Teaching Portuguese to Spanish Speakers: A Case for Trilingualism

Author(s): Ana M. Carvalho, Juliana Luna Freire and Antonio J. B. da Silva

Source: Hispania, Vol. 93, No. 1 (March 2010), pp. 70-75
Published by: American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/25703395
Accessed: 08-11-2015 04:08 UTC

REFERENCES
Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article:
http://www.jstor.org/stable/25703395?seq=1&cid=pdf-reference#references_tab_contents

You may need to log in to JSTOR to access the linked references.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at http://www.jstor.org/page/
info/about/policies/terms.jsp

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content
in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship.
For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend
access to Hispania.

http://www.jstor.org

This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sun, 08 Nov 2015 04:08:04 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 Teaching Portuguese to Spanish Speakers
A Case for Trilingualism
Ana M. Carvalho
Juliana Luna Freire
Antonio J. B. da Silva
University ofArizona, USA

Keywords: Portuguese, Spanish speakers, acquisition, transfer, teaching, reading

Portuguese is the sixth-most-spoken native language in theworld, with approximately

240,000,000 speakers. It serves as one of the communication languages used by twelve
internationalorganizations (UnitedNations, Organization ofAmerican States, and Latin
American Free Trade Association, for example), is a mandatory language inmember countries
ofMercosul, and is one of the official languages of the SouthAfrican Development Community
(Stock 3-4). Within theUnited States, there is a growing demand forK-12 language programs
to engage the community of Portuguese heritage speakers. According to the2000 U.S. census,
85,000 school-age children speak Portuguese at home. As a result,more than 100 public schools
currentlyofferPortuguese courses (Vicente and Pimenta). In postsecondary education, the2006
Modern Language Association (MLA) report indicated thattheofferingof Portuguese increased
22.4% between 2002 and 2006 (Furman, Goldberg, and Lusin 20). Currently offered in 226
postsecondary institutions, it now ranks thirteenthon the list of themost-taught languages.
Moreover, theNational Security Education Program (NSEP) deems Portuguese a preferred
language, and it is currently taught atU.S. Army and U.S. Air Force military academies.
Given the increasing prominence of Portuguese in theUnited States, we argue that insti
tutions should promote the learning of Portuguese among Spanish-speaking students on their
campuses. In addition,we claim thattheSpanish-speaking population presents specific advantages
and challenges in terms of their acquisition of Portuguese and, therefore, institutionsought to
offer specific courses for these learners. Finally, we suggest thatpedagogical approaches for
thispopulation should emphasize authentic readings and metalinguistic awareness. We believe
that the teaching of Portuguese to Spanish speakers presents an extraordinary opportunity to
help broaden our students' linguistic repertoire and form trilingual individuals, in tunewith the
MLA recommendations thathigher education promote "speakers who have deep translingual
and transcultural competence" ("New Structures" 2) and strengthen"the demand for language
competence within theuniversity" (7).
Enrollment inPortuguese classes has increased substantially since higher education institu
tions began offeringPortuguese courses specifically geared for Spanish speakers. For example,
theUniversity ofArizona, which isattended by a large contingentof heritage speakers of Spanish,
has witnessed a rapid increase inPortuguese enrollment since it started to offer and advertise
Portuguese for Spanish speakers.We urge Portuguese language programs to capitalize on the
linguistic similarities between Spanish and Portuguese by expanding Portuguese offerings for
this population. Teaching Portuguese to Spanish speakers responds to the recent increase in
the demand to teach Portuguese while maximizing the educational opportunities for the broad

