Much has been said and is said about the new reform in the Portuguese language. Some are in favor, but as it turns out, most are against. There is a personal crisis in the face of the spelling change: how am I going to write and read differently? How am I going to learn something that I already take for granted and that is now wrong? How am I going to teach my kids to speak if the pronunciation is different?
Some of these thoughts about the spelling agreement are wrong, especially the last question! It is important to know that the way words are pronounced remains the same, as does vocabulary and syntax (the organization of terms in the sentence).
Regarding the time to know what is right and wrong with the new law, on 09/29/08 by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva, a decree that establishes some norms during the transitional period for the new spelling, which began on January 1, 2009 and will until December, 31st, 2012*. During this time, the previous and predicted spellings will coexist.
This decree number 6583 had the participation of those who contacted the Ministry of Education until September/08 through an e-mail available on the website of this federal agency. Through this contact, any citizen could make suggestions to be incorporated into the transitional decree and also clarify doubts about the new spelling law.
The orthographic reform was to take effect since 1990, however, only three countries had signed the amending protocol of the Orthographic Agreement: Brazil, Cape Verde and Portugal. In July 2004 there was a ratification of the same, which regulated the agreement of only three countries on the orthographic reform so that it could take effect.
According to the Ministry of Education, the orthographic agreement aims to simplify and improve the language in all countries of the Portuguese community. In addition, the government may reinforce cooperation agreements between Portuguese-speaking countries, such as expanding the teaching agreement with East Timor, for example.
According to education minister Fernando Haddad, textbooks will be replaced by others updated with the new spelling rules. The intention is that in 2010 students from 1st to 5th grade will have the new teaching materials, followed by the 6th to 9th grade in 2011 and high school in 2012.
Every change process requires adaptation and there are positive and negative factors. However, this agreement will certainly bring the unification of the CLP (Community of Portuguese-speaking countries) and, therefore, more union. Culture will be valued through new Portuguese bibliographies that can now be used, for example.
We must think about reform from the positive side, from the sense of unity and cooperation it brings. We are not depriving ourselves of our dialect, on the contrary, we are approaching our language brothers and excluding the cultural barriers that exist between the countries that have Portuguese as their official language, which are not few: Angola, Mozambique, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, São Tomé and Príncipe, East Timor, Brazil and Portugal.
*The mandatory term of the New Agreement has been postponed to January 1, 2016.
By Sabrina Vilarinho
Graduated in Letters
Brazil School Team
See more!
General considerations - And Portugal in this story, how will it be?
Orthographic Agreement - Grammar - Brazil School
Source: Brazil School - https://brasilescola.uol.com.br/acordo-ortografico/acordo-ortografico-lingua-portuguesa-1.htm