Southern Spanish Dialects and ‘Los Santos Inocentes’ Analysis
Critique of ‘Los Santos Inocentes’ by Miguel Delibes
The novel expresses concern over the world, social problems, and the abuse by the nobility. It combines traditional realism with modernism. The novel is a synthesis of Delibes’ art. In this work, a trait is evident that often goes unnoticed in other novels by Delibes: it conceals an enormous individual and social violence. This violence, according to Delibes, is not merely his personal obsession, but rather the REALITY he describes. The novel admirably and originally denounces misery and injustice through its narrative construction and the richness and authenticity of its language.
The work is centered on a large estate in Extremadura, vividly portraying the alternation between the selfishness of the nobles and the misery of the laborers and servants, who are depicted as authentic serfs. These characters shape the titular ‘innocents’ in the novel. It is structured into six distinct books, though in reality, it functions as a single, cohesive narrative. Its original typological arrangement, particularly its unique punctuation, makes the book a challenging read for unaccustomed readers.
Southern Spanish Dialects: An Overview
Southern Spanish dialects are characterized by their more evolved pronunciation and very marked phonetic features. These include the Castilian spoken from Toledo to La Mancha, Extremadura, Murcia, Andalusia, the Canary Islands, and Spanish America. Within this broad area are the Andalusian dialect, which served as a point of departure for Spanish in the Canary Islands and America, as well as the dialects of Extremadura and Murcia. These are often called ‘transition dialects’: Extremaduran (with Leonese, Castilian, and Andalusian features), Murcian (with Aragonese, Catalan, and southern features), and Canarian (with influences from Western Andalusian and American Spanish).
Main Phonetic Features of Southern Varieties
- Relaxation or Loss of Final ‘s’: Relaxation of syllable-final and word-final ‘s’, producing an aspirated consonant (e.g., avihpa), which can lead to the assimilation of the following consonant (avippa) or the complete loss of the ‘s’ (avipa).
- Vowel Opening for Plural: When the final ‘s’ of a word is lost, the preceding vowel is pronounced more openly to indicate the plural: ojo (singular) vs. oje (plural).
The Andalusian Dialect
Andalusian speech is among the most differentiated in Southern Spain. It has an eastern area, which tends to open word-final vowels due to the loss of final ‘s’ (e.g., oje instead of ojos), and a western one, where such opening does not occur, but rather the vosotros form is replaced by ustedes.
Another defining feature of the Andalusian dialect is the distinction between seseo and ceceo zones. The areas closest to the coast are typically ceceante, whereas the intermediate zone is seseante. In northern and parts of eastern Andalusia, the distinction between ‘s’ and ‘z’ is maintained.
Lexical differences also exist between the eastern and western areas for the same object: panocha / mazorca (‘corn cob’); candela / lumbre (‘fire, flame’).
The Extremaduran Dialect
Perhaps the most characteristic aspect of Extremaduran is the aspiration of ‘j’ (or ‘h’ from Latin ‘f’), with the devoicing this entails, and yeísmo. Both in morphosyntax and lexicon, Leonese influences are mixed, such as the diminutive suffixes -ino, -ina: chiquinino. It also conserves Castilian words that have been lost in other dialects: e.g., alfiler (‘pin, stinger’), bici (‘manure’ – highly regional).
The Murcian Dialect
Murcian presents a set of features common to southern dialects, along with Aragonese influences, such as the diminutive suffixes -ico, -iqui: pajarico, ratiquio. It also includes Aragonese and Catalan lexical items like pescatero (‘fishmonger’), cocote (‘nape of the neck’), flamarada (‘flash, blaze’), llengua (‘tongue, language’), and other archaic Castilian and Arabic words.
The Canarian Dialect
Canarian Spanish exhibits many southern features, especially seseo and the aspiration of ‘s’. Similar to eastern Andalusia, the vosotros form has been lost, replaced by ustedes for the second person plural verb conjugation.
Its lexicon includes Portuguese words: mill (‘corn’), canoto (‘lefty’); Americanisms: papa (‘potato’), guagua (‘urban bus’); Guanchismos: gofio (‘prepared cornmeal’), baifo (‘young goat’); and some archaic Castilian words no longer used in the peninsula: descubierto (‘uncovered, bareheaded’).
Characteristics of American Spanish
Main traits of American Spanish:
- Phonetics: Many features match those of Southern Hispanic dialects, especially Andalusian: seseo, yeísmo, aspiration or loss of final ‘s’, and the confusion of ‘r’ and ‘l’.
- Morphosyntax: Voseo (the use of vos as the second person singular), the use of the simple past perfect instead of the compound past perfect, frequent use of diminutives, and adverbialization of adjectives.
- Lexicon: This is one of the factors that most reflects the dialectal variation of Spanish in America: use of archaic words, and the use of neologisms.