Why is Italian more popular than Portuguese?

[Cainntear]

When I think of Italian culture, I can think of many examples: art, history, food, inventions...When I try to think of culture related to Portuguese, I can't think of many examples.

Or in other words, most of us already have a lot of "headspace" devoted to Italy, so it seems psychologically like a pretty big deal even though politically and economically it isn't actually that noteworthy.

I think it's because our country is very new compared to the others. And learn Italian, Spanish or French gives you more feedback than learning portuguese without mention that portuguse is just spoken for a few countries in Africa besides Portugal and Brazil.

Portugal has existed since the 12th century (minus a 60-year period where they were ruled as part of Spain), so I'm assuming you're Brazilian. Brazil was recognised internationally in 1825, so it's quite a young country. However, Italy didn't exist as a country until 1861, so it is younger still.
Italian is also similarly limited, but it no longer holds official status in former colonies, so is less widespread than Portuguese.

As such, I hold that the biggest difference is that we have heads full of pasta, pizza, classical art, opera etc that just make Italy seem "bigger" in a sense.

[Theodisce]

Italian is a recognized language in the humanities and people who do their research on, for example, antiquity should have at least good reading knowledge of it.* It does not mean that there are no scholarly works published in Portuguese, but the fact is that the language does not enjoy the same amount of prestige as Italian in the academic circles.


*In the ideal world one would be able to read all the research papers published in any language, be it German, Portuguese or Croatian. Recently I saw a book dealing with the medieval Portuguese history. The book was published by a Portuguese scholar in Portugal, but its language was French. Scholars whose native languages lack this recognition in the academia often publish in a more established language (today mostly English, but German and French are not uncommon. There seem to be little non native scholarly writing in Italian, at least in my filed, but many Italians continue to publish in their native language and the public is excepted to be able to read those books and papers).

[Cavesa]

The academical prestige and importance of the language for culture is one huge factor.

Another reason, at least in Europe: Portugal is a more distant travelling desctination than Italy for vast majority of the continent.

And its economy is known to not be in a good condition, that is another point.

Of course Portuguese is still a nice choice that can enrich one's life immensely. But it simply makes sense, why it is in general less popular.

[outcast]

It doesn't take a fusion reactor scientist (rockets seem to be getting easier now, so I'm changing the phrase! lol), to see there are two major reasons people learn a language:

1. economic, this includes lingua franca needs, applies mainly to English, and people moving to another country. There are plenty of examples where people move to a country for a job that requires English and they can spend years in this country without really learning much at all of the local tongue. Also people that move to ethnic neighborhoods and stay there may spend many years without learning the language outside their small area.

2. allure, the culture of the language, the sound of the language, the music and literature of the language, etc, attracts you.

Italy is Italy. I don't have to explain the things about it that people around the world find alluring. And they have been mentioned here. They have an accumulated 3 millennia of stuff to show the world, so there is something for everyone. And even if there is NOTHING you find interesting about it, there are still people who want to learn the language because of how it SOUNDS alone! So it even gets points there.

You see the same thing with Korean, why suddenly the rush to learn it (myself included, but with an *asterisk)? How many logs here start with "I am going to learn Korean because I want to understand Korean soaps, or that K-pop band's lyrics?"
(*I wasn't into any Korean stuff before learning it, I started only because of friendships I have made with Koreans... thus for me it is different)

The same thing above applies to Japanese (even more so in the 80s and 90s).

Why do so many people that like to read great works or stuff about science and philosophy then go on to learn German and Russian?

Take Spanish, with so many options... Yet in this forum and HTLAL, I've have seen not an insignificant number of Spanish learners say they want to learn the Argentine dialect. Two or three for sure in our forum (the names escape me now!), and in the old forum I also remember a Croatian member who was an outright expert in Rioplatense (which would be a more precise definition and includes all of Uruguay, but actually NOT half of Argentina). At first I am asking myself "why?" Because if you are in Europe, peninsular Spanish will be the one you will encounter most and if you are in North America Mexican Spanish would be far more useful (and even though those two remain the most LEARNED forms of Spanish with good reasons). Or why not Colombian, or Venezuelan? (countries with similar population numbers)

"Because it sounds really nice"... And that trumped usefulness. Others because they wanted to read Borges, Cortázar, Sábato, Victoria Ocampo. Some here because they listened to the prolific history of Argentine popular music: tango, nueva canción folk, the large number of good Argentine rock and pop bands. And yet others because of the good films, or tv shows, whatever.. The point is, cultural power does matter whether we are aware of it or not (with English we are most certainly aware of it). And all of the above examples show that it does influence our decisions. Almost no one would have wanted to learn Korean 30 years ago.