AATSP Copyright ? 2010. Hispania 93.1 (2010): 70-75

This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sun, 08 Nov 2015 04:08:04 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 Carvalho et al. /Teaching Portuguese to Spanish Speakers 71

community of Spanish speakers. By adding Portuguese to their linguistic repertoire, students

have access to a broader gamut of professional, intellectual, and personal opportunities.
According to the 2006 U.S. census, there are 44.3 million Hispanics in theUnited States
("ACS Demographics"), of which more than 34 million reported speaking Spanish at home
("Selected Social"). Hispanic students comprised 12% of full-time college students (both un
dergraduate and graduate) in2007, up from 10% in2006, according to theU.S. Census Bureau
("Selected Social"). In addition to studentswho speak Spanish as theirfirst language or heritage
language, thousands of college students acquire Spanish as a foreign language, meaning thata
significantportion of studentsattendingpostsecondary institutionshave Spanish in their linguistic
repertoire, an invaluable national resource.We should capitalize on these students' bilingual
repertoireand build on ittodevelop thirdlanguage (L3) proficiency.The MLAreport particularly
advises institutionsto broaden the range of languages taught,add locally spoken languages to
the curriculum, seek out heritage learners and design a curriculum thatmeets theirneeds, and
encourage heritage speakers to learn additional languages ("New Structures" 8-9).
In order to cater to the Spanish-speaking population, we argue that (1) Portuguese courses
forSpanish speakers should incorporate readings of authentic textsbeginning at the introductory
level; (2) pedagogical materials need to address both the positive and negative crosslinguistic
influences between Portuguese and Spanish; and (3) activities need to emphasize grammatical
accuracy and promote metalinguistic awareness with a goal of helping learners attend to both
congruent and divergent structuralcharacteristics between the languages.
In 2002 Carvalho called for immediate research to provide empirical support for and theo
retical grounding to the development of specific pedagogical techniques for teaching cognate
languages. Since then, three symposia on Portuguese for Spanish speakers have taken place
(at theUniversity ofArizona in2003, StanfordUniversity in 2006, and Universidade Estadual
de Campinas in 2008). Each symposium was followed by the publication of selected papers
(Simoes, Carvalho, andWiedemann; Wiedemann and Scaramucci; Scaramucci and Schlatter)
about classroom interaction, proficiency exams, transferpatterns, program assessment, and
methodological approaches.
Reviewing the contributions to Simoes, Carvalho, andWiedemann (Portuguese for Spa
nish Speakers), the editors stress the following unique features of Spanish-speaking learners of
Portuguese: (1) a high proficiency in receptive skills from the early stages of instruction,(2) a
rapid stabilization of structuralerrorsdue to speakers' ability to communicate meaning at early
stages of learning, (3) a faster learning process, and (4) a beneficial effect of metalinguistic
awareness on the learning of the subtle differences between Portuguese and Spanish (28). The
editors claim that curriculum developers need to consider each of these peculiarities.
In linewith earlier conclusions, Wiedemann reports thatSpanish speakers usually acquire
Portuguese more than twice as fast as English speakers do. Jensen ("Sociolinguistic Variations")
studied the listening comprehension of Portuguese among Spanish speakers with no previous
knowledge of Portuguese and reported that they could understand more than 50% ofwhat was
said. According toHenriques, early reading skills are even more impressive. In her study,na
tive Spanish speakers with no previous knowledge of Portuguese could understand up to 94%
of an academic text in Portuguese. This transparency of meaning is due to a very high level
of lexical similarity between the two languages, estimated to reach 85% (Ulsh; Green). Thus,
we believe that the Spanish speakers' initial ability to read authentic texts in Portuguese that
results from positive transfer should be fully incorporated as a major teaching strategy from
the beginning of instruction.
Linguistic congruence, which allows for a great deal of positive transfer,paradoxically
creates a very strong tendency for negative transferas well (i.e., errors in the target language
that can be traced to influence from previously acquired languages). As Faerch and Kasper
explain, negative transferis a consequence of a cognitive process by which the learner errone

