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Tuesday, December 21, 2021

Castellano / Castilian

 In Spanish "castellano" means what we call the Spanish language, in English. The word is used in certain countries more, like Argentina and Spain. In Spain, it is used to contrast with other national languages, but it includes non-Northern dialects like Andalusian.  

In English, "Castilian" or "Castilian Spanish" refers to the dialects of Spanish spoken in Northern Spain.  It has the theta sound. So people are always asking me about "Castilian Spanish." The presence of this sound is not a "lisp." That would be like saying that someone who pronounces "math" as "math" rather than as "mass" is speaking with a lisp!   

Spanish in the New World took the Southern Spanish dialects as its basis, so the theta is unknown.  Aspiration of d (intervocalic or terminal) is common both in Andalusia and the Caribbean. So "to" and "na" instead of "todo" and "nada." Also aspiration of s before a vowel or in terminal position. ¿Cómoetáuté? There are other phonetic differences, like "yeísmo," the pronunciation of ll as y.  

There are 500 million speakers of Spanish, and the language has quite a global reach. 

6 comments:

Leslie B. said...

OMG is this in the air? I'm working on a short piece on this too, for a popular publication. So tired of being lectured at about how I probably cannot understand "Castilian Spanish" since it is "so much more difficult"!

Jonathan said...

There was an article about how Argentina is now going to call the language Español instead of castellano.

Leslie B. said...

OMG! I will have to look into this!

Jonathan said...

"Y que Argentina es, junto a Bolivia, Venezuela y Paraguay, uno de los cuatro países en los que la palabra castellano es más empleada que español." It just seems to be a regional variation. In some countries they tend to call Spanish "castellano" and in other countries "español." This is not a big deal, and has historic origins. Unless you want to make a big deal of it.

https://www.elmundo.es/cultura/2021/12/19/61bf2fc9fc6c8363278b45d3.html?cid=BESOCYEM01&utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social_besocy&utm_campaign=BESOCYEM01

Leslie B. said...

Yes, I found the article! And finished a draft of my mini-piece, and sent you the link.

Leslie B. said...

Haha! I see that you see it! Gracias!