[THREAD] SPANISH DIALECTS AND VARIETIES EXPLAINED

As you might know, Spanish is widely spoken all over the world and, consequently, there are many varieties. It is quite a heterogeneous language, mostly in terms of pronunciation. In this thread, I'll try to summarize every single variety with its most remarkable features.

We will start our journey in Spain and, to get an overall picture of the varieties spoken in the country, I have marked the dialectal areas on a map (very badly, sorry).

I made those subdivisions of the Castilian dialect since the ones I found on the Internet were too generic.

First of all, let's talk about "Central castilian", which is spoken in most of Castilla y León, Cantabria, the north of Madrid and Guadalajara and La Rioja.

This variety is considered by many to be "the purest", since the first texts in Spanish came from San Millán de la Cogolla (La Rioja) and for a long time, Valladolid (capital city of Castilla y León) has been considered to have the most neutral accent.

It is the variety used in the media and the one closest to "the standard". Their main features are:

Phonic differentiation between /s/ and /θ/: casa / caza. This one is present in every variety of Spain but in the Andalusian and Canarian ones (neither in America).

The voiceless velar fricative /x/
Reduction of hiatuses to diphthongs: héroe > herue ['erwe]
The letter /d/ at the end of a word is often pronounced as a [θ], for example: verdad > verdaz (it also occurs in Madrid)

Elision of the occlusive element in the combination
/ks/ for the graph "x": tasi [tási] instead of taxi [táksi]
Conservation of final consonants: [be.βéɾ] instead of
[be.βé] as it would be pronounced in other areas.

Use of "la" (direct object) as an indirect object: "la dije" instead of "le dije". This is the most remarkable feature of this dialect. There is also an incorrect use of the pronouns "lo" and "le" (loísmo y leísmo).

Pronunciation of the letter 'll' as 'y'. Yes, technically their pronunciations are different, but only in some areas the differentiation is made (less and less)

Preference of forms - se in the imperfect and
subjunctive pluperfect: Hablase instead of hablara, hubiese hecho instead of hubiera hecho.
Preference in the use of the past perfect simple: “He visto a María” rather than “vi a María”.

These are the most characteristic features, which in many of the following subdialects, reappear, although they add their own features. Let's hear a sample. Notice now they say: Valladoliz, el circo "le tenemos" (lo tenemos)...

Let's move on to the Aragonese dialect, spoken in Aragon, parts of La Rioja and villages of Valencia near Teruel. Their features are:

Ascending intonation of the phrases, with lengthening of the final vowel (you'll notice it)

Words are always stressed on the last or penultimate syllable (mostly). The standard Spanish words stressed on the antepenultimate syllable, are stressed on the penultimate in Aragonese castilian: pajáro, medíco, cantáro.

Some consonants are aspired: no'otros (nosotros)

Use of the diminutive suffixes -ico/a, -ete/a, -é/eta: poquico, moceta
Use of the conjunction "pues" at the end of the sentence.
Leísmo (use of le rather than lo/la) is not common in Aragon.

Omission of the final vowel of some prepositions, articles and conjunctions when the accompanying word begins with a vowel: d'aquel (de aquel)
Frequent use of the definite article with names: la Pilarica.
Vocab: fato (tonto), zaborra (piedra), panizo (maíz), presco ()...

Listen to this sample and notice the intonation of Aragonese speakers

Our next stop is: Castilla-La Mancha. Its variety is spoken mostly in Albacete and Ciudad Real, but also in Toledo, Cuenca, the south of Madrid and some villages in Valencia.

Its main features are:

Aspiration of the intervocalic /s/, or rather the pronunciation of /j/ instead of /s/. This occurs especially when a /c/ follows the /s/: ejcalera, ejcuela, ej que...

Suppression of the intervocalic r. It occurs mostly in verbs: comerlo --> comelo

The /d/ intervocalic is almost always elided . Not only when the word ends in -ado, but also with -ada, -ido and -ida: ha parido --> ha parío.

