This semester has been wonderful in learning about the functions of language and how to apply effective studying tactics to learn any language quicker and more efficiently. I have learned that languages have patterns, and there are ways to sort of "hack the system" when trying to learn something new. In my case, Portuguese is very similar to Spanish. They have the same SVO structure and similar vocabulary, and by understanding these similarities, I can gain understanding of the language. While I might not be able to speak Portuguese yet, I definitely can understand bits of what texts are saying based on my recognition of the similarities to Spanish. With this in mind, and from the lessons within the class, I confidently can say I will have an easier time learning the basics of Portuguese.
I enjoyed getting to do a deep dive on the cultures of Brazil and Portugal with my final project, as well as getting to learn a bit about other cultures through our lessons in class. I have learned much about the cultures of these places and how they influence the dialects of the Portuguese language. We learned about this in class; environment, surroundings, and culture all affect language and vocabulary, which is something I never thought about. I found this to be a very interesting part of the class!
I still struggle with the nasalization of vowels, and that will be something I want to keep working on after this class. That ties into my favorite reading/activity/lesson which was when we learned about the IPA and looked at the sound charts. I want to have a good memory of these charts and IPA symbols so I can further my linguistic discovery in the future. These are also going to be good tools in my research of American dialects next semester. I believe a lot of these lessons will be useful in this project.
I had such a great experience in this class this semester and took away a lot of valuable information to be used in my further academic study. Thank you for everything and I look forward to getting to work with you next semester!
Replies
The nasalization of vowels are so hard--- I agree! Recently I have been questioning if I am making the sounds correctly. When I listen to Brazilian funk songs, I always repeat the nasal sounds out loud when I hear them. I think that this is when music can be especially helpful because Portuguese has so many different sounds.