Portugal

[Mike_G (Mike)]

@Giger_Kitty

…I’d like to make a joke about divine intervention, but can’t think of anything that might not be offensive to believers, so I’ll just… dwindle out.

You should listen to the song.

[pinkunz]

@Giger_Kitty

EDIT - Also, in practical terms, in the US, the vast majority of PT-speaking immigrants are Brasilians. So for an American, “PT” becomes quickly synonymous with “BR”.

That’s really contingent on where you are in the US. There are significant European Portuguese communities in the US, especially on the East Coast. Any American living in the New Bedford, Massachusetts area is not thinking Brazil when they hear Portuguese (or smell sun-dried fish).

[Giger_Kitty]

Interesting to know. I was speaking from my experience as interpreter; the vast majority of LEPs (Limited English Proficient) people I interpret for are Brasilians, even in Massachussets. However, I was clearly assuming when I was stating “which version of Portuguese comes to mind”, and we all know what assumptions do. And, of course, I know nothing - zilch - about the immigrants and communities who do not need interpreters…

[EJoyce (Emery Joyce)]

I don’t know if this is true of New Bedford specifically, but most of the parts of MA that used to have big European Portuguese communities now mostly have Brazilian communities because that’s been where most Portuguese-speaking immigrants have come from since the '80s or '90s. (My mother lived here in the '70s and it was still European Portuguese then, and the Brazilians I know who have been here longest came over in the '90s, but I haven’t done a comprehensive community survey and am not quite sure where the inflection point was.) And they preferentially moved into the areas that already had Portuguese-language infrastructure because of the previous waves of immigration from Portugal. (This also often happens with successive waves of immigration from different Spanish-speaking countries, and I know in those cases there can be a lot of tension between the older and newer immigrant communities, but not sure if that’s also the case with the Portuguese and the Brazilians.)

[DeusIrae (Mike Russo)]

Yeah, when I lived in Boston in the aughts there were definitely big Brazilian communities around - though my one half-Portuguese friend is from southeast of Boston so I think the theory mostly checks out.

[pinkunz]

I sit corrected. My wife spent part of her youth in New Bedford. That was some time ago and things very well could have changed.

[Dannii]

@Giger_Kitty

I don’t know how “colour” and such is spelled in Australia and New Zealand.

We (generally) use the Commonwealth spelling.

However we also have a lot of American vocab. So I’m sure there are some cases where we use the “British” spelling for a word that is never used in Britain! Can’t think of any examples off the top of my head though.