Verbs: The Present Indicative

So far, we have been concentrating on verbs in the present tense (also known as the ‘present indicative’), and we are going to stick with it for a little bit longer.  As in English, Portuguese tends to use the present tense only when we are referring to actions that are ongoing, or customary.  For more literal explanations of what is happening at the present moment, we usually employ what is known as a ‘progressive’ tense, making use of a compound verb form.

To give you an example of what I am on about, we might say ‘I work here’.  This is the literal present tense, but denotes an ongoing or customary action.  If we wanted to refer to what is happening at this very moment, we would perhaps say ‘I am working here’ (which, strictly speaking, is not in the present tense). A literal translation of ‘I am working here’ would be ‘eu estou a trabalhar aqui’ or the Brazilian equivalent: ‘eu estou trabalhando aqui’ - so whilst we are still referring to the present, these forms are not present indicative.

Just before we carry on, let me tell you about some word contractions.  The word ‘em’, which can mean ‘in’ or ‘on’, depending on the context, can be merged with the definite or indefinite article to form a single word.  Just prefix the definite or indefinite article with the letter ‘n’, for example:  em + a = na (in or on the…); em + uma = numa (in or on a…).  So to say ‘I live in a house’, instead of translating in full: ‘Eu moro em uma casa’, you can just say ‘Moro numa casa.’

Comments

some mistakes Written by lasara on 2006-06-10 00:08:06 IP: 85.241.114.218 Hi  I hope you don't mind my correcting you.  Assistes alguma coisa? is not the some as 'are you watching anything?'  In fact this is not even something we would say.  Suppose that you come home and find your friend in a room,the television on. If you want to know if she/he is watching something you should ask'estas a ver /a assistir/ alguma coisa/a alguma coisa/ never ves/assistes alguma coisa.  There is something else you might find interesting. It is true that you will find in Portuguese grammars things like 'falarei com o Luis esa noite' or 'beberei um copo de água'.But you will never,never hear a portuguese talking like this. What we say is 'vou falar com o Luis esta noite' or 'vou beber um copo de agua'...  I hope you find this helpful.As a learner   of the English language I also would like to now how it really works. In fact if you could tell me of any site where I can find the different uses of 'would' and 'was going to'   it would be wonderful.  good luck for your site

Corrections Written by Administrator on 2006-06-10 09:35:59 IP: 80.3.128.8 Thank you Lasara - I don't mind you correcting me at all, in fact I welcome it! Thank you for your clarifications - I have amended the text in various places in an effort to convey greater accuracy in line with your comments.    I'm afraid I'm not really familiar with any sites that teach English, however 'would' is almost always used in the same context as the Portuguese conditional tense, and 'was going to' + verb is the same as saying 'ia' + verb.

to thank you Written by Lasara on 2006-06-11 21:32:45 IP: 85.241.125.211 Hi,  I only want to thank you for having answered my comment.When I wrote it I only called your attention to the mistake you had made,but of course, that doesn't mean that you don't have a good knowledge of the Portuguese language.You do know a lot and are vey accurate in many things.  The problem is,grammars can sometimes be misleading, since they often forget to account for the way people really talk.  If you want to improve your knowledge about Portuguese, there's a book that might interest you."Melo,Maria Adelaide Magalhães,Português coloquial para estrangeiros,porto,Asa."  I don't know anything about the book,but I think she is a professor at the Porto university.  Again good luck for you and your site and congratulations for your knowledge of Portuguese language

This is great! Written by Denice on 2007-02-02 07:30:54 IP: 68.42.65.167 I am a French major, but my mom was a voice major, so we always had 501 verb books and random dictionaries lying around. I have always been known for my quickness at Latin based languages, and always loved Portuguese because I could read it and understand it from my knowledge of French, but with my offhand knowledge of Spanish and Italian I could hear it and understand it. Now, I am trying to help my friend with Portuguese, and this site is a life saver! Merci beaucoup! Et si vous avez les questions de Francais, vous pouvez me poser! Tchau!

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