Florianopolitan Dialect

The Florianopolitan dialect of Brazilian Portuguese is spoken in the city of Florianopolis. It originated with immigrants from the Azores. Their isolation made the dialect distinct from other varieties of Brazilian Portuguese.

The dialect is not uniform. For example, many older speakers use an alveolar trill for the post-vocalic r, but younger speakers mostly use the glottal fricative /h/. However, the r can also be a uvular trill, velar fricative or uvular fricative.

Unlike in most varieties of Brazilian Portuguese, the s is a voiceless alveopalatal fricative in words such as dois (two), festa (party) and mas (but). The d and t are always plosives and not affricatives before the vowel /i/, as is the case in most of Brazil. Also, word-final l is a velarized lateral and never vocalized, the same as in Portugal.

The r in words such as arte (art), forno (oven) and porta (door) is a glottal fricative for most speakers. In word-final position, it is usually deleted. The exception is if the next word is spoken without a pause and begins with a vowel. The word mar (sea) is pronounced without the r, but in the phrase o mar e o sol (the sea and the sun), the r is pronounced.

The dialect spoken in Florianopolis differs significantly from other varieties of Brazilian Portuguese. Features of the dialect include the velarized lateral, the pronunciation of the s before consonants and at the end of words, and the lack of affrication of the d and t. It is one of the most distinctive dialects of Brazilian Portuguese.