6 ms·

I can't imagine any two English accents as far apart from each other as are the Portuguese accents of "standard Globo TV presenter in Brazil" and that of the Az

I can't imagine any two English accents as far apart from each other as are the Portuguese accents of "standard Globo TV presenter in Brazil" and that of the Azores. I grew up on and off in Brazil (Rio de Janeiro and Brasília) and later spent 20+ years in the SF Bay Area. Once in a while I'd run into old-school Azoreans who'd lived in the Portuguese towns (Santa Clara, Newark, San Leandro, Half Moon Bay, Pescadero, Castro Valley) for a few generations and it was almost impossible to understand them until I started listening occasionally to the Bay Area Portuguese radio station. I'd mimic those accents and got a bit better at understanding those folks, but with cost/benefit ... Brazilians have said I now sound Portuguese, and Portuguese people say they can understand my Portuguese better than a normal Brazilian's. I'm not sure how it's changed in the last decade, but in many SF Bay Area and Central Valley towns there are Portuguese "Sociedade do Espirito Santo" (Holy Spirit Society) halls and Catholic churches where Portuguese/Azoreans maintain their traditional festivals and music. I think Neto's shut down its huge Santa Clara restaurant/market and reincarnated in a strip-mall/sausage-making operation, but at least a couple years ago you could still go and get an excellent Linguiça sandwich. EDIT: Sociedade Espirito Santo, Neto's

arcticfox 5y ago
Is this a reasonable example of the Azores Portuguese?? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeVHjELjR9s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeVHjELjR9s Sounds like a Russian speaking Portuguese to me (American fluent in Brazilian Portuguese), pretty amusing but I can follow everything. I often think that when I hear PT-PT as well - interestingly someone in the comments says this sounds less Russian to them. I have very little exposure to non-Brazilian accents so no idea in general, but the difference sounds about as much as American English<->Scottish English to my ears. I wonder if there's a way to measure the distance between accents? That would be really interesting. I'd be curious how close all the American accents are to each other, versus the British accents, etc. and then also in comparison to Portuguese accents and other languages.
- FeteCommuniste 5y ago
  The syllable-eating, "Slavic-ish" sound of PT-PT is why I chose to learn it over Brazilian. I love it. I have trouble with Brazilian accents, on the other hand, because I mainly listen to PT-PT.
- nwatson 5y ago
  That sounds quite like the Azorean Portuguese I'd hear in the SF Bay Area, except I think modern Azoreans in the Azores probably have been exposed to a lot of Brazilian TV and music and so have probably "normalized" a bit toward the "centroid" of a pan-luso pronunciation. The SF Bay Area Azoreans I'd hear probably stuck to an "older original accent" and so were probably further from the Brazilian Portuguese I grew up with.
- paol 5y ago
  > Is this a reasonable example of the Azores Portuguese?? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeVHjELjR9s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeVHjELjR9s Yes, but every island has a different accent. That was filmed in S. Jorge and the accent there is quite mild. Some islands have stronger accents. Most notably S. Miguel, which in it's thickest form can be very hard to understand for mainland speakers.
School-Cotton 5y ago
> I can't imagine any two English accents as far apart from each other as are the Portuguese accents of "standard Globo TV presenter in Brazil" and that of the Azores. I don't know anything about Portuguese, but I find a lot of Scottish varieties to be totally incomprehensible (I'm American).
- somewhereoutth 5y ago
  and Mancunian and Liverpudlian (I'm English).
  - School-Cotton 5y ago
    New Zealand, Northern Ireland and South Africa can also be pretty tough. Australia, the Republic of Ireland, south England and Wales are all fine for me.
pelasaco 5y ago
The base of the Florianopolis immigration is from Azores. They are called "manezinhos" and have their own dialect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florianopolitan_dialect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florianopolitan_dialect

arcticfox 5y ago

Is this a reasonable example of the Azores Portuguese?? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeVHjELjR9s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeVHjELjR9s Sounds like a Russian speaking Portuguese to me (American fluent in Brazilian Portuguese), pretty amusing but I can follow everything. I often think that when I hear PT-PT as well - interestingly someone in the comments says this sounds less Russian to them. I have very little exposure to non-Brazilian accents so no idea in general, but the difference sounds about as much as American English<->Scottish English to my ears. I wonder if there's a way to measure the distance between accents? That would be really interesting. I'd be curious how close all the American accents are to each other, versus the British accents, etc. and then also in comparison to Portuguese accents and other languages.

FeteCommuniste 5y ago
The syllable-eating, "Slavic-ish" sound of PT-PT is why I chose to learn it over Brazilian. I love it. I have trouble with Brazilian accents, on the other hand, because I mainly listen to PT-PT.
nwatson 5y ago
That sounds quite like the Azorean Portuguese I'd hear in the SF Bay Area, except I think modern Azoreans in the Azores probably have been exposed to a lot of Brazilian TV and music and so have probably "normalized" a bit toward the "centroid" of a pan-luso pronunciation. The SF Bay Area Azoreans I'd hear probably stuck to an "older original accent" and so were probably further from the Brazilian Portuguese I grew up with.
paol 5y ago
> Is this a reasonable example of the Azores Portuguese?? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeVHjELjR9s https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeVHjELjR9s Yes, but every island has a different accent. That was filmed in S. Jorge and the accent there is quite mild. Some islands have stronger accents. Most notably S. Miguel, which in it's thickest form can be very hard to understand for mainland speakers.

School-Cotton 5y ago

> I can't imagine any two English accents as far apart from each other as are the Portuguese accents of "standard Globo TV presenter in Brazil" and that of the Azores. I don't know anything about Portuguese, but I find a lot of Scottish varieties to be totally incomprehensible (I'm American).

somewhereoutth 5y ago
and Mancunian and Liverpudlian (I'm English).
- School-Cotton 5y ago
  New Zealand, Northern Ireland and South Africa can also be pretty tough. Australia, the Republic of Ireland, south England and Wales are all fine for me.

pelasaco 5y ago

The base of the Florianopolis immigration is from Azores. They are called "manezinhos" and have their own dialect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florianopolitan_dialect https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Florianopolitan_dialect