Vocal apparatus

The diagram below illustrates the major components of the human vocal apparatus. This will be useful to refer to when the production of various sounds is described below.

Distinción, seseo and ceceo

The sound [θ] occurs in English as, for example, the th in thin and is described in phonetic terms as a voiceless interdental fricative¹. This means that it is produced by restricting the flow of air with the tongue between the teeth and with no sound produced by the vocal folds. (Compare this with its voiced counterpart [ð]², occurring as the th in the.)

The sound [s] occurs as the s in sun and is described as a voiceless alveolar fricative³, which means that the air flow is restricted between the tongue and the upper alveolar ridge (the gum ridge behind the upper teeth).

In some varieties of Spanish these two distinct sounds both occur, with [θ] corresponding to the letter z, or c before an e or an i. This is termed distinción. In other dialects the two sounds have merged together, giving seseo where they have become [s] and ceceo where they have become [θ].

Broadly speaking, distinción is found in northern and central Spain, seseo in the Canaries, parts of southern Spain and virtually all of Latin America, and ceceo in certain areas of southern Spain⁴.

In accents exhibiting distinción, cien and sien, for example, are pronounced differently, whereas in seseante and ceceante accents they are not.

Lleísmo and yeísmo

The sound [ʎ], which does not naturally occur in English, is termed a palatal lateral approximant⁵. This means that it is produced by air escaping sideways over the tongue when the middle (lamina) or back (dorsum) is brought close to the hard palate. Traditionally this sound corresponded to the letter elle, or doble l, (ll) in Spanish: a pronunciation known as lleísmo. Replacing the sound with that associated with the letter y, however, is known as yeísmo, and this is prevalent in most of Latin America and parts of Spain. In Spain yeísmo is widespread among the younger generation, even in traditionally lleísta areas.

Note that in Spanish [ʎ] should not be pronounced as [li]⁶. There is some regional variation in the way that y (and ll in yeísta accents) is pronounced in Spanish:

• [ʝ]  voiced palatal fricative⁷. Produced by a restricted airflow down the centre of the tongue with its middle or back raised against the hard palate and the vocal folds vibrating.
• [j]  palatal approximant⁸ — y in yes. Produced by an airflow down the centre of the tongue with its middle or back raised against the hard palate and the vocal folds vibrating. The airflow is not restricted to the same extent as it is with [ʝ].
• [ʃ]  voiceless postalveolar fricative⁹ — sh in shirt. Produced with the tip (apex) of the tongue behind the alveolar ridge directing the airflow over the edge of the teeth without the vocal folds vibrating.
• [ʒ]  voiced postalveolar fricative¹⁰ — s in treasure. Produced in a similar manner to that of [ʃ] but with the vocal folds vibrating.

Pronunciation of y / ll as [ʃ] or [ʒ] is known as sheísmo and zheísmo, respectively, and is characteristic of Rioplatense Spanish¹¹ (spoken mainly in the River Plate regions of Argentina and Uruguay).

Aspirated ‘s’

Another feature characteristic of certain accents is where the letter s at the end of a syllable is pronounced as [h] or even dropped completely. [h] is known as the voiceless glottal fricative¹², and corresponds to the h in hat. In Spanish this pronunciation of s is called the ese aspirada, and the phenomenon ‘comer las eses’. This is common, for example, in Caribbean, Rioplatense and Southern Spanish accents.

‘x’

When the letter x occurs at the start of word (e.g. xilofón) it is normally pronounced as [s]. In other positions it is pronounced as [ks] in Latin America, but in informal speech in Spain this is usually softened to become [s].

Note that in certain Mexican place names, such as México and Oaxaca, the letter x represents a voiceless velar fricative¹³, [x]. This is the sound now associated in Spanish with the letter j (although in certain dialects, such as Caribbean Spanish and those of parts of southern Spain, for example, this is pronounced as [h]). This spelling comes from Spanish transcription of the Náhuatl language at a time when the letter x represented the sound [ʃ]. During the sixteenth century, however, this sound shifted to [x] and later revisions to Spanish spelling introduced the rules that the latter be represented by j and [ks] by x. Nevertheless, the original spelling was retained in certain proper nouns. And in fact the original [ʃ] sound is still present in a number of Central American place names, such as Xela, Xetulul and Xocomil in Guatemala.

‘b’ and ‘v’

In English the letter v is pronounced as a voiced labiodental fricative¹⁴, [v] (e.g. the v in vet). This means that it is formed with the bottom lip under the upper teeth. It is normally stated that this sound does not exist in Spanish and also that the letters b and v are pronounced identically, a phenomenon known in Spanish as betacismo. Their pronunciation depends on the position of the letter: after a pause or after m or n (the latter then being pronounced as an m), the pronunciation is [b], which is a voiced bilabial plosive¹⁵ (b in bad, for example, in English); otherwise the pronunciation is [β], which is a voiced bilabial fricative¹⁶. (Note that in some dialects it is only pronounced as a fricative when it occurs between vowels.) This sound does not occur in English and is made in a similar manner to [v] but with the both lips in front of the teeth and brought close together but not quite touching.

