The Portuguese personal pronouns and possessives display a higher degree of inflection than other parts of speech. Personal pronouns have distinct forms according to whether they stand for a subject (nominative), a direct object (accusative), an indirect object (dative), or a reflexive object. Several pronouns further have special forms used after prepositions.
The possessive pronouns are the same as the possessive adjectives, but each is inflected to express the grammatical person of the possessor and the grammatical gender of the possessed.
Pronoun use displays considerable variation with register and dialect, with particularly pronounced differences between the most colloquial varieties of European Portuguese and Brazilian Portuguese.
Subject, object, and complement
Basic forms The personal pronouns of Portuguese have three basic forms: subject, object (object of a verb), and prepositional (object of a preposition). number person subject object of verb object of preposition singular 1st eu me mim 2nd tu te ti 3rd ele, ela, você o, a1; lhe2; se3 ele, ela; si3 plural 1st nós nos nós 2nd vós vos vós 3rd eles, elas, vocês os, as1; lhes2; se3 eles, elas; si3
1 direct object (masculine and feminine) 2 indirect object 3 reflexive or reciprocal, direct or indirect object
Subject pronouns
Forms of address Like most European languages, Portuguese has different words for "you", according to the degree of formality that the speaker wishes to show towards the addressee (T-V distinction). In very broad terms, tu, você (both meaning singular "you") and vocês (plural "you") are used in informal situations, while in formal contexts o senhor, a senhora, os senhores and as senhoras (masculine singular, feminine singular, masculine plural, and feminine plural "you", respectively) are preferred. However, there is considerable regional variation in the use of these terms, and more specific forms of address are sometimes employed.
Generally speaking, tu is the familiar form of address used with family, friends, and minors. Você indicates distance without deference, and tends to be used between people who are, roughly, social equals. O senhor / a senhora (literally "the sir / the madam") are the most ceremonious forms of address. English speakers may find the latter construction akin to the parliamentary convention of referring to fellow legislators in the third person (as "my colleague", "the gentleman", "the member", etc.), although the level of formality conveyed by o senhor is not as great. In fact, variants of o senhor and a senhora with more nuanced meanings such as titles as o professor ("the professor"), o doutor ("the doctor"), o colega ("the colleague") and o pai ("the father") are also employed as personal pronouns. In the plural, there are two main levels of politeness, the informal vocês or vós and the formal os senhores / as senhoras.
This threefold scheme is, however, complicated by regional and social variation. For example, in many communities of Brazilian Portuguese speakers, the traditional tu/você distinction has been lost, and the previously formal você tends to replace the familiar tu in most cases (the distinction remains, however, in most parts of the country). On the other hand, in Portugal it is common to use a person's own name as a pronoun more or less equivalent to você, e.g., o José, o senhor Silva, which is rare in Brazil (though it is found in parts of the Northeast region, for example). The explicit use of "você" may be discouraged in Portugal because it may sound too informal for many situations. In Mozambique, however, the use of the imperative neutralizes the forms of the 2nd person singular (tu) and (você/senhor). Thus, forms of the imperative with features [+ informal] associated with the pronoun [- informal] (você/senhor) are observable. Also if find shapes with features [+ formal] associated with the pronoun [- formal] (tu)
When addressing older people or hierarchical superiors, modern BP speakers often replace você/tu and vocês with the expressions o(s) senhor(es) and a(s) senhora(s), which also require third-person verb forms and third-person reflexive/possessive pronouns (or, for the possessive, the expressions de vocês, do senhor, etc.). The expressions o(s) senhor(es) and a(s) senhora(s) are also used in formal contexts in modern EP, in addition to a large number of similar pronominalized nouns that vary according to the person who is being addressed, e.g. a menina, o pai, a mãe, o engenheiro, o doutor, etc.
Historically, você derives from vossa mercê ("your mercy" or "your grace") via the intermediate forms vossemecê and vosmecê.
Nós vs. a gente A common colloquial alternative to the first-person-plural pronoun nós "we" is the noun phrase a gente (literally meaning "the people"), which formally takes verbs and possessives of the third person singular (or the expression "da gente"). Although avoided in the most formal registers, it is not considered incorrect, unless it is accompanied by verbs conjugated in the first person plural, as in "*A gente moramos na cidade", instead of the normative "A gente mora na cidade" "We live in the city".
Vós In nearly all Portuguese dialects and registers, the second-person plural subject pronoun vós is usually replaced by vocês and in many cases it is no longer in use, as is the case with its corresponding verb forms. Currently, vós (with its verb forms) is frequently employed only in the following contexts: In some dialects of northern Portugal (i.e., in the colloquial spoken language). In some forms of address (e.g. Vossa Senhoria, Vossa Santidade...) In religious texts and services. In old texts. In formal registers being used as a singular second-person pronoun, for archaism. In historical fiction.
For this reason, many associate the pronoun with solemnity or formality, not knowing that vós is used for plural in the same context as tu is used for singular.
Instead, the word vocês is used, or equivalent forms of address which take verbs and possessives of the third-person plural. In European Portuguese, however, object vos as well as convosco (but not prepositional vós) and vosso have survived, even in formal situations; see the "Forms of address" section, above, and also the notes on colloquial usage, at the bottom of the page.
