã is a special kind of charm.
There's even a band with this name: _É o tchan_ one of the most popular axémusic groups.

tchã
S. m.
'' 1.    Toque especial; apuro, requinte: _O cabeleireiro deu um tchã ao seu penteado.  _
2.    Charme, encanto pessoal: _Ela tem muito tchã. '' (Dicionário Aurélio)_

_


Nino83 said:



			The main point of discussion is if EP and BP should be considered different language because of the different pronunciation of /r, di, ti, l/..
		
Click to expand...

_
The main difference between BP and EP lies in syntax and *not in phonology or vocabulary:*

cheguei *em *casa (BP) ~ cheguei *a *casa (EP)
vou lá *em *casa (BP) ~ vou lá *a *casa (EP)
eu gostaria de saber (BT) ~ gostava de saber (EP)
chocolate *ao *leite (BP) ~ chocolate *de *leite (EP)
se você segui-la (BP) ~ se você a seguir (EP)
vi vocês dançando/dançarem (BP) ~ vi-vos (a) dançar (EP)
foram estudar *em *Londres (BP) ~ foram estudar *a *Londres (EP)
vou fazer isso *depois que* ela voltar (BP) ~ vou fazer isso depois de ela voltar (EP)
fiz isso *depois que* ela voltou (BP) ~ fiz isso depois de ela voltar (EP)
o futuro a gente planeja, a gente faz (BP) ~ *ao* futuro, planeamo-lo, fazemo-lo (EP)
comprei vários produtos *de *João (BP) ~ comprei vários produtos *ao *João (EP)


_quem você conhece ? _ and _quem conhece você?_ mean two completely different things
in Brazil, but not in Portugal

There are many many things that are grammatical in Brazil, but agrammatical in Portugal
(like  _o trem chega em dez minutos, cantava feito um passarinho _etc...    ) and vice versa.

Spoken Brazilian Portuguese is:
a) object clitic deleting,  explicit pronoun favoring language  [Eu amo (BR) ~ Amo-o (PT)]
b) not allowing inversion in questions with transitive verbs
[like in the previous example:  Quem ama você? and Quem você ama mean two different things in Brazil]
c) clitic-avoiding:
_O filho, [eles] nunca mais viram ele_ (BR)
_Ao filho, nunca mais o viram_ (PT)
d) reflexive pronouns avoiding:
_ O vaso quebrou, o pneu furou_ (BR)
_O vaso quebrou-se. o pneu furou-se _(PT)
e) there is only two closeness degrees in demonstratives:_ aquele ~ esse/este,_
the latter two being neutralized, unlike in Portugal which holds to the 3 degree system of demonstratives
f) in popular Brazilian speech, freezing is common:
_    Chegou meus pais.
     Vende-se casas.
    Entre eu e você._
   even RedeGlobo reporters doing street coverage talk like this.

etc.
syntax, pronoun usage and prepositions are completely different,
much more so than between UK and US English.


This is my language:


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## Nino83

You make a list of the (well known) differences between European and Brazilian Portuguese but, as you know, in Brazil there are a formal (written), neutral (written and spoken) and informal (spoken) style.
The written formal language is identical to the European version, the neutral language admits some difference and the informal one is a bit different.

_Viu a Roberta? 
Sim, vi-a (formal written); sim, a vi (neutral, written); sim, vi ela (spoken)_.
_O vaso quebrou-se (formal); o vaso se quebrou (neutral); o vaso quebrou (spoken)_.

So, the European constructions are not wrong in Brazil, they are only used in formal written situations but they are not ungrammatical. This, about object pronouns.

The _esse/este_ difference is not sufficient to say that there are two different languages. For example, in Italian, the difference between _questo_ and _codesto_ (which we all know, in every region, because it is studied at school) is used, in the spoken language, only in Tuscany but it doesn't mean that there are two different languages, Tuscan Italian and extra-Tuscan Italian.

The difference between _quem Ana ama?_ and _quem ama Ana?_ is related to the pro-drop feature of the language.
French and Brazilian Portuguese are not pro-drop, so _qui Anne aime-t-elle? _and _qui aime Anne?_ have a different meaning while _chi ama Anna? quién ama Ana? quem ama Ana?_ in Italian, Spanish and European Portuguese can have two different meanings.
This happens only in wh-questions while in yes-no question the rules are equal.

Prepositions are not "completely different". The difference between _em/a_ with verbs of movements and _para/a_ with indirect object are due to the simple fact that in Brazil the article _a_ and the preposition _a_ have the same pronunciation.

So, can European and Brazilian Portuguese be considered two different languages?

I've some doubt about it.


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## Copperknickers

merquiades said:


> Then Spanish (26 countries) millions and millions and millions of speakers... almost all Latin America is Spanish



People say this a lot, but actually it's about 45% Spanish, 40% Portuguese, and 5% other. Brazil has a larger population than all other Latin American countries put together if you exclude Mexico.


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## merquiades

Nino83 said:


> _ quién ama Ana? _


  In Spanish there is a required preposition to avoid this type of ambiguity.
¿Quién ama a Ana?  ¿A quién ama Ana?

In spoken French it is also clarified by adding words:  Qui est-ce qui aime Anne?  Elle aime qui, Anne?  This is not mandatory though.


