Spanish dialects in Latin America BY PROFESSOR TONY ARTIGAS
The Spanish of America is the set of
linguistic varieties of Spanish spoken on the American continent and makes up
90% of the Spanish speakers on the planet. However, Spanish-speaking America is
not a monolingual territory. The countries that comprise it often use two or
more languages that coexist with Spanish. The origin of these languages is very
diverse; there are Creole varieties of Spanish (Palenquero and Colombian) and
English, as well as mixed modalities and territories that preserve other
European languages, as is the case of German in southern Chile.
However, Spanish is the main tool of
communication and has very similar characteristics to the dialects of southern
Spain, specifically the linguistic variety of Andalusia and the Canary Islands.
Unlike these, English borrowings are much more frequent, there is a strong
influence of indigenous languages and there are particular regional idiomatic
expressions.
Establishing a classification of the
dialectal varieties of Latin America can be quite complex, especially
considering that numerous classifications have already been made based on
phonetic features, on combinations of phonetic and morphological features, on
lexical selections and on origin.
All of them have two basic problems: the
lack of exhaustive descriptions of many areas and countries and the disregard
of diastratic varieties (differences between social groups). For this reason,
researchers have opted for detailed linguistic descriptions of each country.
We can say, however, that there are a
number of general characteristics that most American Spanish speakers share,
among them:
Seseo: c and z are pronounced the same.
Voseo: use of the form "vos" for
the second person singular pronoun "tú".
Yeísmo: there is no difference between the
sound ll (/ʎ/) and y (/j/).
It should be remembered that, just as Spain
has a great variety of dialects, each Latin American country also boasts a
large number of variations within the same national territory. This only
complicates the task of dialectal classification and the enumeration of their
common characteristics.
Although in this article we cannot describe
in detail the myriad of dialects existing in Latin America, we can attempt to
generalize about notable Latin American dialects:
Characteristics
of Mexican Spanish (Mexican dialect)
We can observe chaedizal vowels. That is,
in unstressed and interconsonant position, vowels tend to be pronounced weakly,
if not disappearing directly.
The vowel is pronounced sonorously in all
positions.
Consonantal groups such as -ct-, -pt-,
-bst- are pronounced clearly.
Seseo. The phoneme θ (za, ce, ci, zo, zu)
does not exist as such.
The treatment system is similar to that of
some Andalusian speeches: tuteo in the second person singular and usteo
(ustedes) in the second person plural, replacing the pronoun vosotros
completely.
Use of the pronoun le as an intensifier, as
in expressions such as ándele.
Use of Americanisms and Mexicanisms. In
Mexico, the verb platicar stands out as a synonym of hablar or conversar.
Borrowings from the Nahuatl language,
native in part of the Mexican territory, are frequently heard.
Characteristics
of Chilean Spanish (Chilean dialect)
Medium-high pitch intonation; cadence with
higher frequencies.
Weakening of the intervocalic d and in
final position.
As in Andalusian, there is a tendency to
aspirate the ese in syllable final position.
Palatalized pronunciation of the j, k and
g. For example, instead of saying cheese, they pronounce it similar to
"quieso"; instead of saying fig tree, they usually pronounce it
"higuiera".
The j tends to weaken, and is pronounced
weakly.
Alternation of "tuteo" and
"voseo".
Common queísmo and dequeísmo.
Use of lexical andinisms.
Lexical influence of Mapuche and Quechua
languages.
Alternative verb conjugation of the second
person plural ending in -i. For example: instead of tú eres, in colloquial
Chilean Spanish it is very common to say tú eri. This extends beyond the
present indicative, since in the imperfect tense we can also find forms such as
tú cantabai instead of the standard tú cantabas.
Characteristics
of Argentinian Spanish (Argentine dialect)
Characteristic intonation due to Italian
influence.
Tendency to marked lengthening of stressed
vowels.
Seseo.
Depalatalization of the ñ. For example, the
word bañar is pronounced as "baniar".
Aspiration of s at the end of syllables.
There is a tendency to eliminate consonants
at the end of the word.
Very characteristic pronunciation of the ll
sound.
Voseo with its own verbal paradigm.
Re- prefix with intensifying value.
Lexical Americanisms.
Use of Argentinisms.
Italian lexicon due to linguistic
contamination.
Use of lunfardo, Argentine slang.
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