# vem vs vêm



## kynnjo

Is there a phonetic difference, at least in present-day BP, between _vem_ and _vêm_, that is, between the singular and plural 3rd person present indicative of _vir_?

(I ask because the BP audio course I'm following has a drill consisting of pronouncing these two words back-to-back, as if to show a distinction between them, but I can't hear any difference.)

TIA!

~K


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## Erick404

No, the difference is only kept in the written form. And as far as I know, not only in Brazil, but in all Portuguese speaking countries.
I say this because I only recognize one possible pronounce for the nasal "e" in Portuguese.


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## Carfer

Erick404 said:


> No, the difference is only kept in the written form. And as far as I know, not only in Brazil, but in all Portuguese speaking countries.
> I say this because I only recognize one possible pronounce for the nasal "e" in Portuguese.


 
As far as Portugal is concerned, '_vem_' e '_vêm_' are pronounced in a quite distinct way. I'm not very well acquainted with phonetic transcriptions but maybe someone else can help if this is of any interest to you, as your question regards specifically BR Portuguese.


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## almufadado

It reads

Ele vem = vem

Eles vêm - vem~em

All the above from the verb vir.


Similar pronunciation, from the verb "ver" (see)

Ele vê ~ ve~e 

Ele vêem ~ ve~e~em


The portuguese "e" ("é" as in "woodp*e*cker) is read like in "m*e*ntion".

In this resource page you will find what you need
http://forum.wordreference.com/showpost.php?p=2691608&postcount=9


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## Macunaíma

almufadado said:


> It reads
> 
> Ele vem = vem
> 
> Eles vêm - vem~em


 
This difference is quite clear in my accent too. 

As fot the verb ver, the only difference is that the first *e* in the plural form remains not nasalized.

Ele vê  - Eles vê~em  [ve-eing]
Ele vem - eles vêm [ve~-eing]


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## Outsider

In IPA, this would be [vẽi] for _vem_ and [vẽiẽi] for _vêm_. The nasal diphthong is doubled in the accented word. But as you can see many Brazilians pronounce both words as [vẽi].


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## kynnjo

Outsider said:


> In IPA, this would be [vẽi] for _vem_ and [vẽiẽi] for _vêm_. The nasal diphthong is doubled in the accented word. But as you can see many Brazilians pronounce both words as [vẽi].



Hey!  How did you _do_ that?!?  I mean, how did you input an "e" with a squiggle on top?

I've been trying to do this for a while, with incantations like *&**#*771*;*, etc., but no dice.

~K


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## Outsider

Search the Net for "IPA keyboard". You should be able to type IPA symbols in another page and then paste them here.


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## Vanda

Bons olhos te vejam, OUt!

Muito em breve vamos ter o IPA na borda do quadro acima, assim como já temos os caracteres que não estão presentes nos teclados que não são da língua portuguesa.


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## kynnjo

Vanda said:


> Muito em breve vamos ter o IPA na borda do quadro acima, assim como já temos os caracteres que não estão presentes nos teclados que não são da língua portuguesa.



Vanda, that sounds great!

Then again, together with the standard Portuguese characters already available, it would be a _huge_ palette...

Why not just allow HTML code?  In this way one can input _any_ Unicode character using the format &#_nnn_;.  Granted, this is a pain to type, but on the other hand, it would be needed only rarely.

For a polyglot site like WR it's only plain commonsense to allow all Unicode to be input in messages.

~K


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## Istriano

_Ele tem. Eles têm_. (_tem _and _têm _have the same sound for me, nasal diphthong)
_Ele vem. Eles vêm._ (_vem _and _vêm _have the same sound for me, nasal diphthong)

But_ Eles veem _(former _vêem_) is different, two syllables.

Also, _Ele põe. Eles põem_ (_põe _and _põem _have the same sound for me, nasal diphthong).
Some people pronounce it differently: _Ele põe._ (one syllable) _Eles põ-em_. (two syllables) but I don't.


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## Nino83

Excuse me if I re-open this thread but I didn't get how to pronunce these conjugated verbs:

Ele vê  [ve] (he sees)
Eles veem [veẽj] (they see) 
Ele vem [vẽj] (he comes)
Eles vêm [vẽj] (they come) 

As far as I know there's no distinction in Portuguese between short and long vowels so are veem, vem and vem pronunced [vẽj]? 

I'd like to see IPA transcription otherwise I won't be able to understand. 

Thank you


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## Outsider

_Vêm_ is pronounced like _vem_ /vẽj/ by many people, namely in Brazil. But in Portugal many people pronounce the former /vẽjẽj/, with the diphthong doubled.


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## Nino83

Thank you Outsider. 
I found for "veem" (former vêem) two IPA transcriptions: [veẽj] and [veĩ]. 
Which one is closer to the everyday pronunciation?


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## Outsider

In principle, the pronunciation of "veem" is /veẽj/ (or /vejẽj/), with a fairly clear hiatus or a glide between the first vowel and the nasal diphthong at the end. I don't recall ever hearing it pronounced like "vem", if that's what you're asking. It's possible that this happens in some dialects that I'm not familiar with, or even in the relaxed speech of the more standard dialects. All I can say is that I've never noticed such a merger in Portugal.


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## Nino83

Yes, this was the question. 
So I can pronunce vem and vêm [vẽj] (the latter also [vẽjẽj]) and veem [veẽj] or [vejẽj]. 
Thank you


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## diego-rj

I would pronounce veem as [veẽj] only in careful and emphatic speech. In a more natural and colloquial speech it would be simply [vẽj], as vem and vêm.


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