This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sun, 08 Nov 2015 04:08:04 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
72 Hispania 93March 2010

ously perceives a very high possibility of success in transferringfirstlanguage (LI) knowledge

to second language (L2) production and reception.
Several scholars have provided evidence of the role of negative transfer in the acquisition
of Portuguese by Spanish speakers (Jensen "Relative Influence"; Carvalho and da Silva "O
papel"; Cariello). In a discussion of pedagogical strategies for teaching Portuguese to Spanish
speakers, Grannier (57-80) argues thatmaterials developers must keep inmind the need for
activities thatemphasize grammatical accuracy and promote metalinguistic awareness. Others
have also pointed out that the goal should be to lead these learners to attend to both congruent
and divergent structuralcharacteristics between the languages (Leiria, Pinto, and Judice; Jensen
"Sociolinguistic Variations"; Cariello; Judice;Akerberg; Almeida Filho).
In our view, materials developed specifically for teaching Portuguese to Spanish speakers
should draw heavily on Schmidt's ("The Role," "Interlanguage," "Foreign Language") idea
that conscious processes are a necessary, or at least a facilitative, condition for some aspects
of L2 learning ("Attention"). In Schmidt's view, pedagogical interventions thatmake the L2
input salient increase acquisition. Building on and expanding his earlier arguments, Schmidt
concludes thatmere exposure to input is unlikely to be sufficientfor second language acquisi
tion of sometimes opaque or nonsalient linguistic forms. He adds that linguistic awareness
(conscious attention to grammar, for example) plays a role inL2 learning and thatpedagogic
approaches that aim at the explicit teaching of rules (metalinguistic knowledge) may be con
ducive to second language acquisition.
Schmidt's "noticing" hypothesis has motivated a number of studies investigating the role
of attention in the learning of a second language grammar.Adopting itas their theoretical basis,
Carvalho and da Silva ("Cross-Linguistic") present evidence thatmetalinguistic awareness does
assist Spanish-English bilinguals learningPortuguese as an L3 in exercising more control over
the crosslinguistic transferof knowledge between Spanish and Portuguese and, consequently, in
mastering Portuguese grammarmore effectively. In their study,native speakers of English who
learned Spanish in the classroom had higher levels ofmetalinguistic awareness than Spanish
English bilinguals who learned both English and Spanish naturalistically early in their lives;
they also outperformed the latter in their acquisition of Portuguese as theirL3 because native
Spanish speakers more frequentlyattempted to apply Spanish grammatical rules toPortuguese.
Even though both groups benefited from crosslinguistic influence from Spanish, the Spanish
English bilinguals often relied on theirnative intuitions inSpanish, impairing theirperformance
in Portuguese through negative transferfrom Spanish. Although there is still a great deal of
debate about the extent towhich the explicit teaching of grammar helps learners develop L2
competence and improve theirperformance ingenuinely communicative situations (Norris and
Ortega), research indicates thatdirect teaching of grammar assists Spanish-speaking learners to
acquire Portuguese (e.g., Johnson 2004; Carvalho and da Silva; Grannier). Based on thisbody
of research, scholars have repeatedly emphasized the need for pedagogical interventions that
raise learners'metalinguistic awareness of both the congruent and divergent aspects between
Spanish and Portuguese, particularly since most divergent forms are not salient enough to be
noticed and acquired without explicit teaching (e.g., Leiria, Pinto, and Judice; Jensen "Socio
linguisticVariations"; Cariello; Judice;Akerberg; Almeida Filho).
Therefore,when designing a curriculum tailored to theneeds of Spanish speakers, appropri
ate teachingmaterials are a must. Although Portuguese has been taught atU.S.
postsecondary
institutionsfor several decades, teachingmaterials have always been scarce. Portugues Con
tempordneo (Abreu and Rameh) was based on the structuralapproach. When the communica
tive approach became prominent, Travessia: A Video-Based Textbook (Tolman et al.) became
widely used inAmerican universities until Ponto de Encontro (Klobucka et al.) was released.
None of these books caters to the specific needs of studentswho already possess knowledge of
Spanish. Simoes's Com Licenga was the firstbook published in theUnited States that specifi
cally targets Spanish speakers. Recently, Simoes published Pois nao: A Brazilian Portuguese

