Is Portuguese Pod any good at teaching Portuguese culture? I think that Portuguese Pod 101 not only does a terrific job at teaching the Portuguese language but also introduces Portuguese learners to a new culture. This is really important when learning a language because it’s not just about learning words, there are expressions and vocabulary that can’t be translated to our own languages because sometimes it doesn’t exist or makes sense in our reality.
On Portuguese Pod101, in the Audio Lesson section at Introduction there is a season called “Culture Class: Holidays in Brazil” where many topics are mentioned regarding the culture of the country you are studying about, in this case Brazil. As mentioned, Portuguese Pod does favour Brazilian Portuguese so it’s apt that it mentions more about their culture.
Cultural topics such as New Year’s Day, Christmas, Easter, Our Lady Aparecida and the most Brazillian topic ever, Carnival are mentioned.
If we take the topic about Carnival. Here an English native speaker will make an introduction about the festival while a native Portuguese speaker will translate some key words once in a while so your vocabulary can grow while listening to interesting facts about Brazil. This a very interesting way to know more about the culture and this way you learn more about the people and their rituals.
Portuguese Pod will help you in a way no other language learning website does. You’ll learn about the most important holidays in Brazil and how they are celebrated. Do you know which are the 25 most important holidays celebrated in Brazil? No? Portuguese Pod 101 will teach you and you’ll not just learn about it in English in a boring way. You’ll even learn some words and get the chance to grow your Portuguese vocabulary.
As a student of languages one of the most interesting parts about the whole process of learning a language is in understanding the culture, and since Brazil is such a rich country in history and festivities this is also one of the most fun things to learn about. At the moment Portuguese Pod 101 has very little on the culture in Portugal but I’m sure that this will change soon.