Variation in Spanish /s/: Overview and New Perspectives
The natural tendency for language variation, intensified by Spanish’s territorial growth, has driven sibilant changes and mergers across the Spanish-speaking world. This article aims to present an overview of the most significant processes undergone by sibilant /s/ in various Spanish-speaking areas:...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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MDPI AG
2022-03-01
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| Series: | Languages |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2226-471X/7/2/77 |
| _version_ | 1827659240016183296 |
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| author | Eva Núñez-Méndez |
| author_facet | Eva Núñez-Méndez |
| author_sort | Eva Núñez-Méndez |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The natural tendency for language variation, intensified by Spanish’s territorial growth, has driven sibilant changes and mergers across the Spanish-speaking world. This article aims to present an overview of the most significant processes undergone by sibilant /s/ in various Spanish-speaking areas: devoicing, weakening, aspiration, elision, and voicing. Geographically based phonetic variations, sociolinguistic factors, and Spanish language contact situations are considered in this study. The sibilant merger and its chronological development in modern Spanish, along with geographic expansion, have resulted in multiple contemporary dialectal variations. This historical lack of stability in these sounds has marked modern regional variations. Tracing and framing the sibilants’ geo-linguistic features has received much attention from scholars, resulting in sibilants being one of the most studied variables in Spanish phonetics. In this article, we provide a concise approach that offers the reader an updated sociolinguistic view of the modern cross-dialectal realizations of /s/. It is essential to study sibilant development to describe Spanish dialects, the differences between Transatlantic and Castilian varieties, and the speech features found in Spanish speaking communities in the Americas. Examining sibilance from different approaches with a representative variety of Spanish dialects as examples advances the importance of sociolinguistic phenomena to index language changes. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-09T23:17:43Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-93015b1d38dc4c629e0c69f9c88b06f3 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2226-471X |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-09T23:17:43Z |
| publishDate | 2022-03-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Languages |
| spelling | doaj.art-93015b1d38dc4c629e0c69f9c88b06f32023-11-23T17:33:33ZengMDPI AGLanguages2226-471X2022-03-01727710.3390/languages7020077Variation in Spanish /s/: Overview and New PerspectivesEva Núñez-Méndez0Department of World Languages and Literatures, Portland State University, Portland, OR 97201, USAThe natural tendency for language variation, intensified by Spanish’s territorial growth, has driven sibilant changes and mergers across the Spanish-speaking world. This article aims to present an overview of the most significant processes undergone by sibilant /s/ in various Spanish-speaking areas: devoicing, weakening, aspiration, elision, and voicing. Geographically based phonetic variations, sociolinguistic factors, and Spanish language contact situations are considered in this study. The sibilant merger and its chronological development in modern Spanish, along with geographic expansion, have resulted in multiple contemporary dialectal variations. This historical lack of stability in these sounds has marked modern regional variations. Tracing and framing the sibilants’ geo-linguistic features has received much attention from scholars, resulting in sibilants being one of the most studied variables in Spanish phonetics. In this article, we provide a concise approach that offers the reader an updated sociolinguistic view of the modern cross-dialectal realizations of /s/. It is essential to study sibilant development to describe Spanish dialects, the differences between Transatlantic and Castilian varieties, and the speech features found in Spanish speaking communities in the Americas. Examining sibilance from different approaches with a representative variety of Spanish dialects as examples advances the importance of sociolinguistic phenomena to index language changes.https://www.mdpi.com/2226-471X/7/2/77Spanish sibilantsSpanish /s/devoicingweakeningaspirationelision |
| spellingShingle | Eva Núñez-Méndez Variation in Spanish /s/: Overview and New Perspectives Languages Spanish sibilants Spanish /s/ devoicing weakening aspiration elision |
| title | Variation in Spanish /s/: Overview and New Perspectives |
| title_full | Variation in Spanish /s/: Overview and New Perspectives |
| title_fullStr | Variation in Spanish /s/: Overview and New Perspectives |
| title_full_unstemmed | Variation in Spanish /s/: Overview and New Perspectives |
| title_short | Variation in Spanish /s/: Overview and New Perspectives |
| title_sort | variation in spanish s overview and new perspectives |
| topic | Spanish sibilants Spanish /s/ devoicing weakening aspiration elision |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2226-471X/7/2/77 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT evanunezmendez variationinspanishsoverviewandnewperspectives |