Listening comprehension? Youtube has you covered

(a shot of the TV Folha newsroom)

Like all fans of Street Smart Brazil, I really love hearing Brazilian Portuguese, and I also love finding new ways to hear it. With the Internet these days, doing so is not so hard but finding a sustained listening experience isn’t always as easy. Over the years, I’ve come across a few means of finding a fix for my needs and I’d like to share them with you.

 

TV Cultura

One Youtube feed I discovered just recently is the TV Cultura channel which, among other things, hosts an interview show called Provocações with presenter Antônio Abujamra. The show, which went on the air in 2000, shows interviews that are interweaved with recited poems and “vozes das ruas” (opinions from people on the street). Abujamra interviews intellectuals, artists, celebrities and even everyday people. Check out his recent interview with Serginho Groisman, presenter of another show, Altas Horas.

[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndrklWsNy8U]

(if Provocações isn’t your thing, try out Repórter Eco, also on TV Cultura)

 

TV Folha

Another Youtube channel I discovered last year is that of TV Folha, part of São Paulo’s Folha newspaper. The format is different, in that it’s news-oriented, and the topics are varied. Below is part of last week’s show, and on their channel you can find many more like it.

[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o6PLB1qcdy0]

 

Globo Rural

While not a channel, there are many videos on Youtube with episodes or segments of Globo Rural which, as its name infers, covers rural topics. I’ve seen only a few but the ones I saw were interesting. Below, you’ll see a segment on Zabé da Loca, a flute player from the northeast.

[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2B17Jnn2XJE]

 

Câmera Record

Like Globo Rural, episodes of the news program Câmera Record can be found simply by typing the name of the program into Youtube and looking at the results. Check out an episode on the “Heroes of Inland Maranhão” below.

[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=636LRNQT7e8]

 

As you can see, there’s tons of content freely available at your fingertips. If you live somewhere with a non-existant Brazilian expat community, at least you can practice your listening comprehension at any time, day or night. But if you’d like to speak better, well, you’ll have to talk to the Street Smart Brazil team for that!

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