So, this article is the result of me seeing a bunch of my students getting the two concepts mixed up all the time. And that’s not their fault, it’s the English inside their head LOL 😡. Because both American and British English have different meanings for vacation and holiday.
In Brazilian Portuguese, we could compare férias to vacation in American English, and feriado to holiday. But what I going to do here is detach the English-to-Portuguese translation and give you definitions and when to use each case. Let’s start with férias!
Férias
Fériasare the period of time (usually one month in Brazil) when people can be away from work or school.So, paid vacation for workers, summer break, spring break they are all
férias.férias pagas → paid vacation
férias de verão → summer break
férias de primavera → spring breakBUT, and this is a big BUT, Brazilian schools don’t have
férias de primavera. We do haveférias de invernoandférias de verão, but we call them justférias, and that’s it!For students, they have
fériasin July (summer), and January (winter), and for us that’s justférias. So, when someone still in school says:Tô de férias!, this means I am on school break.For workers, they have
fériaswhenever their employer and they have agreed on. By law, employees have the right toférias pagasfor at least one month of the year. And again, that’s justférias!
Let’s see a few examples:
O quê? Tão saindo de férias?
What? Are you guys going on vacation?
O Mário vai entrar de férias.
Mário is going on vacation.
Foi ideia sua aprender uma língua nas nossas férias.
It was your idea to learn a language on our vacation.
É por isso que chamam de férias.
That’s why they call it a vacation.
Eu tenho um mês de férias, vou aproveitar bastante.
I have one month of vacation. I’ll make the most of it.
Ela foi passar as férias na Itália, que chique!
She went to Italy on vacation, how fancy!
A few examples of it in the sense of a school break!
Estas férias, meus pais voltaram a morar juntos .
This summer break, my parents got back together.
Meus filhos tão de férias. Tão quase pra me deixar doido.
My children are on summer break. They are almost driving me crazy.
Feriado
Now,
feriadois the easiest of all, because that's usually just one day when an important date is celebrated. Like Independence Day, Thanksgiving, etc. People get off work or school on these days.Brazil is mostly a Catholic country, so there are several
feriadosdedicated to important Catholic dates. In some areas of Brazil, people even call those datesdias santos(lit. holy days).We also have many
feriados nacionais(national holidays), such as:April 21 → Tiradentes’s Day (a national hero fighting for Independence from Portugal)
September 09 → Independence Day (Brazil got free of Portugal reins)
November 15 → Proclamation of the Republic of Brazil (Brazil becomes an Republic)
Dia 15 de novembro é um feriado nacional. É a Proclamação da República do Brasil.
November 15th is a national holiday. It’s the Proclamation of the Republic of Brazil.
O Dia de Finados é um feriado internacional.
All Souls Day is a international holiday.
Existem muitos feriados no Brasil.
There are many holidays in Brazil.
Então eu nunca tive esse feriado besta, sabe?
So, I never had this silly holiday, you know?
A gente passou o feriado na praia.
We spent the holiday at the beach.
Hoje não teve aula, porque é feriado municipal.
There were no classes today because it’s a city holiday.
O Dia das Crianças é o meu feriado favorito.
Children’s Day is my favorite holiday.
Ela é agnóstica e não gosta de feriados religiosos.
She is agnostic and doesn’t like religious holidays.
You should now have a pretty good grasp of when to use each one. So no more confusion allowed. Now, it’s time to test your knowledge to see if you really understood the sentences. Te vejo no próximo post!