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Paraguayan Spanish | |
---|---|
Castellano paraguayo | |
Pronunciation | [espaˈɲolpaɾaˈɣwaʝo] |
Native to | Paraguay |
Native speakers | 6 million (2014) [1] |
Early forms | |
Latin (Spanish alphabet) | |
Official status | |
Official language in | Paraguay |
Regulated by | Academia Paraguaya de la Lengua Española |
Language codes | |
ISO 639-1 | es |
ISO 639-2 | spa [2] |
ISO 639-3 | – |
Glottolog | None |
IETF | es-PY |
Paraguayan Spanish (Spanish : castellano paraguayo) is the set of dialects of the Spanish language spoken in Paraguay. In addition, it influences the speech of the Argentine provinces of Misiones, Corrientes, Formosa, and, to a lesser extent, Chaco. Paraguayan Spanish possesses marked characteristics of the Spanish previously spoken in northern Spain, because a majority of the first Spanish settlers were from Old Castile and the Basque Country. In addition, there is great influence, in both vocabulary and grammar, from the Guarani language. Guarani is co-official with Spanish in Paraguay, [3] and most Paraguayans speak both languages. [4] Guaraní is the home language of more than half the population of Paraguay, with higher proportions of its use in rural areas, and those who speak Spanish at home slightly in the majority in the cities. [5] In addition to the strong influence of Guarani, Paraguayan Spanish is also influenced by Rioplatense Spanish due to the geographical, historical, and cultural proximity, as well as the sharing of features such as voseo, which is "the use of vos as a second-person singular pronoun." [6] Paraguayan Spanish is notable for its lack of yeísmo, meaning that the phonemes /ʎ/ (spelled ⟨ll⟩) and /ʝ/ (spelled ⟨y⟩) are distinguished.
The Swedish linguist Bertil Malmberg visited Paraguay in 1946 and observed several features of Spanish pronunciation that he attributed to Guaraní influence. [7] The Guaraní origin of many of these features, however, has been questioned by other researchers, who document them in dialects not in contact with Guaraní. [8]
The unique features of Paraguayan Spanish developed in part due to Paraguay's early isolation; for example, José Gaspar Rodríguez de Francia, the country's president until 1840, sealed Paraguay's borders. Other experiences with geographic, political, and economic isolation relative to its neighbours allowed Spanish spoken in Paraguay to develop its own unique characteristics, even apart from the wide-ranging influence of Guarani. [3]
Paraguay is, depending on the context, considered part of a region of South America known as the Southern Cone (Spanish: Cono Sur; Portuguese: Cone Sul). In its truest definition, the region consists of Chile, Argentina, and Uruguay, but can be expanded to include Paraguay and some regions of Brazil (Paraná, Rio Grande do Sul, Santa Catarina, and São Paulo). Excluding Brazil (where Portuguese is spoken), all the countries in that region have many similarities in vocabulary. Paraguayan Spanish shares many similarities with River Plate Spanish (that is, the variety spoken in Argentina and Uruguay) such as the use of the voseo and various words and phrases.
Typical Paraguayan Spanish has a strong influence from the sentence structure of Guarani as translated to Spanish, as well as the words and borrowed particles of Guarani for colloquial expressions. These are some common cases:
Due to the geographical and cultural proximity of Paraguay and Argentina, the two countries' dialects are often confused. In fact, along the border between Argentina and Paraguay, the local dialects of both countries have fused, creating a northeastern Argentine variety very similar to Paraguayan Spanish in the provinces along the border. [10] Examples:
Voseo is a peculiar characteristic of Paraguayan Spanish which is heavily influenced by the River Plate dialect (since historically in Paraguay Guarani was always spoken, and Spanish was relegated to the inhabitants of the capital or the most favored classes in the interior of the country). Another characteristic of voseo is how long it has been around for. "Voseo is the oldest form of Castilian Spanish". After the second half of the 20th century, the teaching of voseo depended on whether the teacher used vos or not. Adding to the strong Argentinian influence, either by the media or by the geographical and cultural proximity, voseo stayed as a distinctive characteristic of Paraguayan. Although it is rarely taught in schools today, voseo is beginning to regain some popularity in the form of an accepted regional dialect.
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Guarani, specifically the primary variety known as Paraguayan Guarani, is a South American language that belongs to the Tupi–Guarani branch of the Tupian language family. It is one of the official languages of Paraguay, where it is spoken by the majority of the population, and where half of the rural population are monolingual speakers of the language.
The different varieties of the Spanish language spoken in the Americas are distinct from each other as well as from those varieties spoken in the Iberian peninsula, collectively known as Peninsular Spanish and Spanish spoken elsewhere, such as in Africa and Asia. There is great diversity among the various Latin American vernaculars, and there are no traits shared by all of them which are not also in existence in one or more of the variants of Spanish used in Spain. A Latin American "standard" does, however, vary from the Castilian "standard" register used in television and notably the dubbing industry. Of the more than 498 million people who speak Spanish as their native language, more than 455 million are in Latin America, the United States and Canada in 2022. The total amount of native and non-native speakers of Spanish as of October 2022 exceeds 595 million.
