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Portuguese In Asia
I have seen in this forum a lot post about Portuguese from Europe, Brazil and Africa.
But what happens to the portuguese in Macau and East Timor? Are they similar to Portuguese form Africa, Brazil or Portugal? Thank you.
Good topic but i don't know what to say. I don't know portuguese. SO I can not talk anout it.
As it happens, Portuguese in Macau and East Timor is a myth. You may as well ask about the Portuguese spoken by the Brazilian diaspora community in Armenia.
Portuguese is spoken in quite an extend in East-Timor, besides a very tiny Portuguese community in Macau.
In India is pratically extinct. But it's not a myth. English, Portuguese, French and Dutch were the European languages, that gave the most input on new words to many of the East-Asian languages. Concerning the food and so on.
In East-Timor (Timor Lorosae) Portuguese language always remained in common use, even when Indonesia tryed to impose Bahasa by force. Its use was reinforced after the independence, as Portugal made a great effort to support the new country: many portuguese volunteers went to Timor then (some remained there), namely teachers, doctors and others, and many young timorese came to Portugal to study (all paid by Portuguese Gov.).
The timorese see Portuguese as a national unifying language, which reinforces their identity in between a pair of powerful neighbors, Indonesia and Australia (whose smooth moves concerning timorese oil reserves made them suspicious at many timorese nationals eyes). In Macau, as well as in parts of Malaca (Malaysia) and in the territories of former Portuguese State of India, Portuguese is still spoken by some people but it's clearly fading. Still its cultural influence remains visible and it's un-erasable, namely by many pidgin-languages based on Portuguese still in use, in local scale (Sri Lanka, Malaysia, India). And there's Portuguese influence in vocabulary all over Indic Ocean, from Iran to Japan. So, Portuguese in Asia is much more than a myth...
It's not a myth in Timor Leste at all as one can see in the following link:
http://webzoom.freewebs.com/jpesperanca/Mai%20ita%20aprende%20portuges%20ho%20Emilia/curso_portugues_Timor.pdf Not only Portuguese is present in the national language tétum but it has been taught in the country. I also found other Timor Leste websites written in Portuguese: http://www.pm.gov.tp/port/welcome.htm http://www.timorlestecontacto.page.tl/ Cheers!!
While Portuguese does have historic significance, it is all but dead in Macau. Yes, you might find a couple of sites in it from Macau, but that is insignificant. I could also find sites from Macau in Russian, German, etc and probably in greater numbers.
In Timor it is more spoken than in Macau, but I still would in no way call it a stronghold or anything and the situation is very precarious.
to the person who said Portuguese is practically extinct in India...it's false. I know of several communities in Goa who can speak fluent portuguese. In fact most the upper class people in Goa can speak fluent Portuguese.
it's false. That is right. Tom and the moderators project an aura of respectibility. However, the discredited Tom and the discredited moderators enjoy picking on certain posters here and deleting their work. They obviously can't do it to everyone. I was one of their victims and their actions hurt me very badly. You should realize that these discredited people have blood on their hands.
There is not much Portuguese spoken in Macau unless things have changed since I was there. Things were written in Portuguese for which I was glad, but I didn't hear any spoken in the street.
Take a look at all the languages spoken in Goa, this is fantastic!
STATISTIC OF GOA: 1981 Languages (1981): Konkani 600.004 Marathi 266.649 Gujarati 77.677 Kannada 33.512 Urdu 27.703 Hindi 21.158 Malayalam 7.634 English 6.407 Telugu 5.527 Tamil 3.884 Punjabi 1.314 Portuguese It is now spoken only by a small segment of the upper class families and about 3 to 5 % of the people still speak it (estimated at 30.000 to 50.000 people).
I was in december in Macau and I saw a program on tV which teaches portuguese to Citizens of Macau. But it is true I only heard two people speak portuguese no more.
People tend to exaggerate the variation of portuguese. Theres no "African" portuguese, and no "Asian" portuguese.
Theres just two major forms of portuguese (creoles not considered): Brazilian, and European. Brazilian portuguese is unique to Brazil, and everywhere else in the lusophone world they speak standard european portuguese -or something very close to it. Examples of portuguese speakers from Asia: Timor: http://www.instituto-camoes.pt/cvc/hlp/geografia/som84.html Macau: http://www.instituto-camoes.pt/cvc/hlp/geografia/som92.html ^^ listen to the recordings and you'll note that both are very european-sounding. |