Object pronouns
Proclisis, enclisis, and mesoclisis As in other Romance languages, object pronouns are clitics, which must come next to a verb, and are pronounced together with it as a unit. They may appear before the verb (proclisis, lhe dizer), after the verb, linked to it with a hyphen (enclisis, dizer-lhe), or, more rarely, within the verb, between its stem and its desinence (mesoclisis, dir-lhe-ei).
Enclisis and mesoclisis may entail some historically motivated changes of verb endings and/or pronouns, e.g. cantar + o (originally *lo, from Latin illum) = cantá-lo "to sing it". The direct and indirect object pronouns can be contracted, as in dar + lhe + os = dar-lhos "to give them to him"; cf. Spanish dar + le + los = dárselos.
comprá-lo-ei = comprarei (Late Latin comparāre habeō, two words) + o "I will buy it". dar-to-ia = daria (dare habēbam) + te + o "I would give it to you". dar-lho-ia = daria + lhe + o "I would give it to him".
When a verb conjugated in the 1st person plural, ending in -s, is followed by the enclitic pronoun nos or vos, the s is dropped: Vamo-nos [vamos + nos] embora amanhã ("We are leaving tomorrow"), Respeitemo-nos [respeitemos + nos] mutuamente ("Let's respect each other"), Vemo-vos [vemos + vos] ("We see you"), etc.
Allomorphs Third person direct object clitic pronouns have several forms, depending on their position with relation to the verb and on the verb's ending. If the pronoun is enclitic and the verb ends with a consonant, or if the pronoun is mesoclitic and the root of the verb ends with a consonant, then that consonant is elided, and an l is added to the beginning of the pronoun. If the pronoun is enclitic and the verb ends with a nasal diphthong (spelled -ão, -am, -em, -ém, -êm, -õe, or -õem), an n is added to the beginning of the pronoun. The same happens after other clitic pronouns, and after the adverbial particle eis. default after a consonant (-r, -s, -z) after a nasal diphthong (-m) o lo no a la na os los nos as las nas
The third person forms o, a, os, and as may present the variants lo, la, los, las, no, na, nos, and nas: The variants lo, la, los, and las are used after verbal forms ending with a consonant, which is elided. Examples: seduz + a = sedu-la, faz + o = fá-lo, diz + o = di-lo, destróis + os = destrói-los (different from destrói-os, in which the verb is conjugated in the imperative mood), comes + a = come-la (different from come-a = come + a), apanha-las (apanhas + as), amá-lo (amar +o), fazê-lo (fazer + o), partire-lo (partires +o), tem-la (tens + a—the n changes to m). Exceptionally, quer + o gives quere-o, rather than *qué-lo (qué-lo is still permitted, but uncommon). This also occurs when the pronoun is in mesoclitic position: matá-lo-ás (matarás + o), fá-lo-ias (farias + o), feri-lo-ias (feririas + o), comê-lo-ias (comerias + o). The variants no, na, nos and nas are used after a verbal form ending with a nasal diphthong. Examples: põe-no (põe + o), tem-na (tem + a), comeram-nos (ambiguous, can mean comeram + os "they ate them", or comeram + nos "they ate us"). The pronouns o, etc. present the same forms as above when they follow other clitic pronouns, such as nos and vos, or the adverbial particle eis. Examples: ei-lo aqui (eis + o), deram-no-lo (deram + nos + o), "Não vo-lo [vos + o] quero dar a entender."
Contractions between clitic pronouns indirect object direct object o a os as me mo ma mos mas te to ta tos tas lhe, lhes lho lha lhos lhas nos no-lo no-la no-los no-las vos vo-lo vo-la vo-los vo-las
The contraction for lhes + o is lho, not *lhe-lo or *lhos. This occurs because lhe used to be employed indistinctly for the singular and the plural and, while the agglutinated form suffered no alteration, lhe evolved into lhes for the plural number.
These contracted forms are rarely encountered in modern Brazilian usage.
Syntax Apart from the pronouns that act as subjects of a sentence, and from the stressed object pronouns which are employed after prepositions, Portuguese has several clitic object pronouns used with nonprepositional verbs, or as indirect objects. These can appear before the verb as separate words, as in ela me ama ("she loves me"), or appended to the verb after the tense/person inflection, as in ele amou-a ("he loved her") or ele deu-lhe o livro ("he gave her/him the book"). Note that Portuguese spelling rules (like those of French) require a hyphen between the verb and the enclitic pronoun.
In West Iberian-Romance, the position of clitic object pronouns with respect to the verbs which govern them was flexible, but all Romance languages have since adopted a more strict syntax. The usual pattern is for clitics to precede the verb; e.g. Sp. Yo te amo, Fr. Je t'aime "I love you"; Fr. Tu m'avais dit "You had told me" (proclisis). The opposite order occurs only with the imperative: Sp. Dime, Fr. Dis-moi "Tell me" (enclisis). Spoken Brazilian Portuguese has taken more or less the same route, except that clitics usually appear between the auxiliary verb and the main verb in compound tenses, and proclisis is even more generalized: Eu te amo "I love you", but Me diz "Tell me", and Você tinha me dito "You had told me".