The standard pronunciation is therefore [b] in words such as también and enviar, and [β] in words such as abeja and llave.

This is, however, an area where there is some debate, as the sound [v] does occur in certain dialects of Spanish (a pronunciation known as labiodentalismo). The reasons for its existence are said to include:

• Survival in certain areas of pronunciation from old Spanish
• Influences of other languages, such as Catalan, French and English
• Hypercorrection as a reaction against popular styles of speech
• Teaching children that [v] is the ‘correct’ pronunciation of v in order to make spelling easier.

It has been noted, for example, that in the Dominican Republic there is no distinction made in popular speech between the pronunciation of the letters b and v, whereas in formal speech, such as that employed in the media, there is¹⁷.

One study¹⁸, analysing the speech of a number of Cuban students, found occurrences of [v] (together with [β] and [b]) corresponding to the letter v and also occasionally the letter b. Another more recent study¹⁹ involved a group of native speaking instructors of Spanish from a variety of countries at the University of Southern California. In that study it was found that in the speech samples analysed b was never pronounced [v], but overall the letter v was pronounced as [v] 40% of the time. This pronunciation was not systematic, and, among other factors, a correlation was found between its prevalence and the speakers’ number of years of residence in an English-speaking country.

Speech samples

Audio clips of a number of native Spanish speakers all reading the same piece of text are provided below for comparison. Listen carefully and see how many of the features described above you can detect. Note, however, that as the recordings are of a text being read, the speech is very likely to be more formal than that used in everyday conversation. One contributor commented, for example, that she was conscious of forcing the s at the end of words that in spontaneous speech she would have dropped.

Sample text

El cazador de libros se sentía feliz al encontrar en una casa señorial de Zaragoza una colección de cien publicaciones científicas insólitas.

—Yo no veo ningún caballo —le dije a ella al llegar a la llanura lluviosa. Yo sé que viajar instruye mucho pero ayer en la calle de Nueva York, con el billete en el bolsillo, nunca me lo habría imaginado así.

Todos los tesoros oscuros de las islas estaban en la sala de subastas. En el primer lote había dos cisnes negros, unos sigilosos gatos de dimensiones gigantescas y tres muñecos enmascarados.

El boxeador extraño se exasperó al tomar el examen exigente en Extremadura. Se consideraba un excelente experto, pero a su parecer fueron muy ortodoxos y exudaron una exquisita inflexibilidad.

Veintinueve vacas hambrientas vuelven a comer hierba, mientras las abejas zumban por todas partes. Bebiendo un vaso de vino y sentado en un banco cercano, el hombre descubre la clave. Desde ahora sabe qué hacer en verano y en invierno también.

Audio clips

Instructions: use the map below to navigate the audio clip collection. You can click and drag to pan the map and use the control on the left to zoom. Clicking on a map marker will bring the list of associated recordings into view in the panel below the map. You can then click on a link to open the audio clip or right click on it to download it as an MP3 file.

Further resources

International Phonetic Association
Downloadable PDF chart of the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).
http://www2.arts.gla.ac.uk/IPA/fullchart.html

Paul Meier Dialect Services
Interactive IPA chart with audio samples for all of the sounds.
http://www.paulmeier.com/ipa/charts.html

Spanish Pronunciation 101
A blog on Spanish pronunciation, aimed primarily at native English speakers and written by Martín Ventola, a teacher of Spanish Pronunciation from Buenos Aires.
http://www.spanishpronunciation101.com

Université de Lausanne — Introduction to Phonetics
Introductory online course on phonetics. Includes comprehensive descriptions of how all sounds in the IPA are produced together with accompanying audio clips.
http://www.unil.ch/ling/page30184.html

The University of Iowa — Fónetica: Los sonidos del Español
Animated anatomical diagram showing production of the various sounds in Spanish by the vocal apparatus, with accompanying sound samples and descriptions of how the sounds are articulated.
http://www.uiowa.edu/~acadtech/phonetics/spanish/frameset.html

The University of Iowa — Dialectoteca del Español
Audiovisual library with speech samples from a diverse range of native Spanish speakers.
http://www.uiowa.edu/~acadtech/dialects/

Ceceo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ceceo

Yeísmo
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ye%C3%ADsmo

Spanish dialects and varieties
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Spanish_dialects

Acknowledgements

Many thanks to all those who very kindly provided voice recordings for this project:

History⁴

Vos was originally the second-person plural pronoun and by the 4th century had come to be used as a highly respectful singular form of address, initially as a way of responding to the royal ‘we’. Its use in addressing authority figures gradually spread and by the 7th century, using vos to respectfully address a single person had become widespread.

