The discovery of Brazil and its subsequent colonization represents a unique cultural and linguistic situation. In the 16th century, Brazil was a multilingual territory inhabited by native Indian tribes who used for their communication hundreds of different native languages. Portuguese language was used only as a language of colonizers. 

In order to advance the colonization and to use natural resources, the need for a new workforce appeared. This was provided by import of African slaves. As the language of the colonizers was Portuguese, their goal was to set this language as a language of the newly conquered territories. That is why they tried to prevent the arrival of other languages, which could complicate a control of the colony. With the arrival of the massive amount of slaves, it was necessary to take certain measures to prevent the arrival of African languages. These measures were taken right in African ports. The colonizers selected slaves in the way to put the members of different cultures and languages in the same ship. So they could not understand each other. During the long journey to Brazil those slaves had to create an artificial language to be able to communicate with each other. Therefore, after arriving in Brazil, it was much easier for them to learn the language of the colonizers. Africans have gradually learnt spoken Portuguese. 

In the 17th century, due to the communication needs with native people, a General language based on the characteristics of the Portuguese and Tupinambá language was created. This language was used to simplify the communication between Portuguese colonizers and native tribes. The Jesuits used this language to spread Christianity and education among native people. This step did not meet with understanding of Marques Pombal, who, in the 18th century forbade the use of the General language and declared the Portuguese as the official language of the Brazilian colony. In the beginning of the 19th century, the Portuguese began to consolidate its position. One of the main reasons for this consolidation was the arrival of the Portuguese royal family, who settled in Rio de Janeiro. The period of reformations, whose goal to provide education in the national language, started. In this period there were two forms of Portuguese. The spoken Portuguese, which was spread during the colonization by Africans throughout the Brazilian territory and the literary Portuguese, which was used only by higher social class who had access to education. The difference between these two forms of Portuguese causes difficulties in the classification of the Brazilian Portuguese and its norm.