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- Topic: Portuguese >
- "Eu como com meu vô."
22 Comments
Yes! For native people it's clearly seen, not the same for non-native. vô has a more closed sound (some linguists say nasal O - like the letter O in foam), and vó a more open sound (like the letter O in more)
No, it's not a nasal o. It's simply more closed (a linguist would say [o]). A nasal o is written õ
@Rozay101Wetter I think I need to point out a little fallacy here: Being a native speaker doesn't mean someone is an expert in all fields of their language. Paulenrique is a native speaker, yes. I'm sure he knows a lot about his language, but what he said was simply wrong.
Now, of course, I am going to provide you with a source: http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/av%C3%B4
Vô is simply a shortening of avô, so the o-sound is the same. Now, if you look, there's a section about the pronunciation. It says there, that in Brazil, this word is generally pronounced /aˈvo/. I will assume that you can't read IPA (if you can, you don't need to read on, everything should be clear now).
Paulenrique was talking about a nasal vowel. In IPA (the stuff between those slashes), nasal vowels are marked with a tilde ~ above it. So if avô (and therefore also vô) had one, it would be written /aˈvõ/. The exact same symbol is also used in Portuguese writing: coração (heart) - corações. Here you have a nasal vowel.
Read more:
don't worry. you are not disagreeig with me, but linguistis by using just few resources...
Or another way to put it, correct me if I'm wrong, ó sounds like the first 'o' in 'obrigado' while ô sounds like the second 'o'.
I had trouble with this at first. For avô, it's kind of like the vowel in "vOte", and for avó, it's kind of like the first syllable of "AWEsome".
760
You need to use the correct accent, because vò means grandmother and vô means grandfather - without the accent you do not know what is meant.
- 347
Nowhere else in any Duolingo course have I come across a question where you'll get marked wrong for omitting an accent. It just warns you.
Nowhere else in any other Duolingo course did I see where the omission of an accent literally could change the meaning of a word. May be that there is... I just don't recall one and I've been around. That said-- I agree with your point-- for beginners especially, demanding every accent be correct makes it quite a cumbersome task.
- 253
I answered Eu como com meu avô, as that is how it sounded to me, and it wss marked wrong. Is this truly incorrect?
grandmother is the mother of your parent and grandfather is the father of your parent. These are not separated into two words by a space.
I though vó or võ was for grandpa or grandma.. And avó was for grandfather or grandmother. I don't get it. I look it up and that's how it's supposed to be. Why does duolingo say its wrong in either way i put it? They can't be both be wrong or both can't be right
- 327
I typed the answer like this (which, by the way, was incorrect): Eu como com meu avo. Is there a grammatical rule that would require dropping the a in avo? Or, did I just not listen to the dialog closely enough?
No. There isn't. This is an informal way to say grandfather, but you have to put the accent(^) in "avo": Avô.
Avô is the actual word, meaning "grandfather". Vô and vovô are 'cute' nicknames, especially used by kids, similar to "grandpa" or "pop pop".
