Spanish phonology

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This article is about the phonology of the Spanish language. It deals with current phonology and phonetics as well as with historical developments thereof, including geographical variants (for details, see the articles on History of the Spanish language and Spanish dialects and varieties).

Spanish has many allophones, so it is important here to distinguish phonemes (written in slashes / /) and corresponding allophones (written in brackets [ ]).

Consonants

Table of consonant phonemes of Spanish

	Bilabial	Labio- dental	Dental	Alveolar	Palatal		Velar
Nasal	m			n	ɲ
Stop	p   b		t   d		tʃ	ʝ	k   ɡ
Fricative		f	θ	s			x
Trill				r
Tap				ɾ
Lateral				l	ʎ

Phonetic notes

/t/ and /d/ are laminal denti-alveolar.

/b/, /d/, and /ɡ/ are approximants ([β̞], [ð̞], [ɣ˕]; hereafter represented without the undertack) in all places except after a pause, a nasal consonant or, in the case of /d/, after a lateral consonant; in such contexts they are voiced plosives.

/ʝ/ is an approximant in all contexts except after a nasal, /l/, or a pause where it may be an affricate ([ɟʝ]). The approximant allophone differs from non-syllabic /i/ in a number of ways; it has a lower F2 amplitude, is longer, can only appear in the syllable onset (including word-initially, where non-syllabic /i/ never appears), is a palatal fricative in emphatic pronunciations, and is unspecified for rounding (e.g. viuda [ˈbjuða] 'widow' vs ayuda [aˈʝʷuða] 'help'). The two also overlap in distribution after /l/ and /n/: enyesar [ẽ̞ɲˈɟʝe̞saɾ] ('to plaster') aniego [ãnje̞ɣo̞] ('flood'). Although there is dialectal and ideolectal variation, speakers may also exhibit other near-minimal pairs like abyecto ('abject') vs abierto ('opened'). There are some alternations between the two, prompting Alarcos Llorach (1950) to postulate an archiphoneme /I/ so that ley would be transcribed /ˈleI/ and leyes /ˈleIes/.

In a number of varieties, including some American ones, a process parallel to the one distinguishing non-syllabic /i/ from consonantal /ʝ/ occurs for non-syllabic /u/ and a rare consonantal /w̝/. Near minimal pairs include deshuesar [de̞zw̝e̞ˈsaɾ] ('to bone') vs. desuello [de̞ˈzwe̞ʝo̞] ('skinning'), son huevos [ˈsõ̞ŋ ˈw̝e̞βo̞s] ('they are eggs') vs son nuevos [ˈsõ̞ ˈnwe̞βo̞s] ('they are new'), and huaca [ˈ(ɡ)w̝aka] ('Indian grave') vs u oca [ˈwo̞ka] ('or goose').

/θ/, /s/, and /f/ become voiced before voiced consonants as in jazmín ('Jasmine') [xaðˈmĩn], rasgo ('feature') [ˈrazɣo̞], and Afganistán [avɣãnisˈtãn]. While /s/ becomes dental before denti-alveolar consonants, /θ/ remains interdental in all contexts. /x/ may be pronounced uvular before /u/ (including when /u/ is in the syllable onset as [w]).

Although there are only three nasal phonemes and two lateral ones, /l/ and the nasal consonants assimilate to the place of articulation of following consonants even across word boundaries. Nasals are only contrastive before vowels; for most speakers, only [n] appears before a pause, though in Caribbean varieties this may instead be [ŋ] or on omitted nasal with nasalization of the preceding vowel. Assimilatory allophones are shown in the following table:

nasal			lateral
word	IPA	gloss	word	IPA	gloss
ánfora	[ˈãɱfo̞ɾa]	'amphora'
encía	[ẽ̞n̟ˈθia]	'gum'	alzar	[al̟ˈθaɾ]	'to raise'
antes	[ˈãn̪t̪e̞s]	'before'	alto	[ˈal̪t̪o̞]	'tall'
ancha	[ˈãnʲtʃa]	'wide'	colcha	[ˈko̞lʲtʃa]	'quilt'
cónyuge	[ˈkõ̞ɲɟʝuxe̞]	'spouse'
rincón	[rĩŋˈkõ̞n]	'corner'
enjuto	[ẽ̞ɴˈχut̪o̞]	'dry'

