Is it worthwhile to learn Portuguese?
Portuguese is part of the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several dialects of Vulgar Latin in the medieval Kingdom of Galicia and the County of Portugal and has kept some Celtic phonology and its lexicon. It is a Romance language originating in the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. It is the sole official language of Portugal, Angola, Mozambique, Guinea-Bissau, Cape Verde, São Tomé and Príncipe, and Brazil, while having co-official language status in East Timor, Equatorial Guinea, and Macau. Portuguese is the most widely spoken language in South America and all of the Southern Hemisphere, it is also the second-most spoken language, after Spanish, in Latin America, one of the 10 most spoken languages in Africa. It is an official language of the European Union, Mercosur, the Organization of American States, the Economic Community of West African States, the African Union, and the Community of Portuguese Language Countries, an international organization made up of all of the world’s officially Lusophone nations.
It is common knowledge that learning an additional language, apart from your native language, always helps an individual enjoy some leverage in a lot of aspects of life over others. An additional language is likely to help you achieve a spotlight effect and bring a new dimension to your CV. Apart from this, you can also channelise your inner traveller. With all that said, it is important to keep in mind that there exist hundreds of different languages across the globe. So, which one should you personally learn?
Out of so many languages to choose from, in this blog, we will be discussing Portuguese and why should you invest your effort, time and money into learning this particular language.
Let’s start with its significance.
- Global Language: Portuguese is an extremely popular language and is spoken in more than 9 countries. Out of which it holds official status in at least 8. Brazil alone has more than 230 million native speakers who are all fluent in Portuguese. This means that Portuguese has more native speakers than even French and German.
- A Romance Language: Apart from a popular language, Portuguese is also a Romance language. This means that, if you speak either of the Romance languages like French, Spanish, Italian, you’re definitely going to learn this language easily. Furthermore, if you aren’t a Romance language speaker, then Portuguese will single-handedly open up doors to those languages for you.
- Underrated due to lack of awareness: Now, you might wonder, if Portuguese is so popular and significant, then why is it so underrated? My justification would be that there isn’t much awareness about this beautiful language. But, look at the bright side, this would also mean that your possession of the knowledge of this language is bound to help you stand out of the crowd, who most likely are learning a common language.
Now let’s move on to how Portuguese as a language helps an individual grow internally.
- Rich culture: Portuguese has a history of exploration that combined and created a world of food, cultures and practices from around the world. Therefore, Portuguese culture in itself, is definitely a vibrant one. Apart from a vibrant culture, they also enjoy the beauty of diversity. From cultures of Portugal, Japanese, German all the way to Africa and Poland, the Portuguese culture is an Ocean of cultural diversity. This diverse and beautiful culture is depicted in their food and general practices.
- Beautiful language: The Portuguese language is a beautiful one. It is bound to entice any student and create a wonderful learning experience. Portuguese poetry in specific is one that I consider a must-read. It is just as beautiful as it’s fellow Romance languages like French and Spanish.
- Sports: This one is specifically for soccer fans. Soccer is a huge deal in Portugal, Brazil and Argentina. Two out of these three counties consider Portuguese as their official language, so automatically Portuguese matters. Many of your favourite soccer stars most likely prefer to speak in their native language in a lot of their interviews along with English. If you learn the language, I’m sure you’ll enjoy the sport a lot more.
Finally, how does this language help your professional life?
- New job opportunities: Previously Brazil’s economy was considered to be pretty unstable, but in recent years it has shown stable growth and enduring all the ups and downs, it has remained as the world’s eight largest economies. Therefore, Brazil holds a key international business position which you can benefit from, by learning the language.
- Career expansion: Learning Portuguese is bound to give you a competitive advantage when dealings across the oceans are considered with countries like Brazil, Portugal, Africa or even some East Asian countries. Apart from this, industries in these Portuguese speaking countries like the service sector, restaurants, hotels, telecommunications, tourism and electronics, offer great career opportunities.
- Clientele Expansion: It’s clear that as the eighth largest economies, Brazil definitely has strong control over the market. In addition to this, the service and tourism sector flourishes in almost every Portuguese speaking country. So even if you don’t plan on expanding your career or seeking a job in any of these countries, if you happen to work at any company that has Portuguese clients, you already know you’re going to stand out.
Finally,
Portuguese is usually listed as the sixth-most spoken language and the third-most spoken European language in the world in terms of native speakers. A Portuguese-speaking person or nation is referred to as “Lusophone” (lusófono). As the result of expansion during colonial times, a cultural presence of Portuguese and Portuguese creole speakers are also found around the world. With approximately 215 to 220 million native speakers and 50 million second-language speakers, Portuguese has approximately 270 million total speakers. In 1997, a comprehensive academic study ranked Portuguese as one of the 10 most influential languages in the world.
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