This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sun, 08 Nov 2015 04:08:04 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 Carvalho et al. /Teaching Portuguese to Spanish Speakers 73

Course for Spanish Speakers with Basic Reference Grammar. Although both volumes contain
several explanations of grammatical differences between Portuguese and Spanish, littleatten
tion is given to authentic readings.
In foreign language teaching in general, authenticmaterials offer a much richer source of
input than textbooks do, and they are intrinsicallymore motivating (Gilmore). Authentic ma
terials are even more essential in the case of Spanish speakers acquiring Portuguese, because
their early advanced reading skills make the gap between authentic and textbook language
unnecessary and counterproductive. Thus, we recommend that textbooks be complemented
by authentic reading materials and a strong emphasis on reading skills. Two sets ofmaterials
based on authentic textsare currentlyavailable: The first, Learning Languages throughCultural
Texts, by Tesser, Pires, and Santos, consists of a series of CD-ROMs with academic presenta
tions and supporting reading materials on different topics of Brazilian culture. The second,
Teaching Portuguese toSpanish Speakers throughReadings, by Carvalho, Luna Freire, and da
Silva, provides authenticmaterials and focuses on the grammatical differences between these
two cognate languages.
In conclusion, the growth in importance of the Portuguese language in theUnited States
forces postsecondary faculty to rethink theirpriorities and recognize the need to expand their
foreign language programs to include Portuguese, particularly for Spanish speakers. Specific
teaching practices and materials can optimize the learning of Portuguese for this group. We
recommend thatmaterials emphasize the reading of authentic texts and be complemented by
activities thathighlight linguistic forms thatdifferbetween Spanish and Portuguese. This ap
proach is ideal for developing Spanish-speaking learners' linguistic competence and enriching
theircultural understanding of Portuguese while maximizing their reading skills inPortuguese
from thevery beginning of instruction. Assuming with De Angelis and Selinker thatall linguistic
systemspresent in the speaker's mind may simultaneously interactand compete in interlanguage
production, we assert that teaching Portuguese to Spanish speakers presents an extraordinary
opportunity to broaden our students' linguistic repertoire, form trilingual individuals, andmeet
the recommendations of theMLA.

WORKS CITED

Abreu, Maria, and Clea Rameh. Portugues contempordneo. Washington, DC: Georgetown UP, 1972.
Print.

Akerberg, Marianne. Aprendizagem de uma lingua proxima: portugues para falantes de espanhol Stock
holm: Stockholms Universitet, 2002. Print.
Almeida Filho, Jose Carlos de. "Uma metodologia especifica para o ensino de linguas proximas?" Por

tugues para estrangeiros: interface com o espanhol. Ed. Jose Carlos de Almeida Filho. Campinas:
Pontes Editores, 1995. 13-21. Print.

Cariello, Graciela. "Escrita e autonomia: o problema das interferencias na escrita de futuros professores
de portugues." Portugues/lingua estrangeira. Leitura, producao e avaliagao de textos. Ed. Norimar
Judice. Niteroi: Intertexto, 2000. 45-54. Print.

Carvalho, Ana Maria. "Portugues para falantes de espanhol: perspectivas de um campo de pesquisa."

Hispania 85.3 (2002): 597-608. Print.

Carvalho, Ana Maria, and Antonio J. Bacelar da Silva. "Cross-Linguistic Influence in L3 Acquisition:
The Case of Spanish-EnglishBilinguals'Acquisition ofPortuguese."Foreign Language Annals 39.2
(2006): 185-202. Print.
?. "O papel do conhecimento nos padroes de transferencia no desenvolvimento da inter
metalinguistico
lingua e suas implicacoes pedagogicas." Portuguese Language Journal 3 (2008): 1-21. Print.

