o/a

[radiolibre]

I've seen in several places where before proper names in Portuguese we use o/a (e.g. O Paolo vem para a festa.). My question is, is the first "o" before Paolo a formality or is it still used?

 

[MOC]

At least in Portugal it's (almost) always used. I can't recall any time where I heard someone saying just "Paulo vem à festa". Actually this last sentence it's a order being given to Paulo, meaning "Come to the Party", while the sentence you posted means "Paulo is coming to the party". "o" is the article. Like you would say "The cat is in front of me" we would say "O gato está à minha frente", we would also say "O Paulo está à minha frente". It would be the equivalent to saying "(The) Paulo is in front of me".

At least in Portugal try to think you should use the "the" also for person names, "o" if it's male, and "a" if it's female.

 

[Outsider]

I've seen in several places where before proper names in Portuguese we use o/a (e.g. O Paulo vem para a festa.). My question is, is the first "o" before Paulo a formality or is it still used?

It's widely used, on almost all dialects (except for some Brazilian ones), and it's not a formality. On the contrary, omitting the definite article before people's names sounds more formal than using it, to most people.

 

[Vanda]

You can read more about it here .

 

[radiolibre]

Thanks guys. From that link I'm getting the idea that in Brazil use of the article is more of a dialectical question, though grammatically correct.