Puerto Rican Spanish
Encyclopedia
Puerto Rican Spanish (español puertorriqueño espaˈɲol pwertoriˈkeɲo) is the Spanish language as characteristically spoken in Puerto Rico
and by millions of people of Puerto Rican descent
living in the United States
and elsewhere. It belongs to the group of Caribbean Spanish
variants.
between the 15th and 18th centuries came from Andalucia, the one of the basis for most of Puerto Rican Spanish is Andalusian Spanish
(particularly that of Seville
). For example, the endings -ado, -ido, -edo often drop intervocalic /d/ in both Seville and San Juan
: hablado > hablao, vendido > vendío, dedo > deo (intervocalic /d/ dropping is quite widespread in coastal American dialects). Seville Spanish is also the source of the merger of phonemes /s/ (coSer) and /θ/ (coCer) that are both pronounced /s/ in much of Andalusia and generally in all Latin America dialects. This merger is called 'seseo' and makes pairs like cocer/coser, abrazar/abrasar, has/haz, vez/ves homophonous. Another Andalusian trait is the tendency to weaken postvocalic consonants, particularly /-s/: 'los dos > lo do, 'buscar' > buhcá(l). Pronouncing "l" instead of "r" is also a trait of Puerto Rican Spanish that has its origin in southern Spain.
Canarian Spanish
(from Spain
's Canary Islands
) also made a major contribution to Puerto Rican Spanish as one of the basis of Puerto Rican Spanish. Many Canarios came in hopes of establishing a better life in the Americas. Most Puerto Rican immigration in the early 19th century involved Canary Islands' natives, who, like Puerto Ricans, had inherited most of their linguistic traits from Andalusia. Canarian influence is most present in the language of those Puerto Ricans who live in the central mountain region, who blended it with the remnant vocabulary of the Taíno. Canarian and Caribbean dialects share a similar intonation which, in general terms, means that stressed vowels are usually quite long. Puerto Rican and Canarian Spanish accents are strikingly similar. When visiting Tenerife
or Las Palmas, Puerto Ricans are usually taken at first hearing for fellow-Canarians from a distant part of the Canary archipelago.
Later in the 19th century other Spanish immigrants from Catalonia
, the Balearic Islands
, Asturias
and Galicia plus other European settlers—mostly from France
(including Corsica
), Italy
, Ireland
, Scotland
, Germany
, and even some overseas Chinese—settled in Puerto Rico. Words from these regions and countries joined the linguistic stew.
settlers colonized Puerto Rico in the early 16th century, many thousands of Taíno people lived on the island. Taíno words like hamaca('hammock' ), hurakán ('hurricane'), and tobacco came into general Spanish as the two cultures blended. Puerto Ricans still use many Taíno words that are not part of the international Spanish lexicon. The Taíno influence in Puerto Rican Spanish is most evident in geographical names, such as Mayagüez
, Guaynabo
, Humacao, and Jayuya.
n slaves were brought to the island in the 16th century. Although 31 different African tribes have been recorded in Puerto Rico, it is the Kongo
from Central Africa that is considered to have had the most influence on Puerto Rican Spanish. Words like mondongo (tripe soup), gandul (pigeon pea), fufú (a spell), and malanga (a root vegetable), are commonly used and are of African origin.
, Spain ceded Puerto Rico to the United States as part of a peace treaty that brought the Spanish-American War
to a sudden conclusion. The United States Army
and the early colonial administration tried to impose the English
language on island residents. Between 1902 and 1948, the main language of instruction in public schools (used for all subjects except Spanish-language courses) was English. Consequently, many American English words are now found in the Puerto Rican vocabulary. English
has had a fluctuating status as a second official language of the Island, depending on the political party in power at the moment. The majority of Puerto Ricans today do not speak English at home, and Spanish remains the mother tongue of Puerto Ricans, regardless of their political views.
Many third and fourth generation Puerto Ricans who live in the United States borrow English words or phrases in mid-sentence in a phenomenon called code-switching
, pejoratively characterized as Spanglish
. Puerto Rican writer Giannina Braschi
published the first Spanglish novel, Yo-Yo Boing!, in 1998, a book that represents the code-switching linguistic style of some Latino immigrants in the United States. However, this mixture of Spanish and English is simply an informal blending of languages, not a separate language or dialect, and is not a fundamental characteristic of Spanish or Puerto Rican culture. It is merely an occasional convenience used by speakers who are very fluent in the two languages.
Puerto Rico has representation in the Royal Spanish Academy (Real Academia Española
) and has its own national academy along with the other Spanish-speaking countries of Latin America
.
Puerto Rico
Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...
and by millions of people of Puerto Rican descent
Puerto Rican people
A Puerto Rican is a person who was born in Puerto Rico.Puerto Ricans born and raised in the continental United States are also sometimes referred to as Puerto Ricans, although they were not born in Puerto Rico...
living in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
and elsewhere. It belongs to the group of Caribbean Spanish
Caribbean Spanish
Caribbean Spanish is the general name of the Spanish dialects spoken in the Caribbean region. It closely resembles the Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands and Andalusia....
variants.
