Personal Pronouns

Pronomes pessoais

In Portuguese language the personal pronouns differ in grammatical person, number and gender.

First person is the speaker: 

singular	Eu = I
plural	Nós = We

Second person is a person to whom someone is speaking:

      

singular	Tu = You	In some Brazilian states they use "Você" instead of "Tu".
plural	Vocês = You	Originally "Vós" but this form is not used anymore (only in some dialects in north of Pt.).

The third is a person not participating in the speech:

singular	Ele = He
	Ela = She	feminine gender
plural	Eles = They
	Elas = They	feminine gender

How to be polite

T–V distinction

Pronouns "Tu" e "Vocês" aren't the only way to address someone. In addition to these familiar forms, there are also polite variants: "o senhor" for man, "a senhora" for woman and in case of more people: "os senhores" and "as senhoras"- if they are all women.

It all depends on to whom we are talking to.

1. With friends and familiars it's common to use "Tu" for singular and "Vocês" for plural.
2. Speaking with people older than us, authority figures such as professors or our boss or with people that we met for the first time it's respectful to use "o senhor", "a senhora".
3. Pronoun "Você" is very used in Brazil instead of "Tu", but in Portugal rarely, however, you can still hear it in Lisbon. People use "Você" when they want to treat people with respect but they don't want to be too polite, for example, shopkeeper talking to a customer.

To compare it with other languages,

-       Modern English does not distinguish T-V forms. Pronoun “You” is used in all cases.

-       In Polish, “O senhor” equivales to “Pan”, “A senhora” to “Pani” and in plural “Panowie” and “Panie”.

-       In Romanian, the word “Dumneavoastră” is used both in singular and in plural and it’s the same for masculine and feminine gender.

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