Mutual Comprehensibility, Reconvergence

[Joao]

    The Portuguese of Portugal and of the former Portuguese Empire is markedly
different from the Portuguese of Brazil.  The Portuguese of Portugal is a
stress-timed language. Weakening of stress yields vowel-centering, as in the
English of the USA, the UK etc. Varieties of the language are predominantly
regional, as of Italian.

The Portuguese of Brazil is a syllable-timed language, as in Spanish generally,
the English of the Caribbean, etc. Varieties are predominantly
class-distinguished, as in UK English. There is great homogeneity within
Brazil, where the Globo TV network has been a strong unifier.

When Ramalho Eanes, the first President of post-revolution Portugal, visited
Brazil, the Globo network supplied subtitles. President Eanes's accent is,
admittedly, one of the more marked in Portugal, from the Beira Alta region.

 Brazil and her Spanish-speaking neighbours can, indeed, get along without
detailed tranlation, given the will to do so. The gray area is called Portinhol
by Brazilians. There is currently no creolizing.

 The societies of the Brazilian State of Rio Grande do Sul and of Uruguay and
Northern Argentina, on the River Plate, share a lot of features, and generally
get on well together.

 The new factor is the Mercosur/Mercosul common market, which has led to much
interest within Brazil in speaking Spanish well.

 Quite beside Dr White's interest, the Eastern half of the Pacific island of
Timor (the name itself means East), an ex-colony of Portugal, has opted for the
Brazilian variety of Portuguese, rather than the ex-imperial variety.

Cheers!

Chester Graham