Spanish and European influences
Since most of the original settlers of Puerto RicoPuerto Rico
Puerto Rico , officially the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico , is an unincorporated territory of the United States, located in the northeastern Caribbean, east of the Dominican Republic and west of both the United States Virgin Islands and the British Virgin Islands.Puerto Rico comprises an...
between the 15th and 18th centuries came from Andalucia, the one of the basis for most of Puerto Rican Spanish is Andalusian Spanish
Andalusian Spanish
The Andalusian varieties of Spanish are spoken in Andalusia, Ceuta, Melilla and Gibraltar. They include perhaps the most distinct of the southern variants of peninsular Spanish, differing in many respects from northern varieties, and also from Standard Spanish...
(particularly that of Seville
Seville
Seville is the artistic, historic, cultural, and financial capital of southern Spain. It is the capital of the autonomous community of Andalusia and of the province of Seville. It is situated on the plain of the River Guadalquivir, with an average elevation of above sea level...
). For example, the endings -ado, -ido, -edo often drop intervocalic /d/ in both Seville and San Juan
San Juan, Puerto Rico
San Juan , officially Municipio de la Ciudad Capital San Juan Bautista , is the capital and most populous municipality in Puerto Rico, an unincorporated territory of the United States. As of the 2010 census, it had a population of 395,326 making it the 46th-largest city under the jurisdiction of...
: hablado > hablao, vendido > vendío, dedo > deo (intervocalic /d/ dropping is quite widespread in coastal American dialects). Seville Spanish is also the source of the merger of phonemes /s/ (coSer) and /θ/ (coCer) that are both pronounced /s/ in much of Andalusia and generally in all Latin America dialects. This merger is called 'seseo' and makes pairs like cocer/coser, abrazar/abrasar, has/haz, vez/ves homophonous. Another Andalusian trait is the tendency to weaken postvocalic consonants, particularly /-s/: 'los dos > lo do, 'buscar' > buhcá(l). Pronouncing "l" instead of "r" is also a trait of Puerto Rican Spanish that has its origin in southern Spain.
Canarian Spanish
Canarian Spanish
Canarian Spanish is a variant of standard Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands by the Canarian people, and in the southeastern section of Louisiana in Isleño communities that emigrated to the Americas as early as the 18th century...
(from Spain
Spain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
's Canary Islands
Canary Islands
The Canary Islands , also known as the Canaries , is a Spanish archipelago located just off the northwest coast of mainland Africa, 100 km west of the border between Morocco and the Western Sahara. The Canaries are a Spanish autonomous community and an outermost region of the European Union...
) also made a major contribution to Puerto Rican Spanish as one of the basis of Puerto Rican Spanish. Many Canarios came in hopes of establishing a better life in the Americas. Most Puerto Rican immigration in the early 19th century involved Canary Islands' natives, who, like Puerto Ricans, had inherited most of their linguistic traits from Andalusia. Canarian influence is most present in the language of those Puerto Ricans who live in the central mountain region, who blended it with the remnant vocabulary of the Taíno. Canarian and Caribbean dialects share a similar intonation which, in general terms, means that stressed vowels are usually quite long. Puerto Rican and Canarian Spanish accents are strikingly similar. When visiting Tenerife
Tenerife
Tenerife is the largest and most populous island of the seven Canary Islands, it is also the most populated island of Spain, with a land area of 2,034.38 km² and 906,854 inhabitants, 43% of the total population of the Canary Islands. About five million tourists visit Tenerife each year, the...
or Las Palmas, Puerto Ricans are usually taken at first hearing for fellow-Canarians from a distant part of the Canary archipelago.
Later in the 19th century other Spanish immigrants from Catalonia
Catalonia
Catalonia is an autonomous community in northeastern Spain, with the official status of a "nationality" of Spain. Catalonia comprises four provinces: Barcelona, Girona, Lleida, and Tarragona. Its capital and largest city is Barcelona. Catalonia covers an area of 32,114 km² and has an...
, the Balearic Islands
Balearic Islands
The Balearic Islands are an archipelago of Spain in the western Mediterranean Sea, near the eastern coast of the Iberian Peninsula.The four largest islands are: Majorca, Minorca, Ibiza and Formentera. The archipelago forms an autonomous community and a province of Spain with Palma as the capital...
, Asturias
Asturias
The Principality of Asturias is an autonomous community of the Kingdom of Spain, coextensive with the former Kingdom of Asturias in the Middle Ages...
and Galicia plus other European settlers—mostly from France
France
The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...
(including Corsica
Corsica
Corsica is an island in the Mediterranean Sea. It is located west of Italy, southeast of the French mainland, and north of the island of Sardinia....
), Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
, Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
, Scotland
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
, Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
, and even some overseas Chinese—settled in Puerto Rico. Words from these regions and countries joined the linguistic stew.
