Caribbean Spanish

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Spanish language
A manuscript of the Cantar de mio Cid, 13th century
Overview
Pronunciation stress Orthography Names
History
Old Middle Influences
Grammar
Determiners Nouns gender Pronouns personal object Adjectives Prepositions Verbs conjugation irregular verbs
Dialects
Andalusian Andean Argentine Belizean Bolivian Canarian Caribbean Central American Chilean Colombian Costa Rican Cuban Dominican Ecuadorian Equatoguinean Guatemalan Honduran Mexican Murcian New Mexican Nicaraguan Paraguay Panamanian Peninsular Peruvian Philippine status Puerto Rican Rioplatense Saharan Salvadoran Standard Uruguayan Venezuelan
Dialectology
Seseo Yeísmo Voseo Leísmo Loísmo
Interlanguages
Llanito Jopara Judaeo-Spanish Portuñol Spanglish Castrapo Creoles Roquetas Pidgin Chavacano or Chabacano Palenquero or Palenque
Teaching
Hispanism RAE Instituto Cervantes
v t e

Caribbean Spanish (Spanish: español caribeño, [espaˈɲol kaɾiˈβeɲo]) is the general name of the Spanish dialects spoken in the Caribbean region. The Spanish language was introduced to the Caribbean in 1492 with the voyages of Christopher Columbus. It resembles the Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands, and, more distantly, the Spanish of western Andalusia. With more than 25 million speakers, Spanish is the most widely spoken language in the Caribbean Islands.

More precisely, the term in its strictest sense however refers to the Spanish language as it is spoken on the Caribbean island nations of Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico. In a much looser sense, it can also include the Caribbean coasts of Panama, Colombia, and Venezuela; and on the widest application of the phrase, it includes the Caribbean coastal regions of Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Costa Rica.

Phonology

• Seseo, where /θ/ and /s/ merge to /s/, as in the rest of the Americas, in the Canary Islands and in southern Spain.
• Yeísmo, where /ʎ/ and /ʝ/ merge to /ʝ/, as in many other Spanish dialects.
• /s/ is debuccalized to [h] at the end of syllables, as is common in the southern half of Spain, the Canaries and much of Spanish America: los amigos [lo(h) aˈmiɣo(h)] ('the friends'), dos [ˈdo(h)] ('two').^[1] It may also be elided entirely. Syllable-final [s] is always or mostly pronounced in formal speech, like TV broadcasts.
• Syllable-initial /s/ is also sporadically debuccalized in unstressed syllables, although this process is documented only in certain areas, such as parts of Puerto Rico: cinco centavos [ˈsiŋkohenˈtaβo], la semana pasada [laheˈmanapaˈsaða].
• As a reaction to the stigmatization of s-debuccalization and elision, hypercorrections are frequent. For example, speakers may say catorces año for catorce años '14 years'. These hypercorrections are called hablar fisno 'speaking finely', with an extra, hypercorrect 's'.^[2]
• /x/ pronounced [h], as is common in Andalusia, the Canary Islands and various parts of South America.
• Occasional lenition of /tʃ/ to [ʃ] mucho [ˈmutʃo]→[ˈmuʃo], as in part of Andalusia or in Chile.
• Word-final /n/ is realized as a
  velar nasal [ŋ] (velarization). It can be elided, with backwards nasalization
  of the preceding vowel: [pan]→[pã]; as in part of Andalusia.
• Deletion of intervocalic and word final /d/, as in many Spanish dialects: cansado [kanˈsao] ('tired'), nada [ˈnaða]→[na] ('nothing'), and perdido [peɾˈði.o] ('lost'), mitad [miˈtað]→[miˈta]
• Syllable final 'r' has a variety of realisations:
  1. lambdacism
     /ɾ/→[l] porque [ˈpoɾke]→[ˈpolke]
  2. deletion of /ɾ/ hablar [aˈβlaɾ]→[aˈβla]
  3. assimilation to following consonant, causing gemination. carne [ˈkaɾne]→[ˈkanːe], verde [ˈbeɾðe]→[ˈbedːe]. Most notable of Spanish spoken in and around Havana.
  4. /ɹ/ is a common realization in the middle and upper classes in Puerto Rico under the influence of English.
  5. vocalization of /ɾ/ to /i/ hacer [aˈseɾ]→[aˈsej] in the Cibao region of the Dominican Republic.
  6. aspiration
     /ɾ/→[h] carne [ˈkaɾne]→[ˈkahne]
• /r/ is
  uvular fricative [ʀ], [χ] (uvularization
  ) in rural Puerto Rican dialects
• Several
  neutralizations also occur in the syllable coda. The liquids /l/ and /ɾ/ may neutralize to [j] (Cibaeño Dominican celda/cerda [ˈsejða] 'cell'/'bristle'), [l] (alma/arma [ˈalma] 'soul'/'weapon', comer [koˈme(l)] 'to eat'), or as complete regressive assimilation (pulga/purga [ˈpuɡːa] 'flea'/'purge').^[3] The deletions and neutralizations (/ɾ/→/l/→/i/→∅) show variability in their occurrence, even with the same speaker in the same utterance, which implies that nondeleted forms exist in the underlying structure.^[4] That is not to say that these dialects are on the path to eliminating coda consonants since such processes have existed for more than four centuries in these dialects.^[5] Guitart (1997)
  argues that it is the result of speakers acquiring multiple phonological systems with uneven control, like that of second language learners.
• In Caribbean Spanish, there are geminated consonants when /l/ and /ɾ/ in syllabic coda are assimilated to the following consonant.[6] Examples of Cuban Spanish:

Morphology

• As in all American variants of Spanish the third person plural pronoun ustedes has supplanted the pronoun
  vosotros/vosotras
  .
• La Guajira department on Colombia's Atlantic coast, and in the Azuero Peninsula
  in Panama.
• The diminutive (ito, ita) takes the form (ico, ica) after /t/: pato→patico, pregunta→preguntica. BUT perro→perrito.
• Possibly as a result of the routine elision of word-final [s], some speakers may use [se] as a plural marker, but generally this tendency is limited to words with singular forms that end in a stressed vowel: [kaˈfe] café 'coffee' → [kaˈfese] 'coffees', [soˈfa] sofá 'sofa' → [soˈfase] 'sofas'.