# traz/faz/nós (diphthong)



## William Stein

Oi a gente!

I've been listening to some Brazilian tapes and it sounds like some people pronounce "traz" as "trajz" or "traiz". The same thing with "faz". Some people also pronounce "nós" as "nois". Is that a particular accent or is it normal in Brazil?


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## MugenKaosu

William Stein said:


> Oi a gente!
> 
> I've been listening to some Brazilian tapes and it sounds like some people pronounce "traz" as "trajz" or "traiz". The same thing with "faz". Some people also pronounce "nós" as "nois". Is that a particular accent or is it normal in Brazil?


/tráich/ --> Rio de Janeiro
/tráis/, /nóis/, /fáis/ -----> São Paulo, e talvez todo o resto do Brasil, exceto o Rio.

P.S.:
*ch*, como em *ch*ato
*s*, como em *s*apato.


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## William Stein

MugenKaosu said:


> /tráich/ --> Rio de Janeiro
> /tráis/, /nóis/, /fáis/ -----> São Paulo, e talvez todo o resto do Brasil, exceto o Rio.
> 
> P.S.:
> *ch*, como em *ch*ato
> *s*, como em *s*apato.



Okay, thanks. Is there some rule about stressed "a"turning into "ai" and accented "o" turning into "oi" (only before "s" or "z", for example), or do you just have to memorize each case? Aulete doesn't include the pronunciations. Is there some online reference where I can look up the pronunciation (including different verb forms)?


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## Denis555

Well, I speak like this. It certainly has something to do with folowing s or z. It's still a not very much understood phenomenon but it is widely used in Brazil. By the way, this is the cause of the confusion between the words "mas" (but) and "mais" (more) whice are pronounced int the same way /mais/. So people tend to write down both of them like "mais".


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## Vanda

Denis555 said:


> Well, I speak like this. It certainly has something to do with folowing s or z. It's still a not very much understood phenomenon but it is widely used in Brazil. By the way, this is the cause of the confusion between the words "mas" (but) and "mais" (more) whice are pronounced int the same way /mais/. So people tend to write down both of them like "mais".


I sign under Deni's. It doesn't have to do with region not even with education, but habits, sometimes personal preferences, and, yes, location and ambiance, with slang and so on. As Dennis - a specialist in the area - said it is not widely understood yet, linguistics haven't found a 'straight reason' for that.


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## William Stein

Okay, thanks Denis and Vanda. 
Are there any other common words in which it occurs? Does anybody pronounce "paz" as "pais"? I think I heard the diphthong in the feminine plural definite article (as = ais). Does it only occur before "s" and "z"? It would be funny if "voz" were pronounced "vois", like the English "voice".


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## Vanda

William Stein said:


> Okay, thanks Denis and Vanda.
> Are there any other common words in which it occurs? Does anybody pronounce "paz" as "pais"? - many cariocas do, just to quote someone.
> I think I heard the diphthong in the feminine plural definite article (as = ais).
> No, you might have heard 'ash'
> 
> Does it only occur before "s" and "z"? It would be funny if "voz" were pronounced "vois",- it is, sort of-  (minha voish is raspy today)
> like the English "voice".


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## anaczz

Em São Paulo é comum:
atrás -> _atrais_
voz -> _vois_
vozinha (diminutivo de voz) _-> voizinha_

_Mas:_
noz (walnut) _->_ soa como _nós_
avozinha, vovozinha (diminutivos de avó) -> _avózinha, vovózinha_

as pronunciado como _aish _parece típico do Rio de Janeiro.


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## Audie

William Stein said:


> Does anybody pronounce "paz" as "pais"?


I do. In fact, I think most of us do it. But, as Mugen said, sometimes with a "ch" (or "sh", sei lá) sound instead of an "s" one.





> I think I heard the diphthong in the feminine plural definite article (as = ais)


I'm not sure. Maybe "ash", as Vanda said.





> Does it only occur before "s" and "z"?