Carvalho, Ana Maria, Juliana Luna Freire, and Antonio J. Bacelar da Silva. "Teaching Portuguese to

Spanish Speakers through Readings." Center for Educational Resources in Culture, Language and

Literacy. CERCLL. Web. June 2009. <www.portspan.cercll.arizona.edu>.

De Angelis, Gessica, and Larry Selinker. "Interlanguage Transfer and Competing Linguistic Systems in
theMultilingualMind." Cross-LinguisticInfluenceinThirdLanguage Acquisition:Psycholinguistic

This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sun, 08 Nov 2015 04:08:04 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 74 Hispania 93March 2010

Perspectives. Ed. Jasone Cenoz, Britta Hufeisen, and Ulrike Jessner. Clevedon: Multilingual Mat
ters, 2001.42-68. Print.
Faerch, Claus, and Gabriele Kasper. "Perspectives on Language Transfer." Linguistics 8 (1987):
Applied
111-36. Print.

Furman, Nelly, David Goldberg, and Natalia Lusin. "Enrollments in Languages Other Than English in
United States Institutions of Higher Education." Modern Language Association. MLA, Fall 2006.
Web. 22April 2009.
Gilmore, Alex. "Authentic Materials and Authenticity in Foreign Language Learning." Language Teaching
40 (2007): 97-118. Print.
Grannier, Daniele M. "Uma proposta heterodoxa para o ensino de portugues a falantes de espanhol."

Portuguespara estrangeiros: perspectivas de quern ensina. Ed. Norimar Judice. Niteroi: Intertexto,
2000. 57-80. Print.

Green, J.N. "Spanish." The Romance Languages. Ed. M. Harris and N. Vincent. London: Croom Helm,
1989. 79-130. Print.

Henriques, Eunice. R. "Intercompreensao de texto escrito por falantes nativos de portugues e de espanhol."
D.E.L.T.A 16.2 (2000): 263-95. Print.
Jensen,JohnB. "On theMutual Intelligibility
of Spanish and Portuguese."Hispania. 72 (1989): 848-52.
Print.
?. "The Relative Influence of Spanish and English in the Portuguese Writing of Bilingual Students."
Portugues para falantes de espanhol. Portuguese for Spanish Speakers. Ed. R. M. Simoes, A. M.
Carvalho, and L. Wiedmann. Campinas: Pontes Editores, 2004. 67-82. Print.
?. Variations in Portuguese: to Spanish Presentation. Annual
"Sociolinguistic Challenge Speakers."
Congress of the American Association of Teachers of Spanish and Portuguese. Denver, CO, August
1999. Lecture.

Johnson, K. "What is a Spanish Speaker?" Portuges para falantes de Espanhol. Ed. A. R. M. Simoes, A.
M. Carvalho, and L. Wiedmann. Campinas, Sao Paolo: Pontes Editores, 2004. 49-66. Print.
Judice, Norimar. Portugues para estrangeiros. Perspectivas de quern ensina. Niteroi: Intertexto, 2000.
Print.

Klobucka, Anna, et al. Ponto de encontro. Upper Saddle River: Prentice Hall, 2008. Print.

Leiria, Isabel, Paulo F. Pinto, andNormiar N. Judice. "Falemos antes de4 verdadeiros amigos."' Para acabar
de vez com tordesilhas. Ed. Paulo F. Pinto and Norimar Judice. Lisbon: Colibri, 1998. Print.
Modern Language Association. "Foreign Languages and Higher Education: New Structures for a Changed
World." Modern Languages Association. MLA, May 2007. Web. 22 Apr. 2009.
?.
"Report to the Teagle Foundation on the Undergraduate
Major in Language and Literature." Modern

Language Association. MLA, Feb. 2009. Web. 10Apr. 2009.

National Security Educational Program. "NSEP Preferred Countries." National Educational
Security
Program. Web. 15 July 2009.