Later social changes in Spain led to its progressive devaluation as a mark of respect and in the 15th century that role was taken over by the rival vuestra merced (used with verbs in the third person). The latter evolved, via a number of intermediate stages, into usted. Tú then settled as the familiar form of address in the singular.

These changes were reflected in the then viceroyalties of Mexico and Peru, but not elsewhere in Spanish speaking America, where the use of vos survived.

Note that in Spain otros was added to vos (in its original plural sense) in forming the informal second-person plural pronoun vosotros in order to distinguish it from the formal singular sense. (Compare this with French, where vous is used for both the second-person plural and the formal second-person singular.)

Verb forms

In the dialect of Spanish spoken in the River Plate region (rioplatense Spanish),⁵ vos replaces tú as the familiar second-person singular form of address. It also has its own verbal forms. It is used in speech and in formal writing and is the accepted standard in Argentina. It is this form that is given in the verb conjugation tables in the dictionary of the Real Academia Española (DRAE).⁶

In rioplatense Spanish, the vos verbal forms differ from those for tú only in the present indicative and the imperative. In all other cases (including the present subjunctive) the tú inflection is used.

The inflections for vos are derived from those for vosotros, the familiar second-person plural form used in Spain. The present tense conjugation is created by suppressing the weak vowel in the ending of the counterpart for vosotros, as shown in the examples below.

vosotros habláis — vos hablás
vosotros coméis — vos comés
vosotros vivís — vos vivís
vosotros sois — vos sos

There is therefore a difference in the position of the stress between the tú and vos forms (llano or grave in the former, but agudo in the latter), e.g.

(tú) sabes — (vos) sabés

In certain (radical changing) verbs, the vowel in the stem becomes a diphthong when the stress falls on that syllable, for example in the inflection for tú. This does not therefore occur with the equivalent vos forms, e.g.

(tú) puedes — (vos) podés

The affirmative imperative is formed by dropping the final ‘d’ of the vosotros command and the final vowel is accented to preserve the original stress, e.g.

(vosotros) ¡comprad! — (vos) ¡comprá!

Conclusion

If you do decide to use el voseo, be sure to get acquainted with the variation used by the people that you’ll be talking to. As mentioned above, its use instead of tú is widespread in Argentina, for example. But this is not the case everywhere. In Guatemala, for instance, tú is an intermediate familiar form, and vos is extremely familiar, reserved mostly for use between close friends. Nor is it common there to find men addressing women using vos or vice versa. If you happen to use vos with the wrong person you may inadvertently cross a line and cause offence. You should therefore be very careful in deciding when to use it.

“We have really everything in common with America nowadays except, of course, language.”³

Now, if there are such differences between these two countries (US/UK), imagine how many regional variations we can find in Spanish, which is an official language in 21 countries!⁴
To mention one of these, one word can have different meanings depending on the country where it is used. Spanish speakers may be acquainted with their country’s own usage of the word, but be unaware of its connotations in other countries!

For example, in Guatemala we call money pisto. But in Mexico pisto is a drunk. And in Spain pisto is a sauce made of tomato, pepper, egg and onion. Imagine trying to say ‘the drunk bought some sauce with the money he had left’!

The same goes for idiomatic expressions. Consider al chile, for example. In Guatemala this means ‘very fast’. In Costa Rica, it means ‘Really?’.

We’ve got different ways to say the same thing, too. For example, the word for ‘cheat sheet’ or ‘crib sheet’ varies from place to place. It is chuleta in Spain and Venezuela, torpedo in Chile, chivo in Cuba, Puerto Rico and Guatemala; droga, droguita, bate, and nota in Puerto Rico; acordeón in Mexico, El Salvador, Honduras and Nicaragua; chafa in Mexico, chepe in Honduras, forro in Cuba and Costa Rica, copiain El Salvador and Nicaragua, batería in Panama, pastel in Colombia, polla in Ecuador, plagio and compromido in Peru, chanchullo in Bolivia, copiatini in Paraguay, ferrocarril and trencito in Uruguay, and machete in Argentina.⁵

Finally, we’ve got some spelling variations. There’s a word that the RAE⁶ includes in its dictionary with four possible spellings: ceviche, cebiche, seviche, and sebiche! Spelling varies from country to country, but all of them refer to the same thing: a South American dish of marinated raw fish or seafood, typically garnished and served as an appetizer.

So, you might be asking yourself, which Spanish should you learn?

If you’re going to be using a particular variety of Spanish, pick the one which will be most useful to you. If you’re moving to Puerto Rico, learn Puerto Rican Spanish; if you’ve got Argentinian relatives or friends, then Argentinan Spanish will be the best to study; if you’re right on the border between the US and Mexico, you’ll probably want to learn a mixture of Chicano and Mexican Spanish; and if your business frequently takes you to Madrid, then that’s the variety you ought to pay the most attention to.

If you don’t know any speakers of a particular variety of Spanish, you’d be best to stick to standard vocabulary. For example, in all Spanish speaking countries money is dinero. Forget about pisto (or lana or pasta or plata!).