When a word starts with /r/, it tends to add a prothetic vowel (usually /a/): arrompel rather than romper.

Suppression of the preposition "de": Tabla La Yedra, instead of Tabla de la Yedra.

The exchange of the /h/ interspersed with /b/: cohete>cobete.

The superlative without stressed "í": grandismo,feismo, and especially munchismo.

Vocab: Valencian words such as terretremo (terremoto) or bajoca (judía verde); archaic terms like sotro (otro), vido (vío), apechusque (dolor) or zaraballo (trozo de pan); contracted expressions like pos miaque (pues mira que) or menestér que (haría falta que).

There are written texts using only words from this dialect:

There is a famous TV show called "Muchachada nui" were they speak with that manchego accent and you can learn many words. In this excerpt, you will hear: mu' (muy), ej'acento (es acento), viejuno...

Next stop: Asturias, one of the most stunning areas. The Asturian dialect is spoken in Asturias and some villages in León, Zamora and Cantabria.

The Asturian castilian is influenced by the bable language, spoken in those areas:

Asturian main features are:

Feminine plural endings in -as are pronounced as -es and "las" turns into "les": las casas > les cases.

Use of "ye" instead of "es": "ye una rapaza" (es una chica).

Characteristic intonation similar to the Galician one .

Final /o/ is pronounced as /u/ and /ado/ as /au/: frasco > frascu; desesperado > desesperau.

Suffix –ín(o)/-ina: mozo > mocín. If you hear the suffix -uco, then the speaker is from Cantabria for sure: bajo > bajuco.

Use of past simple (pretérito perfecto simple) instead of past perfect (pretérito perfecto compuesto): Hoy comí en casa de la abuela.

The enclitic pronoun is placed behind the verb rather than before and usually replaced by "-y": Receta-y (Le receta).

Their vocab is full of words from Bable and localisms: muller (mujer), babayu (imbécil), prestar (gustar), guaje (niño), gochu (sucio), fame (hambre), "Calla, ho!" (¡no puede ser!), estrallapar (aplastar) and so on...

Now it's time to hear a sample and notice how he says: el doctor receta-y, muller, "dos hores seguíes", escapen...

The Galician variety of Castilian is really similar to the Asturian one. They share most of its features but this one adds some particularities taken from the Galician language. It's only spoken in Galicia.

Its main features are the following:

It tends to close the final vowels a lot, almost pronouncing /o/ and /u/; and /e/ and /i/ as equivalents.

Reduction of the consonantal groups in certain words: perfeto > perfecto.

Velarization of the final -n: camión [ka'mjoŋ]

Pronunciation of /c/ and /z/ (θ) as /s/ in some areas.

Pronounciation of the letter /x/ in Galician, with the phonetic value [ʃ], especially at the beginning of the words when in Spanish it is pronounced with the phonetic value [s]: xilófono [siˈlofono] > [shiˈlofono]

Characteristic intonation, influenced by the cadence of Galician, which makes it really nice to listen.

Use of pretérito perfecto simple, as in Asturian: Esta mañana, desayuné tostadas.

They tend to mix up Spanish and Galician words in some expressions: pecha la ventana.

Abundant use of diminutive forms ending in -iño/iña: bueniño, rapaciña.

Use of the first form of the imperfect subjunctive instead of the pluperfect one: "Esta película ya la viera yo" rather than "Esta película ya la había visto yo"

Future formed by "ir" + infinitive (not "ir a"): Me voy marchar.

Vocab: Galician words like pota (olla), riquiño (simpático), carallo (joder), colo (regazo), pan reseso (pan duro), morriña (like portuguese saudade), tanto me da (me da igual)

Okay, so it's time to hear some Galicians speaking and in the video you'll hear the intonation, and the pronunciation of some words: perfeto, un bucata (bocata)...

I will update this thread every day, it isn't finished!! But I need some time to find reliable information and samples. So please, if you want to read the whole thread, just bookmark it and check it out!