Norris, John, and Lourdes "Effectiveness

Ortega. of L2 Instruction: A Research Synthesis and Quantita
tive Meta-Analysis." Language Learning 50 (2000): 417-528. Print.
Scaramucci, Matilde V. R., and Margarete Schlatter. Portugues para falantes de espanhol. Ensino e

aquisigao. Portuguese for Spanish Speakers. Teaching and Acquisition. Campinas: Pontes Editores.
In press.

Schmidt, Richard. "Attention." Cognition and Second Language Instruction. Ed. Peter Robinson. Cam

bridge:CambridgeUP, 2001. 3-32. Print.

?, ed. "Consciousness and Foreign Language Learning: A Tutorial on the Role of Attention and Aware
ness in Learning." Attention and Awareness inForeign Honolulu:
Language Learning. University
of Hawaii, Second Language Teaching and Curriculum Center, 1995. 1-63. Print.
?. "Consciousness, and Interlanguage Ed. Gabriele
Learning, Pragmatics." Interlanguage Pragmatics.
Kasper and Shoshana Blum-Kulka. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1993. 21-42. Print.
?. "TheRole ofConsciousness inSecond Language Learning."AppliedLinguistics 11.2 (1990): 129-58.
Print.

Simoes, Antonio R. M. Com licenga. Austin: U of Texas P, 1992. Print.

?. Pois nao: A Brazilian Course for Spanish Speakers with Basic Grammar. Austin:
Portuguese Reference
UofTexasP,2009. Print.

Simoes, Antonio R. M., Ana Maria Carvalho, and Lyris Wiedemann. Portugues parafalantes de espanhol.

Portuguese for Spanish Speakers. Campinas: Pontes Editores, 2004. Print.

This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sun, 08 Nov 2015 04:08:04 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions
 Carvalho et al. /Teaching Portuguese to Spanish Speakers 75

Stock, Maria Jose. "Lengua portuguesa: perspectivas para el siglo XXI." Expolingua. es. ExpoLingua?XVI

Congreso muestra international, Madrid, Feb. 2003. Web.

Tesser, Carmen, Alessandra Pires, and Regina Santos. Learning Languages through Cultural Texts: A

Project of thePortuguese School atMiddlebury College Funded byNEH and FLAD. Middlebury:
Middlebury College, 2006. CD.
Tolman, Jon, et al. Travessia: A Video-Based Textbook. Washington, DC: Georgetown UP, 1988. Print.
Ulsh, J. L. From Spanish to Portuguese. Washington, DC: Foreign Service Institute, 1971. Print.
United States Census Bureau. "ACS Demographics and Housing Estimates: 2006." American Community

Survey. U.S. Census Bureau, 2006. Web. 8 Aug 2009. <http://factfinder.census.gov>.

?. "Selected Social Characteristics in the United States: 2007." United States Census Bureau. Web. 11

April 2009. <http://factfinder.census.gov>.

?. "U.S. Census Bureau, 2000." United States Census Bureau. Web. 8 July 09. <http://factfinder.census.

org>.
Vicente, Antonio Luis, and Margarida Pimenta. Promoqao da lingua portuguesa no mundo. Lisbon:
Fundacao Luso-Americana. 2008. Print.

Wiedemann, Lyris. "Portuguese for Spanish Speakers?What Research Tells Us." Annual Meeting of
theAmericanAssociation ofTeachers of Spanish and Portuguese.Albuquerque, NM, July18,2009.
Lecture.

Wiedemann, Lyris, and Matilde V. R. Scaramucci, eds. Portugues para falantes de espanhol. Ensino e

aquisigao. Portuguese for Spanish Speakers. Teaching and Acquisition. Campinas: Pontes Editores,
2008. Print.

This content downloaded from 128.197.26.12 on Sun, 08 Nov 2015 04:08:04 UTC
All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions