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Future outlook: French vs. Portuguese | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
 Iversen Super Polyglot Moderator Denmark berejst.dk Joined 6708 days ago 9078 posts - 16473 votes  Speaks: Danish*, French, English, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Swedish, Esperanto, Romanian, Catalan Studies: Afrikaans, Greek, Norwegian, Russian, Serbian, Icelandic, Latin, Irish, Lowland Scots, Indonesian, Polish, Croatian Personal Language Map | Message 73 of 81 28 November 2012 at 11:28am | IP Logged | |||||
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The comparison between French and Portuguese is not really indicative of anything. The real battle will be between Spanish and Portuguese, and Spanish has three things going for it: 1) In Europe Spain is bigger on every single quantitative scale, 2) The Hispanophone population in North America is already big and growing, 3) there are more countries in Latinamerica with Spanish as their main language than there are Lusophone ones... although it has to be said that Brazil alone has almost as many inhabitants as the rest of South America put together. So among these two languages Spanish will always be number one, but if the economy of Brazil grows enough the Portuguese language will become more relevant for language learners world wide - especially if the Brazilians don't get too eager about learning foreign languages.
One thing that could serve as a warning about disregarding Portuguese is case of German compared to French. French is spoken in places all over the world, but with three focal points: the 'Hexagone', Quebec and (as a second language) in much of Northern and Western Africa. Besides it has for purely historical reasons had a role as the diplomatic language par excellence - but it is rapidly losing this role to English. German is mainly spoken as the native language in three countries in Europe, but it has become an important language party because of the power of the German economy, but also because it has a rich culture with lots of wellknown names. So being distributed in many countries is an advantage, but a strong economy and a rich (and exportable) culture in one country can mean a lot when people choose which languages they want to learn. Edited by Iversen on 09 December 2012 at 6:14am 6 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| FireViN Diglot Senior Member Brazil missaoitaliano.wordpRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5234 days ago 196 posts - 292 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, EnglishC2 Studies: Italian | Message 74 of 81 28 November 2012 at 11:46am | IP Logged | |||||
Well, that's weird coming from someone who learn languages. I agree with your post, but this sentence just doesn't make sense to me. Why would you learn French then? French people should speak German/English to communicate with Germany! Why learn Mandarin? The same applies. Of course you can get by in Brazil speaking Spanish, but hey, it's not our native language! You'll succeed much more here if you speak Portuguese. Brazil is a regional power in South America, so many people are learning it to do business or whatever. Brazilians learn Spanish and English because we want to communicate with the world and can't (and we don't) demand people to speak Portuguese, but if you do, there's a higher chance of doing great business here. Something that pisses off many brazilians is the assumption that all brazilians speak Spanish. Of course we'll gladly help you get by if you're traveling or anything, but people would be a lot more friendly to you if you bothered learning at least a little of the local language. 5 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4627 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 75 of 81 28 November 2012 at 11:52am | IP Logged | |||||
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Brazil is a regional superpower. It is surrounded by Spanish-speaking nations, many of which are small economic players. Surely people in these countries have a motivation to learn Portuguese in order to increase their business opportunities. Much in the same way as some citizens of the countries lying to the east of Germany are able to speak German.
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| justonelanguage Diglot Groupie United States Joined 4467 days ago 98 posts - 128 votes Speaks: English, Spanish | Message 76 of 81 28 November 2012 at 5:06pm | IP Logged | |||||
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Both French and Portuguese have their issues in regards to maintaining their linguistic might.
French: 1. Not that many native speakers compared to other UN languages 2. Much of its future is dependent on how it does in Africa but its future economic dominance is not as promising as, say, Brazil. (if it doesn't catch on/keep strong in Africa) Portuguese: 1. Large native speaking population but apparently a lot of differences between European and Brazilian Portuguese. 2. Most of the future growth of the language is tied to Brazil, just one country...to be fair Brazil has a promising future in many aspects! I also was confused about your statement saying that Spanish-speaking South Americans shouldn't learn Portuguese....English and Portuguese should be the two most "useful" languages for a South American.
Edited by justonelanguage on 28 November 2012 at 5:07pm 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Presidio Triglot Newbie United States Joined 4586 days ago 39 posts - 150 votes Speaks: English*, Russian, German Studies: Spanish, Arabic (Gulf) | Message 77 of 81 28 November 2012 at 10:37pm | IP Logged | |||||
-- It would be interesting to hear what UNESCO bases their opinion on. Spanish? Yes. But Portugues? I would have to hear the justification for that opinion. As far as Portuguese having a "strong potential for growth" in Africa.... None of the nations you listed are economic powerhouses that will have much of an impact on the world economy. Neither are they what one would call "tourism destinations" that will draw people to them....even when they aren't embroiled in a civil war, drought, or health crisis. As far as the topic of this thread goes, you leave out the fact that there are also a number of Africa nations where French is also an official (or unofficial but highly influential) language.
-- There is a flipside to that, as well. If are Brazil you have a market of 15-plus nations between Mexico and Tierra Del Fuego whose primary language is Spanish. If you wish to develop business partnerships with them, having government agencies and business representatives who speak Spanish would in essence kill 15-plus birds with one stone. Besides France having strong economic influence around the world, French is a primary language of the UN, the EU and even the Olympics. While Brazil will continue to grow in influence, Portugal is doing just the opposite, wallowing in debt, high unemployment, government instability, etc. 1 person has voted this message useful | ||||||
| Medulin Tetraglot Senior Member Croatia Joined 4673 days ago 1199 posts - 2192 votes Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali | Message 78 of 81 29 November 2012 at 3:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
4 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4627 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 79 of 81 29 November 2012 at 4:51pm | IP Logged | |||||
And the Eurovision song contest! 2 persons have voted this message useful | ||||||
| Medulin Tetraglot Senior Member Croatia Joined 4673 days ago 1199 posts - 2192 votes Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali | Message 80 of 81 30 November 2012 at 8:22am | IP Logged | |||||
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The future outlook looks better for French since MUCH more people in the UK, Ireland, Germany, Austria, Italy, Flanders, the Netherlands, Italy, Scandinavia, Canada study French than Portuguese.
In Spain more people learn French than Portuguese. In Argentina, most students opt for English instead of Portuguese. Edited by Medulin on 30 November 2012 at 8:29am 1 person has voted this message useful |
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