Taino influence
When the SpanishSpain
Spain , officially the Kingdom of Spain languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Spain's official name is as follows:;;;;;;), is a country and member state of the European Union located in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula...
settlers colonized Puerto Rico in the early 16th century, many thousands of Taíno people lived on the island. Taíno words like hamaca
Mayagüez, Puerto Rico
Mayagüez is the eighth-largest municipality of Puerto Rico. Originally founded as "Nuestra Señora de la Candelaria" it is also known as "La Sultana del Oeste" , "Ciudad de las Aguas Puras" , or "Ciudad del Mangó"...
, Guaynabo
Guaynabo, Puerto Rico
Guaynabo is a municipality in the northern part of Puerto Rico, located in the northern coast of the island, north of Aguas Buenas; south of Cataño; east of Bayamón; and west of San Juan...
, Humacao, and Jayuya.
African influence
The first AfricaAfrica
Africa is the world's second largest and second most populous continent, after Asia. At about 30.2 million km² including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of the Earth's total surface area and 20.4% of the total land area...
n slaves were brought to the island in the 16th century. Although 31 different African tribes have been recorded in Puerto Rico, it is the Kongo
Kongo language
The Kongo language, or Kikongo, is the Bantu language spoken by the Bakongo and Bandundu people living in the tropical forests of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo and Angola. It is a tonal language and formed the base for Kituba, a Bantu creole and lingua franca...
from Central Africa that is considered to have had the most influence on Puerto Rican Spanish. Words like mondongo (tripe soup), gandul (pigeon pea), fufú (a spell), and malanga (a root vegetable), are commonly used and are of African origin.
United States Influences and Puerto Rican Anglicisms
In 1898, during the armed conflicts of the Puerto Rican CampaignPuerto Rican Campaign
The Puerto Rican Campaign was an American military sea and land operation on the island of Puerto Rico during the Spanish–American War. The offensive began on May 12, 1898, when the United States Navy attacked the archipelago’s capital, San Juan. Though the damage inflicted on the city was minimal,...
, Spain ceded Puerto Rico to the United States as part of a peace treaty that brought the Spanish-American War
Spanish-American War
The Spanish–American War was a conflict in 1898 between Spain and the United States, effectively the result of American intervention in the ongoing Cuban War of Independence...
to a sudden conclusion. The United States Army
United States Army
The United States Army is the main branch of the United States Armed Forces responsible for land-based military operations. It is the largest and oldest established branch of the U.S. military, and is one of seven U.S. uniformed services...
and the early colonial administration tried to impose the English
American English
American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....
language on island residents. Between 1902 and 1948, the main language of instruction in public schools (used for all subjects except Spanish-language courses) was English. Consequently, many American English words are now found in the Puerto Rican vocabulary. English
American English
American English is a set of dialects of the English language used mostly in the United States. Approximately two-thirds of the world's native speakers of English live in the United States....
has had a fluctuating status as a second official language of the Island, depending on the political party in power at the moment. The majority of Puerto Ricans today do not speak English at home, and Spanish remains the mother tongue of Puerto Ricans, regardless of their political views.
Many third and fourth generation Puerto Ricans who live in the United States borrow English words or phrases in mid-sentence in a phenomenon called code-switching
Code-switching
In linguistics, code-switching is the concurrent use of more than one language, or language variety, in conversation. Multilinguals—people who speak more than one language—sometimes use elements of multiple languages in conversing with each other...
, pejoratively characterized as Spanglish
Spanglish
.Spanglish refers to the blend of Spanish and English, in the speech of people who speak parts of two languages, or whose normal language is different from that of the country where they live. The Hispanic population of the United States and the British population in Argentina use varieties of...
. Puerto Rican writer Giannina Braschi
Giannina Braschi
Giannina Braschi is a Puerto Rican writer. She is credited with writing the first Spanglish novel YO-YO BOING! and the poetry trilogy Empire of Dreams , which chronicles the Latin American immigrant's experiences in the United States...
published the first Spanglish novel, Yo-Yo Boing!, in 1998, a book that represents the code-switching linguistic style of some Latino immigrants in the United States. However, this mixture of Spanish and English is simply an informal blending of languages, not a separate language or dialect, and is not a fundamental characteristic of Spanish or Puerto Rican culture. It is merely an occasional convenience used by speakers who are very fluent in the two languages.
Puerto Rico has representation in the Royal Spanish Academy (Real Academia Española
Real Academia Española
The Royal Spanish Academy is the official royal institution responsible for regulating the Spanish language. It is based in Madrid, Spain, but is affiliated with national language academies in twenty-one other hispanophone nations through the Association of Spanish Language Academies...
) and has its own national academy along with the other Spanish-speaking countries of Latin America
Latin America
Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...
.
See also
- List of Puerto Rican slang words and phrases
- Spanish dialects and varietiesSpanish dialects and varietiesSpanish dialects and varieties are the regional variants of the Spanish language, some of which are quite divergent from one another, especially in pronunciation and vocabulary, and less so in grammar....
External links
- Academia Puertorriqueña de la Lengua Española
- López Morales, Humberto: Arcaismos lexicos en el espaňol de Puerto Rico
- Puerto Rican Accent Example Short video with locals speaking.