Vowels

	Front	Central	Back
Close	i		u
Mid	e̞		o̞
Open		ä

Spanish has five vowels /i/ /e/ /a/ /o/ /u/. Each occurs in both stressed and unstressed syllables:

stressed		unstressed
piso	'I step'	pisó	's/he stepped
peso	'I weigh'	pesó	's/he weighed'
paso	'I pass'	pasó	's/he passed'
poso	'I pose'	posó	's/he posed'
pujo	'I bid' (present tense)	pujó	's/he bid' (past tense)

Spanish diphthongs

IPA	Example	Meaning
Falling
/ei/	rey	king
/ai/	aire	air
/oi/	hoy	today
/eu/	neutro	neutral
/au/	pausa	break
/ou/	bou	seine fishing
Rising
/je/	tierra	earth
/ja/	hacia	towards
/jo/	radio	radio
/ju/	viuda	widow
/wi/	fuimos	we went
/we/	fuego	fire
/wa/	cuadro	picture
/wo/	cuota	quota

Nevertheless, there are some distributional gaps or rarities. For instance, an unstressed high vowel in the ultimate syllable of a word is rare.

Spanish has six falling diphthongs and eight rising diphthongs. In addition, during fast speech, sequences of vowels in hiatus become diphthongs wherein one becomes non-syllabic (unless they are the same vowel, in which case they fuse together) as in poeta [ˈpo̯eta] ('poet') and maestro [ˈmae̯stɾo] ('teacher'). In the case of verbs like aliviar ('relieve'), diphthongs result from the suffixation of normal verbal morphology onto a stem-final /j/ (that is, aliviar would be |alibj| + |ar|). This contrasts with verbs like ampliar ('to extend') which, by their verbal morphology, seem to have stems ending in /i/.

Spanish also possesses triphthongs like /wei/ and, in dialects that use a second person plural conjugation, /jai/, /jei/, and /wai/ (e.g. buey, 'ox'; cambiáis, 'you change'; cambiéis, '(that) you may change'; and averiguáis, 'you ascertain'). Non-syllabic /e/, /o/, and /a/ can be reduced to [ʝ], [w̝] and complete elision, respectively, as in beatitud [bʝatiˈtuð] ('beatitude'), poetisa [pw̝e̞ˈtisa] ('poetess'), and ahorita [o̞ˈɾita] ('right away'); the frequency (though not the presence) of this phenomenon differs amongst dialects, with a number having it occur rarely and others exhibiting it always.

Phonetic nasalization occurs for vowels occurring between nasal consonants or when preceding a syllable final nasal.

An epenthetic [e̞] is inserted before word-initial /s/ + consonant. e.g escribir ('to write') but not transcribir ('to transcribe').

Stress

Spanish is a syllable-timed language, so each syllable has the same duration regardless of stress. Stress most often occurs on any of the last three syllables of a word, with some rare exceptions at the fourth last. The tendencies of stress assignment are as follows:

• In words ending in vowels and /s/, stress most often falls on the penultimate syllable.
• In words ending in all other consonants, the stress more often falls on the ultimate syllable.
• Preantepenultimate stress occurs rarely and only in words like guardándoselos ('saving them for him/her') where a clitic follows certain verbal forms.

In addition to the many exceptions to these tendencies, there are numerous minimal pairs which contrast solely on stress such as sábana ('sheet') and sabana ('savannah'), as well as límite ('boundary'), limite ('[that] he/she limits') and limité ('I limited').

Phonological stress may be marked orthographically with an acute accent (ácido, distinción, etc). This is done according to the mandatory stress rules of Spanish orthography which are similar to the tendencies above (differing with words like distinción) and are defined so as to unequivocally indicate where the stress lies in a given written word. An acute accent may also be used to differentiate homophones (such as té for 'tea' and te for 'you').

