Spanish Language in the Americas: Origins and Features
The Spanish American Language
With the arrival of the Spanish in 1492, the Spanish language became the common tongue of colonizers and colonized. Although influenced by American Indian languages, the first colonizers were primarily from Extremadura, Andalusia, and the Canary Islands. Many presented typical features of southern dialects, such as lisping, yeísmo, and the aspiration of ‘-s’ in syllable-final position or at the end of words.
Linguistic Features
Phonetic Features
- The lisp: Pronunciation of /s/ and /θ/ as /s/.
- Yeísmo: Pronunciation of ‘yy’ and ‘ll’ as [y].
- Aspiration or loss of ‘-s’: At the end of a syllable or word, this is the most common aspiration, although many cases involve the loss of the /s/ phoneme, as in Andalusian dialects.
- Aspiration of the phoneme [x]: This occurs only in some zones. For example, [agúha] instead of “aguja” (needle).
- Confusion of ‘r’/’l’: In final syllabic or word position, this happens in places like Puerto Rico and Panama. For example, [amá] instead of “amor” (love).
Morphosyntactic Features
- Voseo: The use of the pronoun “vos” instead of “tú”. Areas where this occurs include Chile and Argentina. It should be noted that voseo existed in Spain during the Middle Ages. The form “usted” was the respectful treatment. The pronoun “vosotros” is unknown in Hispano-America; instead, “ustedes” is used.
- Diminutives: Widely used in America, in addition to adjectives with adverbs, with nouns, and even with verb forms: adiocito, corriendito.
- Adverbialization of adjectives: Example: “¡Que te vaya bonito!” instead of “¡Que te vaya bien!”.
- Emphatic structure: Using interrogative adverbs for emphasis. Example: “¿Cuándo tú llegaste?” instead of “¿Cuándo llegaste?”.
Lexical Features
- Common words: There are Spanish words common to America and Spain with different meanings. Example: carro (car).
- Archaic words: In Latin America, some words are current that are considered archaic in Spain. Example: acordar (to wake up).
- New words: Many words have been created due to the influence of English in some zones. Example: closet (closet).
Context
Understanding a text means understanding its components. It is necessary to take into account various linguistic and extralinguistic factors. All these factors are called context. Context is important for producing statements and interpreting their meaning. However, the meaning of a sentence is not only what the speaker explicitly says, but also what the listener implicitly draws from the context.
Classes of Context
- Linguistic Context: Formed by all the words, groups of words, and paragraphs that surround a statement. These categories have anaphoric or cataphoric functions within a text.
- Situational Context: The place and time in which the communicative act occurs, and the physical environment surrounding the interlocutors. Important elements of situational context include gestures and intonation.
- Sociocultural Context: Derived from the social and cultural conditions surrounding the communicative act, meaning the set of prior knowledge, ideas, beliefs, and values shared by the sender and receiver of the message. The principal sociocultural factors are: the relationship between the participants, the existence of shared knowledge and beliefs, and the intention of the issuer, which determines the direction in which a statement is used.