If you mean "ai", I think so. But there's also "au": 'corram'(/corrãum/). Mas aí já é outr história, digo, fio...





> It would be funny if "voz" were pronounced "vois", like the English "voice".


So, I'm funny!  (Sometimes I pronounce _"voish_" also).
É verdade, Ana. "Voizinha" (pronúncia do diminutivo de '_voz_) e "vozinha" (pronúncia do diminutivo de '_vó_')


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## Vanda

I 'm trying to remember a song where the singer - a woman - says 'voish' and that I always mimick when singing the song.


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## William Stein

Audierunt said:


> But there's also "au": 'corram'(/corrãum/).


 
Thanks Anaccz and Audierunt. Does that mean some people say "corrão" instead of "corram"?


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## Alacritas

Well all the Brazilians I know here in Portugal do this. 

Also, if a Portuguese person tries to make fun of the Brazilian accent, they inevitably start with "Então, rapaz!" pronounced like /ẽ(n)'tãw xa'pais/ or something very similar.


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## anaczz

William Stein said:


> Thanks Anaccz and Audierunt. Does that mean some people say "corrão" instead of "corram"?


 

Sim, inclusive, devido a essa pronúncia, muita gente confunde, ao escrever, o pretérito e o futuro de certos verbos:

Eles _comerão_ muito ontem.
Eles comeram muito ontem.


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## William Stein

anaczz said:


> Sim, inclusive, devido a essa pronúncia, muita gente confunde, ao escrever, o pretérito e o futuro de certos verbos:
> 
> Eles _comerão_ muito ontem.
> Eles comeram muito ontem.


 
That's a relief, because I learned in Campinas and I've alway pronounced the "am" verb ending as "ão". Then when I got these Portuguese tapes I heard people pronouncing "am" as "am" and I thought: "Damn, I've been making a mistake all these years!" But according to what you guys say most Brazilians do the same thing so I didn't just invent it...


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## Vanda

And I had a student at college that could never learn how to conjugate past and future of verbs with -ão and -am. Till today, after 3 years of correction and making her understand the difference she can't get it. She'll say: ontem eles estudaram, amanhã eles  estudaram. (me crying)


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## William Stein

Vanda said:


> And I had a student at college that could never learn how to conjugate past and future of verbs with -ão and -am. Till today, after 3 years of correction and making her understand the difference she can't get it. She'll say: ontem eles estudaram, amanhã eles estudaram. (me crying)


 
But according to what to Anaccz said, a Brazilian can know the difference between the "estudarão" (future) and "estudaram" (past) and still pronounce them both the same, right?


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## Alacritas

William Stein said:


> But according to what to Anaccz said, a Brazilian can know the difference between the "estudarão" (future) and "estudaram" (past) and still pronounce them both the same, right?



In Portugal (and I've heard the same from all the Brazilians I know), the only difference between these two words is the stress. 


estuda*rão* 

vs.

estu*da*ram

My Portuguese professor helped me remember this by saying that whenever you have an diacritic (ie an accent mark) on a syllable, that's the stressed one (unless there's two diacritics in one word, one being an agudo (´) and the other a til (~): in that case the agudo gets the emphasis).

Apparently, from what Vanda and Audierunt said (if I understood correctly), there are Brazilians who don't make this distinction and who put the emphasis on the last syllable in both instances, leading to the confusion of Vanda's university friend.

Haha I must say that "Amanhã eles estudaram" seems patently absurd to me.


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## anaczz

Bem, o erro que costumo ver é apenas na grafia, ou seja, pronunciam corretamente a sílaba tônica:
_"estu*da*rão"_ (pretérito) 
_"estuda_*rão" *(futuro), 
mas ignoram que, caso a forma do pretérito (paroxítona) terminasse em ão, deveria, necessariamente, ser acentuada (estudárão) e, assim sendo, escrevem as duas da mesma forma (estudarão).