Brazil has a massive culture, and that along with Brazil's rise in the last 15 years (takeaway the last 2 years since that does not erase the trend since 2000), means Portuguese has seen in increase in interest. I have seen this myself in Miami, where in CERTAIN spots Portuguese signs replaced Spanish. And groups to learn Portuguese multiplied. So it is changing.

Ultimately, the comparison with Italian is unfair, IMHO. Put almost any other language in place of Portuguese on the title thread, and the same equation would hold. So I would submit to look at it the other way around: there is nothing wrong with Portuguese, it is Italian that is special.

[Spoonary]

Well, life changed and now I speak Spanish and a decent amount of Italian. I can understand virtually everything in Portuguese though, having watched lots of Youtube videos in the language, and I even own the new Spanish-based Brazilian Assimil course. I still haven't picked it up, however, primarily because of a lack of other resources and fear of mixing it up with Italian.

I have nothing to add to the discussion, but this paragraph is so similar to my situation, it's scary.*

I studied Brazilian Portuguese at university for 2 years (these were low level classes, nothing inpressive) and had great fun with it. I chose it over Italian at the time because I knew I would learn Italian one day and wanted to try something else. When I came back from my year abroad, though, I couldn't wait any more so I dived into Italian instead of continuing with Portuguese. I still watch videos in Portuguese on youtube quite regularly, but I don't do anything else for fear of mixing it up with Spanish or Italian. I'm sure it would be brilliant to be able to chat away with Brazilians, but I wouldn't want to push aside Spanish or Italian for it, and I'm satisfied being able to understand the language.

*Well, I don't have the assimil course, but you know what I mean.

[reineke]

THE IMPORTANCE OF THE STUDY OF THE PORTUGUESE LANGUAGE
John Casper Branner
Hispania Vol. 2, No. 2

"The word "importance" is used here entirely in relation to commercial, diplomatic and other international transactions.

Unfortunately, most of our people have the erroneous idea that the language of all South America is Spanish; and if perchance some of us have heard that Portuguese is the language of one of those countries, we seem disposed to think that any country of that continent using any other language than Spanish is negligible, or, on a pinch, that Spanish will do just as well, or that there must be some way to do business without bothering about the language....

The leading merchants of Brazil are men of good breeding, and, though they would never say it themselves, they resent doing business with persons who speak their language as if they had no respect for it or for the users of it. It is worth while, also, to insist upon the importance of proper instruction in connection with any study the beginner may undertake. The much advertised, short-cut methods and the without-the-grammar and without-a-teacher methods are all delusions.

So far as the Portuguese language itself is concerned, fortunately it has much to offer those who study it for something more than its uses for business purposes. The literature is not so extensive as the French, Italian, or Spanish, but it is worthy of the respectful attention of all scholars..."

1919.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/331111?seq ... b_contents

I have read something similar about foreign languages (and particularly German French etc) being irrelevant to Americans. If memory serves me right, the paper was written also around 1912.

[Luso]

Portugal has existed since the 12th century (minus a 60-year period where they were ruled as part of Spain)

Actually the part of having been ruled as a part of Spain is not true. It was a personal union, which meant that the King of both countries was the same person, but everything else was kept separated. This is not as superficial or as trivial as it looks. For instance, the governors of all the cities and overseas possessions were always nationals of the country that was the original owner. When the Restoration War took place, all Portuguese possessions had Portuguese commanders and garrisons, and all declared their allegiance to the Portuguese claimant. Had it all been ruled as a single country, the situation could have been very different (and, given the extension of both empires, hugely complicated).

I know this is off-topic, but I thought it worth mentioning.

[YtownPolyglot]

In the area where I live, there are lots and lots of Italian-Americans. Most of them seem to know little more than kitchen vocabulary and swear words, but Italian has the second-largest enrollment at the university after Spanish. French is being phased out. I was able to take some inexpensive night courses locally offered by an Italian-American organization.

