"It is so refreshing to finally get some rational, sensible and intelligent feedback"
George, you are obsessed!
If you say that the closest language to Portuguese is Spanish then ok. But the closest language to Spanish (which is not the same as above) is NOT Portugues, it´s Italian! Portuguese from Brazil is more intelligible but so is Italian..
tiffany:
"Spanish uses imperfecto and preterito "
Which tenses are those??? We have "preterito perfecto" and "preterito imperfecto", which one are you talking about? It looks like you still dont know the tenses too well..
"Can someone actually give me solid proof that Spanish is closer to Italian than it is to Portuguese? "
The only solid proof i can give you is that if you put in front of me a portuguese and an italian and ask them to talk to me, i´ll understand the Italian guy better than the Portuguese. And thats it!
For Gods sake, this is a nonsense! Im a native speaker of Spanish and i know whats closer to spanish and whats not, or what languages i´m able to understand better or not.
=>Portuguese and Spanish are the closest Romance languages<=
FALS ITALIAN IS!
Tranquilizaos, tranquilizaos, tíos.
Siempre me gusta hablar en acento madrileño.
Definitivamente decir que el ladino y el español son los más parecidos, es como decir que el rumano y el moldavo son los más similares entre sí. Son lo mismo, hueones. ¿Qué tal A Fala?
¿Qué piensas de mi español, Ana? ¿Todavía me falta mucho por aprender?
¡Por fin algunas personas con quien practicar el español! Ya me estaba cansando de que nadie supiera hablarlo (con excepciones como la de Tiffany, ¿oíste, Ana?).
Yes, I know they are different, but I was angry.
Ori mentioned Ladino spoken by Jews who were expelled from Spain in 1492 under pressure from Tomas de Torquemada (who may have been part Jewish himself) and the Spanish Inquisition. They fled to North Africa and the Ottoman Empire (primarily Yugoslavia, Greece and Turkey) taking their Spanish dialect with them. Ladino has a lot of 15th century characteristics and is probably close to the Spanish spoken by the Conquistadors. Like Yiddish, it had a large speaking community in New York City before the Second World War but has been steadily declining.
I agree that it is probably the closest relative of Spanish if it is indeed a separate language now and not just a dialect. Below are some short samples of these languages:
Spanish:Las ocho huerfanitas
Ladino: Las ocho guefanikas
Portuguese: As oito orfãzinhas
English: The eight little orphan girls
Spanish: hablar, mucho, ahora, rojo, verdad
Ladino: favlar, muncho, agora, roxo (pronounced ro-sho), vedrad
Portuguese: falar, muito, agora, vermelho, verdade (pronounced ver-da-jee)
Gloss: to speak, a lot, now / at present , red, truth
Hola xatufan, de español vas bien :-) no creo que te haga falta aprender más. El tio este esta obsesionado y estas cosas me queman, para mi es como mirar por la ventana y ver que hace sol y tener a uno al lado diciendo todo el rato " mira, no ves que esta lloviendo".
Creo que para estas cosas es mejor ser nativo del idioma, para poder ser objetivo sobre que idioma se parece mas o no (al oirlo). No vale lo de "pues yo los se todos y todos se entienden" ..vaya...o lo de "pues yo me se dos palabras de este y dos del otro y soy nativa del swahili y yo digo que son como dos gotas de agua"..anda ya..
Que la gramatica y vocabulario se parece mas, vale!..pero de ahi a decir que se entiende mejor..yo por mi experiencia entiendo mejor el italiano. Con el portugues me pierdo completamente aunque me enseñen 100 diccionarios diciendo "mira si todo es igual que el español, es todo lo mismo".
En fin, hay gente que se aburre mucho..
Un saludo pa´ ti :-)
However difficult it may be for some people to respect the rules of this forum as well as its participants, the language here is ENGLISH.
Rule N° 8 of this forum:
If you want to post to this forum, you must agree that you will not post:
8. Messages in languages other than English.
"(However difficult it may be) for some people to respect the rules of this forum => as well as its participants <="
OK, start for yourself..
Why not take very simple sentences and compare?
En: I went to the beach Sunday
It: Mi sono andata alla spiaggia domenica
Sp: Fui a la playa domingo
Po: Fui à praia domingo
And yes, my grasp of Italian is much better than Spanish.
I don´t need your sentences Tiffany, sorry, I´ve already found myself in the situation of having to understand either an Italian or a Portuguese and i could understand better to the first one. So, in general ( i dont mean those particular sentences that you´re giving which look obviously the same) i understand Italian better.
I don´t deny that they have similarities but Portuguese doesn´t SOUND any easy to me and pronunciation is quite a difficult subjet in that language. Im all the time refering to spoken Italian, not the gramatics or vocabulary. I´m refering to the way it sounds. I hope that we´re talking about the same thing.
As a french speaker who also know some spanish, Catalan and Italian I can give you my opinion.
I don't know Portuguese, but when I read it I can understand most of it due to its similarity to spanish. I can see a lot of words and gramatical word that are exactly or almost exactly the same than spanish ones. Of course words can seem similar to Italian because they are all romance languages. But we can see a huge part of words that are commun between spanish and portuguese that don't exist (or exist differently) in Italian or french.
I don't think that Catalan is closer to Spanish than portuguese. Catalan seems to be intermadiary between Spanish and french.
In fact I think you can speak endlessly about what language is closer to other because all latin languages are obviously linked in different ways to each other (depending of point of view : pronociation, grammar, vocabulary, etc.) and there is a continuum between the differents sub-groups.
Ana, you're in the minority in terms of how you view this subject. There are many people in this forum who have more than confirmed that Portuguese is closer to Spanish and vice-versa. Obsessed? You were the one who said you weren't going to discuss this anymore, but you are still ranting and raving. Face it, you are one of the very few who thinks that Italian is closer to Spanish. But you are wrong, wrong, wrong. Your opinion only proves that you have a different point of view, but it does not make it right. Admit it and suck it up.
I agree with you, but my point is that even if Portuguese has more similarities it absolutely doesn´t sound like it. That´s what i´ve kept saying since the beginning. So, it might be very similar but i understand Italian better (than continental Portuguese). Anyway, Galician is the closest romance language to Spanish ;-)
I love Cataluña and i do understand Catalan very well. Far better than Portuguese, as it´s obvious.
I supose that everybody´s opinion change depending on their native language, the country where they live, etc... So it all depends...but independently from other peoples´opinions that´s what i think. Besides, if we´re comparing Spanish with other languages, i´m a native speaker of it and that means that i know all the possibilities for spanish and my knowledge of Spanish is at least as broad as anybody´s knowledge of their native language. So maybe i´m conceited but i think i´m in better conditions to compare my language with others. Specialy those that i dont know.