Alternations

A number of alternations exist in Spanish that reflect diachronic changes in the language and arguably reflect morphonological processes rather than strictly phonological ones. For instance, a number of words alternate between /k/ and /θ/ or /ɡ/ and /x/ with the latter in each pair appearing before a front vowel:

word		gloss	word		gloss
opaco	/oˈpako/	'opaque'	opacidad	/opaθiˈdad/	'opacity'
sueco	/ˈsweko/	'Swedish'	Suecia	/ˈsweθja/	'Sweden'
belga	/ˈbelɡa/	'Belgian'	Bélgica	/ˈbelxika/	'Belgium'
análogo	/aˈnaloɡo/	'analogous'	analogía	/analoˈxia/	'analogy'

There are also alternations between unstressed /e/ and /o/ and stressed /je/ and /we/ respectively:

word	gloss	word	gloss
heló	'it froze'	hiela	'it is freezing'
venezolano	'venezuelan'	Venezuela	'Venezuela'

Likewise, the alveolar trill ([r]) and alveolar tap ([ɾ]) contrast intervocalically but are otherwise in complementary distribution: [r] is found after /l/, /n/, and /s/, before consonants, and utterance finally; [ɾ] is found elsewhere. Alternations exist when a rhotic appears word-finally. With words like amor, the rhotic manifests as the trill when said before a pause or a consonant-initial word as in amor paterno [ãˈmo̞r paˈte̞rno̞] ('paternal love') but as the tap when preceding a vowel-initial word as in amor eterno [ãˈmo̞ɾ e̞ˈte̞rno̞]. There are also alternations occurring with suffixation, such as when nouns are pluralized: amor [ãˈmo̞r] vs. amores [ ãˈmo̞ɾe̞s].

In more casual speech, a preconsonantal rhotic is the tap rather than the trill thus arma ('gun') may be [ˈarma] or [ˈaɾma].

Other alternations include /ks/ ~ /x/ (anexar vs anejo), /kt/ ~ /tʃ/ (nocturno vs noche), as well as pairs that show antepenultimate stress in nouns and adjectives but penultimate stress in synonymous verbs (vómito 'vomit' vs vomito 'I vomit').

Phonotactics

Spanish syllable structure is (C)(L|R)V(C)(S) with a maximal example being the first syllable of transporte.

Dialectal variation

One notable dialectal feature is the merging of /ʝ/ and /ʎ/ into one phoneme (yeísmo); in metropolitan areas of the Iberian Peninsula, /ʎ/ simply loses its laterality and in some South American countries, they are both realized as [ʒ]. Other dialectal variations include /x/ → [h] and the merging of /θ/ and /s/ in areas of Andalusia, Canary Islands, and Latin America (see ceceo for more information).

/s/ is also the subject of some variation; in most of Spain, it is apicoalveolar while it is laminal in Andalusia, Canary Islands, and Latin America. In some dialects, /s/ may become the approximant [ɹ] in the syllable coda (doscientos: [do̞ɹˈθje̞nto̞s] 'two hundred'). In many places it debuccalizes to [h] in final position (niños), or before another consonant (fósforo) - in other words, the change occurs in the coda position in a syllable. In the Colombian Caribe, gemination may occur before /k/ or /f/ consonants (pescado: [pe̞ˈkːaðo̞] or [pe̞ˈkːao̞], fósforo: [ˈfo̞fːo̞ro̞]).

From an autosegmental point of view, the /s/ phoneme in Madrid is defined only by its voiceless and fricative features. This means that the point of articulation is not defined and is determined from the sounds following it in the word or sentence. Thus in Madrid the following realizations are found: /peskado/ → [pe̞xkao̞] and /fosforo/ → [fo̞fːo̞ro̞]). In parts of southern Spain, the only feature defined for /s/ appears to be voiceless; it may lose its oral articulation entirely to become [h]) or even a geminate with the following consonant ([ˈmihmo̞] or [ˈmĩmmo̞] from /ˈmismo/ 'same'). In Eastern Andalusian Spanish, word-final /s/ and /x/ (phonetically [h]) regularly weaken and the preceding vowel is lowered:

/is/ → [i̞] e.g. mis [mi̞] ('my' pl)

/es/ → [ɛ] e.g. mes [mɛ] ('month')

/as/ → [æ̞] e.g. más [mæ̞] ('plus')

/os/ → [ɔ] e.g. tos [tɔ] ('cough')

/us/ → [u̞] e.g. tus [tu̞] ('your' pl)

A subsequent process of vowel harmony takes place so that lejos ('far') is [ˈlɛhɔ], tenéis ('you all have') is [tɛˈnɛi] and tréboles ('clovers') is [ˈtɾɛβɔlɛ] or [ˈtɾɛβo̞lɛ].

