Chapter 11 Acquiring Brazilian Portuguese

1. Chapter 11Acquiring Brazilian Portuguese Daniela Evaristo dos Santos Galea

2. Introduction • This chapter provides an overview of phonological development in Brazilian Portuguese • Data from children in São Paulo, a city in the southeastern region of the country • Acquisition of Brazilian Portuguese • Syllable and phoneme inventory of the language • Child data • Age of acquisition of individual phonemes • Age of elimination of phonological processes

3. Portuguese Speakers Around the World • Portuguese is a Romance language • Spoken in Europe • Portugal • South America • Brazil • Africa • Mozambique • Angola • Cape Verde • Guiné-Bissau • São Tomé e Príncipe • Asia • Macau • East Timor • Goa

4. The Phonology of Brazilian Portuguese • Phoneme inventory (Bechara, 1998) • Consonants • Occlusives • Stops /p, b, t, d, k, g/ • Nasals /m, n, ŋ/ • Constrictives • Fricatives /f, v, s, z, ʃ, ʒ/ • Laterals /l, ʎ/ • Flap /ɾ/ • Trill /ʁ/ Considered a liquid by some authors, or a voiceless velar fricative /x/ by others • Vowels • Oral /a, e, i o, u, ε, ɔ/ • Nasal /ã, ẽ, ɪ,̃ õ, ũ/

5. Syllable and word shapes • V core • Optional C or CC onset • If singleton C, 16 of the consonants can appear • If CC, the first C must be /p, b, t, d, k, ɡ, v, f/and the second C a liquid • Not all of combinations are possible, e.g.,* /vr/ in word-initial position, */dl, vl/ in any position • Optional C coda • If coda, must be /S, R, l, n/ (note: capital letters denote archiphonemes) • Predominant syllable shape is CV

6. Typical Phonological Development Understanding the acquisition patterns of the sounds, syllable shapes, and word shapes of a language informs clinical decisions in diagnosis and treatment Research on typical development of Brazilian Portuguese has focused on children in the South and Southeast regions of Brazil

7. The Acquisition of Individual Speech Sounds • Nasals • /m, n/ 1;6 and 1;8 • /ŋ/slightly later • Fricatives • /f, v, s, z/ before age 2;0 • /ʃ, ʒ/ around 2;10 and 2;6 • Laterals • /l/between 2;0 and 3;0 depending on sample and word position • Palatal lateral /ʎ/ 4;0 to 4;1 • Flap /ɾ/ 4;2 to 4;3 • Clusters • /r/ clusters 3;7 to 5;0 • /l/ clusters 4;7 to 5;0

8. Cross-sectional study of children age 2;0 to 3;0 (Galea, 2008) • Each phoneme was analyzed based on % of children who produced the phoneme accurately • 75% up to 100%: “acquired” • 50% up to 75%: “customary production? • 26% up to 50%: “in acquisition” • 0% up to 15%: “not acquired”

9. Table 11.1 Phonemes and clusters in two groups (2:1 to 2:6 years and 2:7 to 3:0 years) as elicited in a picture naming task

10. Phonological Processes • Yavas (1988) • Southern Brazil • 4;6 • Cluster reduction • Devoicing • 3;6 • Unstressed syllable deletion • Final fricative deletion • Gliding • Liquid substitution • 3;0 • Intervocalic liquid deletion • Backing • 2;6 • Liquid onset deletion

11. Table 11.2 Description of phonological processes in children acquiring Brazilian Portuguese

12. Table 11.2 (cont’d)

13. Table 11.2 (cont’d)

14. Connections Chapter 6: English Chapter 9: Common trends in many languages Chapter 10: French Chapter 12: Korean

15. Concluding Remarks When drawing conclusions about the acquisition of Brazilian Portuguese phonology, dialectal variations should be taken into account In general, children master the sound system by age 7 The last phonological processes to be eliminated involve complex syllable shapes (e.g., CCV and CVC) and the presence of liquids