Adjectives: gender and number agreement

Agreement helps hold a Portuguese phrase together and shows which words belong together. In standard usage, use ✓ uma cerveja gelada (an ice-cold beer), rather than ✗ um cerveja gelado. The good news is that this is one rule with a short list of exceptions, and once it clicks it runs quietly in the background for the rest of your Portuguese. Spoken variation is explained below.

The adjective copies the noun

Portuguese adjectives are copycats. Whatever gender and number the noun is carrying, the adjective picks it up and repeats it back. Adjectives whose masculine form ends in -o have the full set of four:

• o hotel barato (the cheap hotel) · a pousada barata (the cheap guesthouse)

• os hotéis baratos (the cheap hotels) · as pousadas baratas (the cheap guesthouses)

Describing people

• "Minha irmã é muito simpática." (My sister is very friendly.)

• "Meus primos são engraçados." (My cousins are funny.)

• "As crianças estão cansadas." (The children are tired.)

• "Ele é alto e ela é baixa." (He is tall and she is short.)

Shopping and things

• "Comprei duas camisetas brancas." (I bought two white T-shirts.)

• "Esses sapatos são caros demais." (Those shoes are far too expensive.)

• "Essa mala é grande e essa aqui é pequena." (That suitcase is big and this one is small.)

• "Os produtos brasileiros são bons." (Brazilian products are good.)

The noun's gender wins, not its last letter

Problema, dia and mapa end in -a and are all masculine, so the adjective goes masculine too:

• um problema sério (a serious problem) — never séria

• um dia longo (a long day)

muito and pouco freeze in front of an adjective

Before a noun they behave like ordinary adjectives — muitas pessoas (many people), poucos lugares (few places). Propping up another adjective they are adverbs, and adverbs never agree:

• Elas são muito simpáticas. (They are very friendly.) — never muitas simpáticas

• A prova foi muito difícil. (The exam was very hard.)

meio: "half" agrees, "a bit" does not

Meaning "half", meio is an adjective and agrees: meia hora (half an hour), meio quilo (half a kilo). Meaning "a bit", it is an adverb and stays frozen even in front of a feminine adjective:

Plural agreement varies in spoken Brazilian Portuguese. As menina bonita rather than as meninas bonitas is not simply carelessness — it is a variable pattern that sociolinguists have been studying since the 1970s. Lemle and Naro proposed a link between plural marking and how audible the singular/plural contrast is; research associated with Scherre also examines how earlier plural marking affects later marking. Grammar books, exams and formal writing expect standard agreement, which is what this lesson teaches; invariable forms remain unchanged.

Source: SciELO — Revista DELTA.

Pink got a special dispensation from the spelling reform. Colour phrases built on cor de… lost their hyphens — it is cor de laranja now — but cor-de-rosa kept both of its own, because the Academia Brasileira de Letras lists it among the compounds already consagradas pelo uso. People have been arguing about why pink, and only pink, got the exemption ever since.

Source: Dicio.