On the other hand, there is no visible Portuguese or Brazilian expatriate community here. I know of no classes in Portuguese offered here. The situation may be different in places where it's easier to find such people.

So I have invested in some books and recordings. I'm doing some self-teaching and I've met a few nice Brazilians on Facebook. However, not all language learners are willing to go to that trouble.

[kujichagulia]

I'm not sure if this adds to the discussion, but also here in Japan Italian seems to be a more popular language to learn than Portuguese. When Japanese people want to learn a European language other than English, the usual suspects come up: French, Spanish, German, Italian. Even Russian is somewhat popular, and if you consider it a European language, Turkish is also popular to a lesser extent. What hardly comes up? Portuguese. This despite the fact that there is a large group of immigrants in Japan that come from Brazil, especially in the area in and east of the city of Nagoya. I'd say that there are more native Portuguese-speaking immigrants here than those of other European languages (although English and Spanish might rival that). Yet you can find Japanese-language materials to learn French, Spanish, German, Italian, etc., but Portuguese textbooks in Japanese are really hard to find.

I'm not sure exactly why that is the case, because to me, learning Portuguese in order to communicate with Brazilians right here in Japan should be an interesting option for some people. There are a lot of stores in the Nagoya area where Portuguese is spoken. I'm only guessing, but I think the reason people don't really learn Portuguese here is that:
(a) Almost all the Brazilian immigrants here are Japanese-Brazilian, and I think there is the expectation that, because they are ethnically Japanese, they should just drop Portuguese and learn to speak Japanese. Perhaps people look at them and wonder, "You look just like me. Why aren't you speaking Japanese?" My Japanese-American friends have had that problem, so I wonder if it's the case with Japanese-Brazilians as well.
(b) Here in Japan, there's the same allure for European countries like Italy that other countries have. People dream of going to Italy, France, Spain, Germany, the U.S., etc. While Portugal is becoming more popular, it's not up there with those other countries, and Brazil doesn't often come up when discussing where to travel to. (One reason is that it's so dang far! From Japan, you have to transfer in the U.S.)

[JacobT]

Thanks to all for shedding light on this subject. I guess it makes sense that Italy has been exporting its culture for centuries, whereas the Portuguese-speaking world has been comparatively insular until recently. I am surprised, however, that Italian (and even Turkish, for that matter) is more popular than Portuguese in Japan... I always thought that Portuguese was more widely studied there than in the US, but that just reveals my ignorance I guess...

Italy is a wonderful country with an incredible history and culture, but it seems that, from an economic standpoint, there isn't much advantage to learning the language. As the numbers go, Brazil and other Portuguese-speaking countries don't carry more weight than Italy, but internet circles often tout Portuguese as "the language of the future". Of course, as some of you point out, economic considerations are not the main reason that many choose to study languages... Italian, after all, offers its musicality and a whole supply of literature, art and culinary delights. I thought Italy was a fantastic place, so much so that I traveled there twice. That said, I'm sure if I had continued with Portuguese, as I originally intended, I might have felt the same way about Brazil.

Since I started Italian with the intention of later learning Portuguese, I've had to reassess my reasons and priorities at several points along the way. Portuguese is spoken here in Florida, albeit mostly by tourists, whereas Italian is not. It has been challenging, at times, to keep focused on Italian when I hear Portuguese spoken around me. Dropping Portuguese, however, was a pragmatic choice based on a relative lack of resources and concern about mixing languages (for whatever reason, Italian has not affected my Spanish at all the way that Portuguese did). The irony is, between Spanish, Italian and my previous exposure to Portuguese, I can somehow manage a conversation in the language whenever the opportunity comes up.

When it comes to the US and tourism, I admit that my view of the importance of Portuguese may be a bit skewed simply because Orlando is such a popular theme park destination. Without generalizing too much, it seems that many Brazilians love Disney World. Living in Colorado, however, I virtually never heard the language spoken. While there are a lot of Portuguese-language reviews on TripAdvisor for our national parks, especially the Grand Canyon and Yosemite, I've rarely ever heard the language while traveling in those places. I guess in that regard, Italian wins