Canarian Spanish
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State flag of the Autonomous Community of the Canary Islands, Spain. Esp: Canarias, España
Canarian Spanish (Spanish: español de Canarias or el habla canaria) is a variant of standard Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands by the Canarian people, and in the southeastern section of Louisiana in Isleño communities that emigrated to the Americas as early as the 18th century. The variant is very similar to Caribbean Spanish; because of Canary emigration to the Caribbean in earlier times, Canarian Spanish heavily influenced the development of Caribbean Spanish.
The incorporation of the Canary Islands into the Crown of Castile began with Enrique III and ended with the Catholic Monarchs. The expeditions for their conquest started off mainly from ports of Andalusia and is the reason why the Andalusians predominated in the Canaries. There was also an important colonizing contingent coming from Portugal in the early conquest of the Canaries, along with the Andalusians and the Castilians from mainland Spain. In earlier times, Portuguese settled alongside the Spanish in the north of La Palma, but died off or were absorbed by the Spanish. The population that inhabited the islands before the conquest, the Guanches, spoke a series of Berber dialects, often referred to by the insular term, amazigh. After the conquest, a cultural process took place rapidly and intensely, with the native language disappearing almost completely in the archipelago. Surviving are some names of plants and animals, terms related to the cattle ranch, and numerous island placenames.
Due to their geographic situation, the Canary Islands have received much outside influence, causing drastic cultural changes, including linguistic ones. Canarian speech influenced the development of the Spanish spoken in Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Dominican Republic, as thousands of Canarians emigrated to those islands during the colonial period. In the U.S. state of Louisiana, there is a large community of Canary Islander descendants east of New Orleans called St. Bernard Parish; members of this community continue to speak the Canarian dialect of Spanish.
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[edit] Uses and pronunciation
[edit] Distinguishing features
- As is the case with most varieties of Spanish outside of mainland Spain, the indefinite past is generally used instead of the composed present perfect. Example: "I visited John" instead of "I have visited John" Ex. in Spanish: visité a Juan instead of yo he visitado a Juan.[citation needed]
- As is the case with most varieties of Spanish outside of central and northern Spain, Canarians use ustedes for all 2nd person plurals. Thus, instead of saying vosotros estáis they say ustedes están. Only in few and decreasing areas of the islands of Hierro, Palma and Gomera the pronoun vosotros is used, generally only by some of the older speakers. In Gomera and some parts of Palma, ustedes vos vais is used. Archaic forms like vaivos are used in some parts.[citation needed]
- The diminutive. As is the case with most varieties of Spanish outside of mainland Spain, -itito exists as an exaggerated use of the diminutive -ito. Example: We will make a comidita and if it is an even smaller amount, it is a comiditita, just as chiquito can be chiquitito.[citation needed]
Location of the Canary Islands in relation to the rest of Spain. - As is the case with most varieties of Spanish outside of mainland Spain, in some diminutives, syllables are suppressed. Example: Cochito instead of cochecito for small car, or florita instead of florecita.[citation needed]
- The most distinctive non-mainland (and Andalusian) Spanish characteristic is the merger that consists of pronouncing the sounds of "S" and "Z/soft C" alike. Example: caza ('hunt') is pronounced exactly like casa ('house').[citation needed] This feature is common to most parts of the Spanish-speaking world outside of the northern three quarters of Spain (Castile and the surrounding provinces which have adopted a very similar way of speaking).[citation needed]
- /s/ debuccalization. As is the case with many varieties of Spanish, /s/ debuccalized to [h] in coda position. These three characteristics are common in Andalusia, the area of the Caribbean, the Colombian Caribbean Coast and Venezuela. Between vowels, this may become complete deletion.[citation needed]
- Disappearance of de which means "of" in certain expressions, as is the case with many varieties of Spanish outside of mainland Spain. Example: casa Marta instead of casa de Marta, gofio millo instead of gofio de millo, etc.[citation needed]
[edit] The Isleños
The Isleños are the descendants of Canary Islanders in the U.S. state of Louisiana. The Isleño community is a large community in the southeast region of Louisiana. The Isleños speak Canarian Spanish with a few words borrowed from other cultures. The Isleños still have ties with the Canary Islands to this day.
[edit] Phonology in addition to the Phonology of the Canary Islands
The phonology of the Isleños can be linked diachronically to the Spanish dialects of the Canary Islands, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and ultimately to Andalusía in Spain. For example, the aspiration of syllable-final /s/ is a salient characteristic of the Canary Islands and the Caribbean and can also be found in Andalusian Spanish as is the assimilation of /r/ to the /l/ of a following enclitic pronoun. Isleño phonology has other phonetic variations which link it to the Canary Islands and Caribbean dialects: syllable-final /r/ becoming [h], as in [ˈpwehta] for puerta ('door'), and the deletion of /d/ between vowels and word-finally as in [eŋkaenˈao] for encadenado ('padlocked') and [uhˈte] for usted ('you').
The phonetic features of Isleño show their ancestry to Canarian Spanish, Caribbean Spanish, and Andalusian speech.
[edit] Vocabulary
The Canarian vocabulary also displays several influences, including archaisms that come from the Castilian of the time of the conquest, such as apopar (
There is also a notable Gaunche influence, especially in the toponymy where words of Gaunche origin have become nativized by the Spanish settlers. In addition, many names exist in the Canaries that come from the Guanche language (Gara, Acerina, Beneharo, Jonay, Tanausú, Chaxiraxi, Ayoze, Yaiza, etc).