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## Nino83

merquiades said:


> In Spanish there is a required preposition to avoid this type of ambiguity.
> ¿Quién ama a Ana?  ¿A quién ama Ana?



Thank you. 
Anyway it's not the word order (SVO, OVS) that changes the meaning, like it is in French and in Brazilian Portuguese. 



merquiades said:


> In spoken French it is also clarified by adding words:  Qui est-ce qui aime Anne?  Elle aime qui, Anne?  This is not mandatory though.



Yes, in French only word order changes the meaning of the sentence.


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## merquiades

Nino83 said:


> Thank you.
> Anyway it's not the word order (SVO, OVS) that changes the meaning, like it is in French and in Brazilian Portuguese.



Some possibilities would not sound so natural though.

Ama a quién Ana, a Ana ama quién


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## Nino83

merquiades said:


> Some possibilities would not sound so natural though. Ama a quién Ana, a Ana ama quién



Nobody said that there are other possibilities.
In these sentences (wh-questions) the subject is at the end of the sentence in Spanish, Italian and European Portuguese.
The order is _chi/quem_ + _verb_ + _subject_ for both "_who does Anne love?_" and "_who loves Anne?_" 
This doesn't happen in French and Brazilian Portuguese.


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## Deslandes

Bienvenidos said:


> I was talking to a language professor who told me that Portuguese no longer serves any purpose, that it is an "archaic" language, and it is destined to serve no purpose in the future. She also said that it is not in a person's best interest to learn it since it is hardly used, except in Brazil and Portugal. Realistically, she mentioned that Portuguese has no distinct advantage that will make it a language that will survive for years to come.
> 
> What is your opinion on this topic? Is Portuguese one of the world's leading language, or could it be forgotten with little impact on the globe?



Your so-called "professor" is an utter ignorant. Portuguese is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world and the official language of several countries (Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Cabo Verde, São Tomé e Príncipe, etc.). Moreover, several companies are searching more and more for employees fluent in Portuguese, especially in the air travel industry as Brazilians and other Portuguese-speaking peoples are traveling abroad more than ever before. Your excuse of a professor should retire and get lost. She's the one who is archaic. But if you are willing to listen to her gibberish go ahead and learn Dutch or Danish instead...    Disgusting!


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## ewie

Deslandes said:


> Portuguese is [...] the official language of several countries (Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Cabo Verde, São Tomé e Príncipe, etc.).


It's still pretty official in Portugal too, apparently


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## merquiades

Deslandes said:


> Your so-called "professor" is an utter ignorant. Portuguese is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world and the official language of several countries (Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Cabo Verde, São Tomé e Príncipe, etc.). Moreover, several companies are searching more and more for employees fluent in Portuguese, especially in the air travel industry as Brazilians and other Portuguese-speaking peoples are traveling abroad more than ever before. Your excuse of a professor should retire and get lost. She's the one who is archaic. But if you are willing to listen to her gibberish go ahead and learn Dutch or Danish instead...    Disgusting!


Totally in agreement, but there is nothing wrong with learning Dutch and Danish....


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## Doraemon-

This is really stupid from your teacher.
Of course Portuguese is not one of the leading languages in the world, as English and Spanish can be, but it is the sixth most spoken language anyway. If that's "dead" what would be the 2000 languages that are spoken less than portuguese...


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## Red Arrow

Deslandes said:


> Your so-called "professor" is an utter ignorant. Portuguese is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world and the official language of several countries (Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Cabo Verde, São Tomé e Príncipe, etc.). Moreover, several companies are searching more and more for employees fluent in Portuguese, especially in the air travel industry as Brazilians and other Portuguese-speaking peoples are traveling abroad more than ever before. Your excuse of a professor should retire and get lost. She's the one who is archaic. But if you are willing to listen to her gibberish go ahead and learn Dutch or Danish instead...    Disgusting!


Dutch has more speakers than European Portuguese, that's for sure. I don't know why you're calling my mother tongue disgusting.


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## L'irlandais

I wonder if Deslandes was not referring to the position of the language professor as disgusting actually.

Bienvenidos, in the OP should have asked his prof. their position on Pashto (13 million speakers) and Dari (9 million speakers).  Would the prof. have dared be dismissive about Hazaragi (2 and a half million) and Aymaq (less than 1 million speakers)?  If so I suggest that person either change careers or perhaps try to learn at least one language other than their mother tongue.


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## Pedro y La Torre

Well Dari is a dialect of Persian, I'm not sure you can refer to it as a language on its own.


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## L'irlandais

Sure, my point being it is easy to be dismissive about a "third-party" language.  Since the OP came from Afghanistan, I imagine the prof would have had a debate on his hands if trying to be dismissive about one of that countries main languages.  (Even if some are dialects of Persian.)

Okay the OP was a native Farsi-speaker. (110 million speakers worldwide)


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## uchi.m

É a mesma coisa que dizer que todos os que odeiam chocolate vão morrer, porque não são importantes, abjetos e de mau gosto simplesmente porque não gostam de chocolate.

Claro que vão morrer, mas enquanto existir chocolate, os que não gostam de chocolate terão a sua própria opção e a sua vida digna.

It is such as telling someone that everyone who dislikes chocolate is going to die because they are unimportant, detrimental and of bad taste, simply because they don't fancy chocolate.

Of course they will all die, but as long as there will be chocolate, the ones who dislike it will have their own choice, and their life will be dignified.


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