Reforms of Portuguese Orthography - Portuguese Orthography Vs. Brazilian Orthography

Portuguese Orthography Vs. Brazilian Orthography

Brazil was never consulted about the orthographic reform of 1911, and so it did not adopt it. In the decades which followed, negotiations were held between representatives of Brazil and Portugal, with the intent of agreeing on a uniform orthography for Portuguese, but progress was slow. In 1931, Portugal and Brazil finally signed an orthographic agreement, on the basis of which Brazil established its own official orthography, in 1938.

Soon after, however, it became apparent that there were differences between the spellings being used in the two countries. Even though both were based on the same general principles, phonetic differences between European Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese had led to divergent spellings in some cases. Various attempts were made in the remainder of the 20th century to bring the two orthographies closer to each other, sometimes with modest success, other times without success. To this day, they do not coincide completely.