So, you’ve got the game, you’ve got the acrobatics, you’ve got the music (or even if you haven’t and are a keen capoeirista)…what’s next? O linguagem, camara! Alright, so it’s not exactly completely learning Portuguese, and it’s not in exactly six lines, but while we’re on the topic of language (well, tangentially!), I thought I’d throw this little find out there. My friend bookmarked it on her del.icio.us page, and though I haven’t had time to try it out myself yet, it seems promising!
These are the six lines:
The apple is red.
It is John’s apple.
I give John the apple.
We give him the apple.
He gives it to John.
She gives it to him.
or if you prefer something more capoeira-oriented:
The berimbau is brown.
It is John’s berimbau.
I give John the berimbau.
We give him the berimbau.
He gives it to John.
She gives it to him.
The point of the page she posted was that you can give yourself a headstart in learning any language by deconstructing it before you actually start to learn it. After you have translated the above sentences into Portuguese, or asked someone to do it for you, you will have an instant snapshot of many of the basic grammatical rules of the language! That is to say, you will know things like how they arrange subject/verb/object in a sentence, how to use the possessive, plural and singular pronouns, basic verb conjugation, and how to treat direct and indirect objects. After that, you can do the same with negative sentences, and with auxiliary verbs (e.g. “should kick”, “want to play”, “must buy in”), and see how those are put together.
It’s far from perfect, but it’s an interesting way to start, and might make some things easier to catch on to after you start learning for real! If you’re interested, I recommend reading the full post, which has a more thorough explanation and additional tips on learning any language: Click here to go to post
Mandingueira 