São Tomean Portuguese
Portuguese dialect of São Tomé and Príncipe / From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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São Toméan Portuguese (Portuguese: português santomense or português de São Tomé) is a dialect of Portuguese spoken in São Tomé and Príncipe.
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São Toméan Portuguese | |
---|---|
português santomense | |
Native speakers | Native speakers: 70,000 (2016)[1] L2 users: 100,000[1] |
Official status | |
Official language in | São Tomé and Príncipe |
Regulated by | Academia São-Tomense de Letras |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-3 | – |
Glottolog | None |
IETF | pt-ST |
It contains many archaic features in pronunciation, vocabulary, grammar, and syntax, similar to Angolan Portuguese. It was once the dialect of the owners of the roças and the middle class, but now it is the dialect of the lower and middle classes, as the upper class often uses modern European Portuguese standard pronunciation, which is now also used by lower and middle classes.
São Tomé is the third country in order of percentage of Portuguese speakers (after Portugal and Brazil), with more than 95% of the population speaking Portuguese, and more than 50% using it as their first language[citation needed]. The rest of the population speaks Portuguese creoles.
The Portuguese language is undeniably the most spoken and promoted language in the archipelago, being spoken by 98.4% of the population, including by official means. However, the variety chosen as target and loaded with social prestige is still European Portuguese, which generates a series of problems, considering that it is a different variety from that current in the everyday life of speakers. So much in São Tomé and Príncipe, varieties of the Portuguese language emerge from the use and also contact with local languages. European Portuguese is mostly spoken in formal situations, in the media, business, education, judicial system and legislature, while Sao Tomean Portuguese and Portuguese Creoles Forro Creole, Principense Creole, and Angolar Creole are preferred for informal situations as a vernacular language in day-to-day life and daily activities, and code switching even occurs between the Creoles, standard European Portuguese, and São Tomean Portuguese in informal speech.