Carioca

Carioca (Portuguese pronunciation: [kaɾiˈɔkɐ] listen (help·info)) is a Portuguese adjective or demonym word that refers to the metropolitan area of the city of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The original word "Kara'i oca" comes from the indigenous Amerindian language of the Tupi people, meaning "White Man's House".

It is said that the first Portuguese dwellings in Rio de Janeiro were placed along a limpid stream, which soon got the Portuguese name "Carioca". The last PNAD (National Research for Sample of Domiciles) census numbers for the state of Rio de Janeiro are: 6,278,704 White people (53.6%), 3,935,904 Pardo people (33.6%), 1,440,822 Black people (12.3%) and 58,000 Asian or Amerindian people (0.5%).^[1] Cariocas, like other Brazilians, speak Portuguese.

According to a survey published in American Scientist Magazine, the Cariocas of Rio de Janeiro exhibited great friendliness and offered to help in various situations. A quote from the article mentioned pointed to the following :^[2]

In contrast, the demonym meaning for the state of Rio de Janeiro is fluminense, taken from the Latin word "flumen", meaning "River".

Carioca Dialect

This section requires expansion.

The variety of Brazilian Portuguese language spoken in the city of Rio de Janeiro is called "Carioca". In written form, the Carioca accent follows the standard Brazilian Portuguese influence. On the other hand, this speech has several distinctive traits, such as in the pronunciation of final "s": it becomes the postalveolar /ʃ/. Guttural R can be a velar [x], a uvular [χ] or a glottal [h]. Also, the consonants t and d before i or unstressed e /ɪ/ become affricatives /t͡ʃ / and /d͡ʒ/.

There are some grammar divergences in colloquial speech, an important difference is the mixing of the second person pronoun "você" and the obliquous pronoun "te" in the same speech, while standard Portuguese requires "lhe" as obliquous for "você", and "te" as obliquous for "tu". In very informal Carioca speech, the pronoun tu is retained, but with the verb forms belonging to the form você: "Tu foi na festa?" (Did you go to the party?). However, this usage is considered slangy and is avoided by many speakers.

The slightly different variety of Brazilian Portuguese language spoken in the remainder of the state of Rio de Janeiro is called "Fluminense". The so called chiado (pronouncing /ʃ/ instead of [s]), typical of the city of Rio, is absent in the Southwestern varieties of Fluminense (around Paraty, Barra Mansa and Volta Redonda). In the Northern varieties of Fluminense (from the city of Niterói northwards), usage similar to the Capixaba accent may be observed. For instance, the article is most likely dropped before personal names (using Maria where Cariocas would say a Maria) and with certain words such as papai, mamãe, fulano (de papai instead of do papai; por mamãe instead of pela mamãe; com fulano instead of com o fulano). Around Campos, rhotacism is common in informal usage (Cráudia for Cláudia), as well as some words from the nearby Capixaba dialect, such as pocar for explodir (to explode) or pocar fora for ir embora (to go away).

Slang words from Rio de Janeiro include caraca! (gosh!) [now spread throughout Brazil], e aê? and coé? (whuzzup?), and maneiro and sinistro (both in the sense of "awesome"), some of these slang words can be found in other regions of Brazil.

See also

• Caipira
• Gaucho
• Carcamano

References