Some of the regional varieties of the Spanish language are quite divergent from one another, especially in pronunciation and vocabulary, and less so in grammar.
In Spanish grammar, voseo is the use of vos as a second-person singular pronoun, along with its associated verbal forms, in certain regions where the language is spoken. In those regions it replaces tuteo, i.e. the use of the pronoun tú and its verbal forms. Voseo can also be found in the context of using verb conjugations for vos with tú as the subject pronoun.
Rioplatense Spanish, also known as Rioplatense Castilian, or River Plate Spanish, is a variety of Spanish originating in and around the Río de la Plata Basin, and now spoken throughout most of Argentina and Uruguay. It is the most prominent dialect to employ voseo in both speech and writing. Many features of Rioplatense are also shared with the varieties spoken in south and eastern Bolivia, and Paraguay. This dialect is influenced by Italian languages, due to the historically significant Italian immigration in the area, and therefore has several Italian loanwords and is often spoken with an intonation resembling that of the Neapolitan language of Southern Italy.
Jopara or Yopará is a colloquial form of Guarani spoken in Paraguay which uses a number of Spanish loan words. Its name is from the Guarani word for "mixture".
Mexican Spanish is the variety of dialects and sociolects of the Spanish language spoken in the United Mexican States. Mexico has the largest number of Spanish speakers, more than double any other country in the world. Spanish is spoken by over 99% of the population, being the mother tongue of 93.8%, and the second language of 5.4%.
Yeísmo is a distinctive feature of certain dialects of the Spanish language, characterized by the loss of the traditional palatal lateral approximant phoneme and its merger into the phoneme. It is an example of delateralization.
Caribbean Spanish 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.
Central American Spanish is the general name of the Spanish language dialects spoken in Central America. More precisely, the term refers to the Spanish language as spoken in Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, and Nicaragua. Panamanian Spanish is considered a variety of Caribbean Spanish, it is transitional between Central American and Caribbean dialects.
Chilean Spanish is any of several varieties of the Spanish language spoken in most of Chile. Chilean Spanish dialects have distinctive pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, and slang usages that differ from those of Standard Spanish. Formal Spanish in Chile has recently incorporated an increasing number of colloquial elements.
Dominican Spanish is Spanish as spoken in the Dominican Republic; and also among the Dominican diaspora, most of whom live in the United States, chiefly in New York City, New Jersey, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania, and Florida.
Spanish is the language that is predominantly understood and spoken as a first or second language by nearly all of the population of Argentina. According to the latest estimations, the population is currently greater than 45 million.
Colombian Spanish is a grouping of the varieties of Spanish spoken in Colombia. The term is of more geographical than linguistic relevance, since the dialects spoken in the various regions of Colombia are quite diverse. The speech of the northern coastal area tends to exhibit phonological innovations typical of Caribbean Spanish, while highland varieties have been historically more conservative. The Caro and Cuervo Institute in Bogotá is the main institution in Colombia to promote the scholarly study of the language and literature of both Colombia and the rest of Spanish America. The educated speech of Bogotá, a generally conservative variety of Spanish, has high popular prestige among Spanish-speakers throughout the Americas.
Peninsular Spanish, also known as the Spanish of Spain, European Spanish, or Iberian Spanish, is the set of varieties of the Spanish language spoken in Peninsular Spain. This construct is often framed in opposition to varieties from the Americas and the Canary Islands.
Nicaraguan Spanish is geographically defined as the form of Spanish spoken in Nicaragua. Affectionately, Nicaraguan Spanish is often called Nicañol.
Uruguayan Spanish, a part of Rioplatense Spanish, is the variety of Spanish spoken in Uruguay and by the Uruguayan diaspora.
Andean Spanish is a dialect of Spanish spoken in the central Andes, from southern Colombia, with influence as far south as northern Chile and Northwestern Argentina, passing through Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia. While similar to other Spanish dialects, Andean Spanish shows influence from Quechua, Aymara, and other indigenous languages, due to prolonged and intense language contact. This influence is especially strong in rural areas.
The Republic of Paraguay is a mostly bilingual country, as the majority of the population uses Spanish and Guaraní. The Constitution of Paraguay of 1992 declares it as a multicultural and bilingual country, establishing Spanish and Guaraní as official languages. Spanish, an Indo-European language of the Romance branch, is understood by about 90% of the population as a first or second language. Guaraní, an indigenous language of the Tupian family, is understood by 77%, and its use is regulated by the Academy of the Guaraní Language.
Bolivian Spanish is the variety of Spanish spoken by the majority of the population in Bolivia, either as a mother tongue or as a second language. Within the Spanish of Bolivia there are different regional varieties. In the border areas, Bolivia shares dialectal features with the neighboring countries.