Rules and permission in Brazilian Portuguese

Level A2

Rules and permission in Brazilian Portuguese

At a community centre, you check the rules before an activity. The key distinction is between permission and necessity: pode allows, não pode forbids, tem que requires, and não precisa removes a requirement. You practise a short exchange and explain the rules to a friend.

Actions and words you need

Aqui means “here”; comer, “eat”; ler, “read”; esperar, “wait”; pagar, “pay”. Poder names the verb behind posso (“I can”) and pode (“you can”). You already use it for ability; in these rules it expresses permission. Precisar means “need”: preciso is “I need”, precisa with você is “you need”. Ter que means “have to”.

After these expressions, keep the action in its dictionary form: comer, ler, esperar or pagar. With an action, precisar takes no de in these models. Não before the verb makes it negative. Você addresses one person.

A visitor checks the rules

A is a visitor in the centre’s waiting area; B is a staff member. Reading is allowed, eating is forbidden, and the visitor has to wait here for the activity leader. Listen to the six turns as one exchange. Posso ler aqui? asks “Can I read here?”; Posso comer aqui? asks about eating. Tenho que esperar? asks “Do I have to wait?” The answers concern these rules, not the visitor’s skills.

Allowed or forbidden

Aqui pode ler means “You can read here”: reading is permitted. Aqui não pode comer means “You can’t eat here”: eating is forbidden. In this common way of stating a local rule, there is no expressed person before pode. The template’s ação no infinitivo means an action in its dictionary form.

Aqui pode comer means “You can eat here”. It belongs to the centre’s cafeteria, not its waiting area. Place and context determine the permission. In a personal question, use posso for yourself: Posso comer aqui? English “can” also covers ability, but permission is the meaning here.

Aqui pode / não pode ação no infinitivo

What the rule requires

Você tem que esperar aqui means “You have to wait here”. Tem que goes together before esperar; keep que. With você use tem que; in a question about yourself use tenho que: Tenho que esperar? The personal subject eu (“I”) can be left out of this question.

Ter here is part of ter que, not ownership. These models give you a usable expression; you do not need a full conjugation chart.

Você tem que ação no infinitivo

No obligation is different from a ban

Você não precisa esperar means “You don’t need to wait”: waiting is optional, not forbidden by this statement. Aqui você não precisa pagar means “You don’t have to pay here”. Precisa goes straight before the action; add não before precisa.

Compare the messages: não pode comer forbids eating; não precisa esperar says waiting is unnecessary. English “mustn’t” expresses a ban, while “don’t have to” expresses no obligation. To remove a requirement, practise não precisa; do not replace it with não pode.

Recognize a posted requirement

A sign in this waiting area says Você deve esperar aqui: “You must wait here”. Deve is from dever. The sign states a compulsory rule, so this line has the same practical message as Você tem que esperar aqui. Recognize it as a whole; you do not practise a dever paradigm. Dever has other uses, and this lesson does not give every deve sentence the force of a posted rule.

Pass on the rules, then change the place

Before reading the first three models, tell a friend the waiting-area rules: reading is allowed; eating is forbidden; waiting here is required. Join the three sentences into a short message. Then check and listen.

Now you are in the centre’s cafeteria. Its rules allow eating, and your friend does not need to wait for you. Say both messages with the same familiar actions, then check the last two models. Could your friend hear a ban instead of no obligation? Choose não precisa for an unnecessary action. Remember the four messages: pode allows, não pode forbids, tem que requires, não precisa says there is no need.

Practise this lesson

Next lessons