In Standard Castilian, voiced obstruents are devoiced before a pause as in [se̞ð̥] ('thirst').

See also

• History of the Spanish language
• List of phonetics topics
• Spanish dialects and varieties
• Spanish vocabulary

References

• Abercrombie, David (1967), Elements of General Phonetics, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press
• Alarcos Llorach, Emilio (1950), Fonología Española, Madrid: Gredos
• Bowen, J. Donald; Stockwell, Robert P. (1955), "The Phonemic Interpretation of Semivowels in Spanish", Language, 31 (2): 236–240
• Browman, L.; Goldstein (1995), "Gestural syllable position in American English", in Bell-Berti, F.; Raphael, L.J. (eds.), Producing Speech: Contemporary issues for K Harris, New York: AIP, pp. 9–33
• Cressey, William Whitney (1978), Spanish Phonology and Morphology: A Generative View, Georgetown University Press, ISBN 0878400451
• Eddington, David (2000), "Spanish Stress Assignment within the Analogical Modeling of Language" (PDF), Language, 76 (1): 92–109
• Fougeron, C (1999), "Prosodically conditioned articulatory variation: A Review", UCLA Working Papers in Phonetics, vol. 97, pp. 1–73
• Harris, James (1969), Spanish phonology, Cambridge: MIT Press
• Lipski, J.M. (1994), Latin American Spanish, London: Longman
• Lloret, Maria-Rosa (2007), "On the Nature of Vowel Harmony: Spreading with a Purpose", in Bisetto, Antonietta; Barbieri, Francesco (eds.), Proceedings of the XXXIII Incontro di Grammatica Generativa, pp. 15–35
• MacDonald, Marguerite (1989), "The influence of Spanish phonology on the English spoken by United States Hispanics", in Bjarkman, Peter; Hammond, Robert (eds.), American Spanish pronunciation: Theoretical and applied perspectives], Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, pp. 215–236 {{citation}}: External link in |title= (help)
• Martínez-Celdrán, Eugenio; Fernández-Planas, Ana Ma.; Carrera-Sabaté, Josefina (2003), "Castilian Spanish", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 33 (2): 255–259
• Martínez-Celdrán, Eugenio (2004), "Problems in the Classification of Approximants", Journal of the International Phonetic Association, 34 (2): 201–210
• Navarro Tomás, Tomás (1961), Manual de pronunciación española (10th ed.), Madrid: CSIC
• Obaid, Antonio H. (1973), "The Vagaries of the Spanish 'S'", Hispania, 56: 60–67, doi:10.2307/339038
• Ohala, John; Lorentz, James, "The story of [w]: An exercise in the phonetic explanation for sound patterns", in Whistler, Kenneth; van Vahn, Robert Jr.; Chiarelloet, Chris (eds.), Proceedings of the 3rd Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society, Berkeley: Berkeley Linguistic Society, pp. 577–599
• Recasens, Daniel (2004), "The effect of syllable position on consonant reduction (evidence fromCatalan consonant clusters)", Journal of Phonetics, 32: 435–453
• Saporta, Sol (1956), "A Note on Spanish Semivowels", Language, 32 (2): 287–290
• Trager, George (1942), "The Phonemic Treatment of Semivowels", Language, 18 (3): 220–223
• Wetzels, W. Leo; Mascaró, Joan (2001), "The Typology of Voicing and Devoicing", Language, 77 (2): 207–244

Further reading

• Hammond, Robert M. (2001). The Sounds of Spanish: Analysis and Application. Somerville, Massachusetts: Cascadilla Press. ISBN 1-57473-018-5.