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## William Stein

anaczz said:


> Bem, o erro que costumo ver é apenas na grafia, ou seja, pronunciam corretamente a sílaba tônica:
> _"estu*da*rão"_ (pretérito)
> _"estuda_*rão" *(futuro),
> mas ignoram que, caso a forma do pretérito (paroxítona) terminasse em ão, deveria, necessariamente, ser acentuada (estudárão) e, assim sendo, escrevem as duas da mesma forma (estudarão).


 
That's what I understood. I didn't express myself very well, because I should have said: 
"a Brazilian can know the difference between the "estudarão" (future) and "estudaram" (past) and still pronounce them both the same *except for the stress*, right?

Alacritas, do you know of any online reference to check pronunciation? On the one hand, it seems forgivable for Portuguese dictionaries (at least in Brazil) not to spell out the pronounciation phonetically because the stress is predictable and the words seem to be pronounced as written except for the above-mentioned diphthongs, verb endings (am) and the letter "X", which can be "sh", "ks", "z" or "s". On the other, it would be nice to be able to check when in doubt.


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## Vanda

That student of mine quoted above came from a very poor public school and environment, even though in college by means of some 'quotas' we have nowadays she could never make a difference in spelling the verbs endings -ão and -am and she is only a representative parcel of many semi-illiterate orfunctionally illiterate Brazilians.


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## Alacritas

Vanda said:


> That student of mine quoted above came from a very poor public school and environment, even though in college by means of some 'quotas' we have nowadays she could never make a difference in spelling the verbs endings -ão and -am and she is only a representative parcel of many semi-illiterate orfunctionally illiterate Brazilians.



Duas perguntas:

Primeiramente, quando dizes "college" queres dizer "university" (o que a palavra significa aos Estados Unidos) ou outra coisa (por exemplo, a escola segundária)?

Em segundo lugar, acho que não percebi bem este erro do que vocês estão a falar. É só um erro de ortografia, ou também de pronunciação? Tipo, é que eles dizem as duas palavras "estudaram" e "estudarão" da mesma maneira? Ou é que eles não sabem escrever a diferença?


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## Vanda

College = universidade/faculdade
No meu caso específico, quero dizer, no que mencionei acima era na escrita, spelling. Talvez a aluna não perceba a sutileza da pronúncia ou sei lá o quê! Durante 3 anos tentei descobrir e ajudar, mas o enraizado estava fundo demais para apenas 2 aulas por semana.


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## William Stein

Vanda said:


> That student of mine quoted above came from a very poor public school and environment, even though in college by means of some 'quotas' we have nowadays she could never make a difference in spelling the verbs endings -ão and -am and she is only a representative parcel of many semi-illiterate orfunctionally illiterate Brazilians.


 
I don't think that student sounds so bad. She speaks correctly but she doesn't write "correctly" because she's used to Portuguese being a phonetic language that reflects actual pronunciation. Since Brazilians pronounce "am" as "ão", she's is writing phonetically even when it doesn't correspond to the spelling. Maybe it would be more logical to reform Brazilian spelling so the "am" is written "ão" when that's how it should be pronounced.


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## anaczz

William, há alguma coisa no babelmundo e também no acapela (opção Brazilian portuguese).
Veja também assentavam, falaram e falarão no forvo.

assentavam -> parece assentávão
falaram, neste caso,  é pronunciado quase como "falaro", que também é uma pronúncia praticada por muitas pessoas.


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## Vanda

William, we are referring to a college student that intends to be a teacher! Yes, it is extremely bad for us!


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## William Stein

anaczz said:


> William, há alguma coisa no babelmundo e também no acapela (opção Brazilian portuguese).
> Veja também assentavam, falaram e falarão no forvo.
> 
> assentavam -> parece assentávão
> falaram, neste caso,  é pronunciado quase como "falaro", que também é uma pronúncia praticada por muitas pessoas.



Thanks a lot. Forvo seems like the best for my purposes, because it has conjugated verbs like "traz", whereas Babelmundo only has infinitives. Still the best thing as far as I'm concerned would just be a standard phonetic transcription like you can find in most English dictionaries, for example:

1  catch


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