“Me dá” or “dá-me”: which is correct in Portuguese?

In Brazil, “give me” is usually me dá, with the pronoun first: me dá meu cachorro! In Portugal the normal form is dá-me, with the pronoun after the verb and a hyphen: dá-me o meu cão! Both are correct where they’re used, and the word order is one of the quickest clues to where a speaker is from. Me ajuda vs ajuda-me (“help me”) works the same way.

Brazilian school grammar says you shouldn’t start a sentence with a pronoun, but everyday speech does it all the time. To Brazilian ears, dá-me sounds formal or Portuguese. Here a girl angrily demands her dog back: me dá meu cachorro, isso não é brincadeira! (“give me my dog, this isn’t a joke!”).