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Caipira

Caipira (in English, "hillbilly", or "country people") is a Brazilian Portuguese term used to designate inhabitants of rural, remote areas of some Brazilian states---It refers to the people of lesser schooling. It can be considered pejorative when used to describe others, but it can also be used as a self-identifier without negative connotations. It often carries the connotation of an uneducated (at times naïve or even stupid) person, and someone who can't speak proper Portuguese. In festas juninas it is traditional in some areas for people who are not considered as such to dress up as stereotypical Caipiras.

By extension, it is also used as a name for a dialect or group of dialects of Portuguese spoken in the states of São Paulo and neighboring areas in Mato Grosso do Sul, Goiás, the south of Minas Gerais, and part of Paraná.

Characteristics

Although the caipira dialect originated in São Paulo, the current language in São Paulo City, capital of the state of São Paulo, is a very different variety close to standard Portuguese, albeit with large Italian-influenced elements. Caipira is spoken mostly in the countryside.

Phonetically, the most important differences in comparison with standard Portuguese are the approximant "r", and the absence of the palatal "l", written "lh" in Portuguese, which in caipira is pronounced like a consonant "i." The "l" is frequently modified into "r". There are other important changes, as in the following examples:

Standard Brazilian Portuguese		Caipira Portuguese		English
Spelling	Pronunciation (IPA)	Pronunciation spelling	Pronunciation (IPA)	English
Flor	[floɾ]	Frô	[fɾo]	Flower
Falso	[ˈfaʊ̯sʊ]	Farso	[ˈfaɹsʊ]	False
Melhor	[meˈʎɔɾ]	Mió	[miˈjɔ]	Better
Voar	[vʊˈaɾ]	Avuá	[avʊˈa]	To fly
Você	[voˈse]	Ocê	[oˈse]	You
Ganhamos	[gɜ̃ˈɲɜ̃mʊs] or [gɜ̃ˈɲɜ̃mʊʃ]	Ganhemo	[gɜ̃ˈɲɛmʊ]	We won
Voltamos	[vou̯ˈtɜ̃mʊs] or [vou̯ˈtɜ̃mʊʃ]	Vortemo	[voɹˈtɛmʊ]	We came back

There are some significant differences in caipira morphology and syntax. For example:

The negative adverb não has distinct strong and weak forms, não [nɐ̃ʊ̯̃] in short replies, and num [nʊ̃ⁿ] for negative phrases.
In plural forms only the article or pronoun is inflected, and the adjective often remains uninflected, e.g.: standard Portuguese: essas coisas bonitas "those beautiful things" (that-PL beautiful-PL thing-PL) ↔ caipira: essas coisa bonita (that-PL beautiful-SING thing-SING).

Despite these differences, a speaker of standard Portuguese has no great difficulty understanding caipira.

Like other Portuguese dialects in Brazil, caipira has never been considered a separate language. It has no significant tradition in literature, nor a definite standard for spelling and it is considered as a coloquial mode of Portuguese.