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Slang that came but hasn't gone

Slang that came but hasn't gone

posted on February 24, 2011

Often there are Portuguese words you may not hear all the time and as such, you may put less effort into memorizing them. Sometimes the word in question seems scientific in nature and other times the word may be less formal and have some history to it. The latter are usually from the 60’s, 70’s and even 80’s, and classified as “something my (grand)parents would say”, which isn’t to say they still aren’t useful. Here are a few for you which you may come across every once in a while (in rough order from most used to least, IMO).

Barato – a slang term that was created in the beginning of the 1970’s, as a counterculture term to signify a high from marijuana or LSD. Gradually, it came to mean ‘cool’.

Pombas! or Raios! or Putz grila! – Expressions that denote surprise or indignation (‘putz’ is still used).

Lenga-lenga or Lero-lero – Chit-chat, idle chatter, small talk, baloney, nonsense (sometimes written without hyphen).

Toró – heavy rain (used in the Amazon region, for example).

Mandar brasa – to continue, to go ahead.

Sanduba (m) – Sandwich.

Broto – a young person or young attractive female (currently can mean a personal-sized pizza).

Supimpa – cool, great.

Many old slang words, however, have not fallen out of popular use. Some examples of “gírias antigas” (old slang terms) which are still frequently used are bacana (cool), bicho (friend), cafona (out of style), jóia (cool, great), and sacou? (got it?).

If slang terms interest you, I recommend taking a look at this site, though it’s in Portuguese.

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About Adam Lee

Adam is a writer and a researcher who has studied Brazilian culture for over a decade and created several Brazil-themed blogs going back to 2008. Having taught himself Portuguese, he put it to practical use by spending three years doing Brazil on a budget (and living in favelas), from Rio de Janeiro to the Amazon.

He now resides in Lisbon, Portugal, developing a startup and dreaming about having a beachside B&B in the Northeast of Brazil.

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