Questions & Answers about O senhor é português e ele não é alto.
Why does "O senhor" mean "you", and why does it use "é" instead of a "you" verb?
In Portugal, o senhor (literally "the sir" or "the gentleman") is a polite, formal way to say "you" to a man. Because it acts like a third-party noun, it uses the "he/she" verb form é instead of the informal "you" form és. Could I just use "você" here instead of "o senhor"?
Grammatically, yes. você also means a formal "you" and uses the same verb é. However, in Portugal, o senhor (for a man) or a senhora (for a woman) is highly preferred because você can sometimes sound a bit too direct or blunt to locals. Where exactly do we put "não" when making a sentence negative?
To say "not" in Portuguese, you simply put não directly in front of the verb you want to negate. In this sentence, it sits right before the second é to create não é (is not). Why is "é" used to mean both "are" and "is" in the English translation?
The verb ser (to be) uses the exact same form, é, for both "he/she" and the formal "you". So, o senhor é translates to "you are", while ele é translates to "he is". What would happen to the words "português" and "alto" if this sentence was about women?
Adjectives must match the gender of the person they describe. If you were talking to a woman and about a woman, the sentence would become: A senhora é portuguesa e ela não é alta. Learn O senhor é português e ele não é alto and more in Portuguese
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