Portuguese Language Blog

Brazilian novelas, or soap operas, are famous the world over and are broadcast in countries throughout Latin America, Africa, and Europe. Watching novelas is an excellent way to work on your listening comprehension skills, as well as to build your vocabulary.

Luckily, many novelas are now available on YouTube, and you can watch entire episodes there. One of the big novelas in Brazil right now is Viver a Vida. Let’s take a look at an excerpt:

Questions (from 0:00 – 3:15)

1. What does the woman threaten to do to the little girl?

2. The maid tells the man in pajamas that his mom is worried. Why?

3. Who is the writer of the blog the women are looking at?

Read More…

Watching TV is a great way to learn Portuguese, and though they may not seem important, commercials are also helpful ways to learn new vocabulary words. Let’s take a look at a few commercials as an example:

Keywords to listen for in Portuguese: menu, dip/sauce, vegetables, ice cream, discount, percent, broadband, calls

Rede Record, Globo’s major competitor, has come out with a new reality show to rival Globo’s Big Brother series. The show, called A Fazenda, is like Big Brother, but the participants are famous Brazilian actors and actresses who live together on a farm in rural Sao Paulo, rather than in a house on a set. (For those not familiar with Brazilian soap stars, you may know Jonathan Haagensen, from City of God.) They have to run the farm, getting up early, taking care of the animals, planting, and taking on the roles of actual farmers. The participants are voted off by the viewers, leaving an eventual winner who wins R$1 million.

Check out some scenes from the show, below.