PORTUGUESE DEMONSTRATIVE PRONOUNS

Hello Everybody! This post will discuss some basic topics about Portuguese demonstrative pronouns.

CLICK HERE TO BACK TO THE COURSE'S MENU

We use demonstrative pronouns to explicit the position of a noun or something in relation to others or to the context. This relationship can occur in terms of space, time or speech...

See this image bellow, you can notice some of those relations:

Looking at this image, we can imagine some example for phrases:

"Este livro é meu." [This book is mine]
"Essa caneta é sua." [That pen is yours]
"Aquele quadro negro é nosso." [That blackboard over there is ours]

Maybe you noticed that in Portuguese the demonstrative pronouns must agree in gender and number with the noun the pronoun is related to.

Let's see more details about each one...

Masculine Singular	Masculine Plural	Feminine Singular	Feminine Plural
ESTE	ESTES	ESTA	ESTAS

"ESTE" is translated as "THIS" in English and its plural form "ESTES" is translated as "THESE". "ESTE" and its variations are used to indicate something or someone that is close to the speaker.

Examples:
"Este menino é o meu filho." [This boy is my son.]
"Este cachorrinho é tão fofo!" [This puppy is so cute!]
"Esta maçã é muito gostosa." [This apple is delicious.]
"Estas mesas são caras." [These tables are expensive.]
"Estes são os meus irmãos." [These are my brothers.]

Masculine Singular	Masculine Plural	Feminine Singular	Feminine Plural
ESSE	ESSES	ESSA	ESSAS

"ESSE" is translated as "THAT" in English and its plural form "ESSES" is translated as "THOSE". "ESSE" and its variations are used when something or someone is far from the speaker but close to the listener.

Examples:
"Você vai comer esse bolo?" [Will you eat that cake?]
"Essa bola é minha!" [That ball is mine!]
"Maria, essas são as suas amigas?" [Mary, those are your girlfriends?]
"Esses livros são velhos." [Those books are old.]

Masculine Singular	Masculine Plural	Feminine Singular	Feminine Plural
AQUELE	AQUELES	AQUELA	AQUELAS

"AQUELE" is translated as "THAT OVER THERE" or only "THAT" in English and its plural form "AQUELES" is translated as "THOSE". "AQUELES" and its variations are used to refer to something or someone that are further away from both speaker and listener.

Examples:
"Aquele que está chegando é o João." [That one who is coming is João.]
"Aquela casa está muito longe." [That house is really far.]
"Aqueles homens são elegantes." [Those men are elegant.]
"Aquelas borboletas voando no céu são lindas." [Those butterflies flying on the sky are beautiful.]

ISTO

ISSO

AQUILO

"ISTO" means "THIS THING", "ISSO" means "THAT THING" and "AQUILO" means "THAT THING OVER THERE". They are used when we don't know or when we don't want to use the name of the thing. These demonstrative pronouns do not identify objects (they don’t accompany a noun) and they are used just in the singular form (they NEVER vary). Also we can use them when we want express opinion or ideas. Let's see some examples:

"O que é isso?." [What is that?]
"O que é aquilo?." [What is that thing over there?]
"Isso não é bom." [This is not good.]
"Aquilo parece um OVNI." [That over that seems to be an UFO.]


NOTE:
"ESTE", "ESSE" and "AQUELE" are not used only to refer to the spece. They follow the same logic to refer to time. Suppose we are in the year 2016, see these examples:

"Este ano está sendo bom para nós." [This year is good for us.]
"Quanto a 2015... Esse ano que passou foi razoável." [About 2105... That past year was reasonable]
"Ah 1970! Aquele ano foi terrível para todos." [Ah 1980! That year was terrible for everyone.]


NOTE2:
Maybe this article can be useful for you too: "AQUI", "CÁ", "ALI", "LÁ", "AÍ" IN PORTUGUESE

---