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Portuguese on the rise
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As the official language of 10 countries, Portuguese is estimated to be spoken by around 230 million people worldwide. However, its foothold in the language travel industry has remained relatively modest. But with Brazil’s emergence as a potential powerhouse, it is fast becoming another language to add to one’s repertoire. Nicola Hancox reports.
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Considered to be the sixth most common language in the world, Portuguese has a wide geographical spread. Early expeditions by the Portuguese Empire in the 1400-1500s saw colonial strongholds crop up in parts of Africa, Asia and perhaps more notably, South America.
Many of these former colonies adopted Portuguese as their official or co-official language. Consequently, globe-trotting students could well have their Portuguese put to the test if they ever found themselves in Macau – an administrative region of China – East Timor, Angola, Guinea-Bissau, Mozambique, Equatorial Guinea and the island nations of Cape Verde and São Tomé & Príncipe just off of the African coast.
Some evidence points to the fact that Portuguese has the highest growth potential as an international language in South America and Africa. If you consider that by 2050, Africa alone stands to represent 83 million Portuguese speakers and South America a further 252 million, this seems highly plausible. What is certain, however, is that the language is gaining in popularity as a second language to learn.
Educators in both Portugal and Brazil are quick to point out its growing popularity. Marcos de Campos Bueno from It’s Cool Idiomas in São Paulo, Brazil – who founded his school in 1993 – says, “The main difference between now and then is the rising number of students looking for Portuguese lessons in Brazil”. Sheila Waksman from Basica Lingua in Salvador, Brazil concurs. “Each year, the Portuguese language travel market is growing and we firmly believe it will continue to do so,” she asserts. While some providers reflect that Portuguese makes a pleasant change from the proverbial norm (most notably English or Spanish), contributing factors such as Brazil’s booming tourism industry and its uprising as a global conglomerate are making it a sensible language to get to grips with.
Ana Cecília Ribas de Aguiar Poluhoff from the Business and International Communication School (BICS) in São Paulo has witnessed a surge in the number of corporate clients opting to learn Portuguese of late. “Most of the demand is for business Portuguese,” she says and she reasons this could well be down to the fact that along with Russia, India and China (the BRIC nations) – Brazil was labelled one of the fastest growing economies by Goldman Sachs. In fact, by the year 2050 ,analysts predict that BRIC could possess more economical clout than some of the world’s richest countries.
“Brazil is growing economically,” agrees Waksman. “Most economists here are very optimistic. Inflation is under control and up until now the world crisis hasn’t affected Brazil like other countries.” Indeed, with Brazil’s economy shifting into overdrive, it is fast becoming the place to conduct business, claims Martha Ghizzo from The Language Club in Florianopólis, Brazil. As a result, their bookings for language courses have noticeably increased. “The market has definitely been growing in Brazil. That can be perceived by the number of conferences, courses and books published in the area and the regular demand for Portuguese courses along the year.”
Providers in Portugal report a similar story with most of those canvassed for this article reporting that a majority of clientele are business people. However, Ernesto Pinho from the Fast Forward Language Institute in Porto says that at his school, “It is a mix of work, study and pleasure” that entices students. “For example, the majority of students we get from the UK and the USA are university students who come to Portugal to study Portuguese for academic reasons,” he explains, “while students from Germany, Switzerland and Italy tend to study Portuguese for pleasure or cultural reasons.” Alexandra Borges de Sousa from CIAL – Centro de Linguas in Lisbon has also experienced booking variation of late. “At first, most of our students needed the language for professional reasons. Today, we see an increase both at the level of university students and in students who do it for pleasure, in combination with a vacation in our country,” she agrees.
There are slight differences between the South American and European markets and Natalia Barata from the See Learning Center in Amadora, Portugal, notes that given the language originated in what is now Galicia (an autonomous community in the north of Spain) the dialect taught in Portugal is purer than among their Brazilian contemporaries. This, she claims, lends itself to an authentic language learning experience in Portugal. “Students are integrated in an ancient European culture, living history and traditions but never forgetting the new trends. This makes Portugal undoubtedly a better choice when comparing with other native Portuguese markets such as Brazil,” she reasons. However, Borges de Sousa ventures, “There are only 11 million speakers of Portuguese in Europe, so [the future of the market] will depend a lot on the strength and dynamism of Brazil and other non-European countries.”
Branded the sweet language by Miguel de Cervantes, the Spanish novelist, poet and playwright, Portuguese’s future as a language teaching market does look set to prosper. Adriana Lago de Carvalho from the University of Minho in Braga, Portugal, sees real growth potential in the African continent, particularly Angola, with its booming oil industry. “[Angola] shows important levels of economic growth which obviously has a strong impact on commercial transactions and the job market,” she states. Colin McMillan from IH Lisbon adds, “We’re hopeful that the Angolan market continues to develop and that people will choose Portugal as a language stepping-stone and also that with this growth in Africa, Portuguese becomes like Spanish, and Italian – a fashionable option,” he states.
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