Greetings in European Portuguese
There are only a handful of them, and most learners still get them wrong, because the difficulty is not what they mean but when you are allowed to use them.
ReadThe Portuguese alphabet, and what the accents are for
Twenty six letters, five marks that go above and below them, and a spelling reform that makes older books look wrong. Here is the whole system, and how to say your own name down a Portuguese phone line.
ReadIs Portuguese similar to Spanish?
Spanish gives you a real head start in Portuguese, though not the one most people expect. Here is what actually carries over, what does not, and why the two languages are not equally easy in both directions.
ReadWhy Portuguese sounds nothing like it looks
Most of my students hit the same week somewhere around month four, when they find out that the language on the page and the language in the street are not quite the same thing.
ReadEuropean Portuguese pronunciation, sound by sound
Portuguese is not written the way it is spoken, and European Portuguese least of all. Here is what each sound actually does, and why the language you studied does not match the one you hear in Lisbon.
ReadWhy I teach Portuguese the way I do
After nine years and two hundred students, I've learned one thing. The textbooks aren't wrong, but they're not enough.
ReadFive Portuguese words that don't translate (but should)
Every language has words that carry weight beyond their dictionary definition. Here are five of my favourites from Portuguese.
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