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How Spanish varieties are viewed? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : Philological Room |  | |
| Maximus Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6749 days ago 417 posts - 427 votes  Studies: Spanish, Japanese, Thai | Message 1 of 35 04 June 2006 at 5:21pm | IP Logged | ||
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I learn Spanish and understand that this is the language of about 20 counties of which all have individual characteristics. Well, in the English speaking world certain verieties of English are considered "Cool" by some such as the English of California or the unique accent of Jamaican English whilst some accents may be considered "whimpy" or dull. In the Spanish speaking world, which national variations of Spanish are considered to be "Cool" or attractive accents by people of the hispanic world?
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| patuco Diglot Moderator Gibraltar Joined 7015 days ago 3795 posts - 4268 votes Speaks: Spanish, English* Personal Language Map | Message 2 of 35 04 June 2006 at 6:00pm | IP Logged | ||
I don't know about "cool", but I find the Spanish spoken in Cuba, Venezuela, Galicia and Catalunya to have attractive accents, whereas I really don't like the accent from Madrid. This is a personal choice, however, so others will have different viewpoints. Edited by patuco on 04 June 2006 at 6:01pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Frisco Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6856 days ago 380 posts - 398 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Norwegian, Italian, Turkish, Mandarin | Message 3 of 35 04 June 2006 at 6:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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I know a lot of Spanish speakers amuse themselves by trying to imitate Argentine Spanish because of its unique intonation, verb/pronoun forms, and pronunciation of "y". Most Mexicans I know think it's the coolest accent.
Caribbean accents get on my nerves. Especially Cuban, but that's mostly due to the Cuban reputation of talking loudly, continuously and over everyone. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Lucia Diglot Senior Member Spain Joined 6820 days ago 146 posts - 147 votes Speaks: English, Spanish* Studies: German | Message 4 of 35 05 June 2006 at 10:03am | IP Logged | ||
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I think the people of Catalunya speak the coolest
Spanish ,mostly due to the influence Catalan has on their accent. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Maximus Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6749 days ago 417 posts - 427 votes Studies: Spanish, Japanese, Thai | Message 5 of 35 06 June 2006 at 8:53am | IP Logged | ||
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Patuco: I agree with the Madrid accent comment. I find Madrilenos pretty difficult to understand compared to "nicer" accents like that in Cataluna and also the Madrid accent appears rather dull.
I really think the Argentina accent is really beautiful and reminds me of Italian. I found the Chileno accent to have similar beauty. Is Chileno Spanish viewed tis way? What do most think of Mexican Spanish? Because I heard it is claimed to be the most clear and "pure" be Mexicans and is prefered by American TV chanels. What do Spanish people think of this? 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| sigiloso Heptaglot Groupie Portugal Joined 6779 days ago 87 posts - 103 votes Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2, PortugueseC1, Galician, French, Esperanto, Italian Studies: Russian, Greek | Message 6 of 35 14 June 2006 at 6:55am | IP Logged | ||
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Accent discussion is a no-no for me, but as I see this post is not getting much feedback from the around 20 native speakers in the forum, I thought I would make an effort. For what you are apparently after is not a collection of personal opinions and tastes, even less from non-native speakers, but something like associations in the "collective linguistic conscience", as I would call it. I have been off most Spanish things for a long time, but this is what I would say:
First of all, accents in Spanish most of the time are completely free of connotations other than geographical origin of the speaker. That is, usually nobody comes to a conclusion on social class, profession, etc. from the accent. This is important for an Englishman to understand and viceversa. You expect I suppose from a university professor something close or right RP, and Estuary from a plumber, but in Spain you can have university professors and plumbers with any accent. Clearly, conclusions can be arrived at from linguistics features such as propriety of vocabulary selection, of level of language to situation, content, etc., but not accent by itself. When meeting someone with a non local accent, the first and propably only reaction triggered in our mind -and mouth- is "you're not from here, arent you" "you're Sevillano, aren't you", that's all. But in England, some lorry drivers and so told me "You've been to University, haveyah?" "What makes you think that?" I would say, "Your accent", were their answer. (If ever I set out to further my English, it would be to try to shift from RP to Estuary at pleasure, now virtually I can't). A different thing is someone with a bias against, say, Catalonians, who insist their accents is awful, or polititians mocked by comedians for their accents, but I believe there are no a general shared view on coolness, etc., conected to an accent, and all you will get is a collection of opinions, but would be an interesting poll to see which accent is disliked more. Second thing you must bear in mind is that, beyond perhaps Madrileņo, as you call it, and Argentinian, as you call it ( I rather say Septemtrional and Rioplatense), and Cuban, which are a bit particular, the rest are so close to each other that the whole thing is almost negligible. I remember a Tv program on books conducted by a Canarian, I think , who use to interview together some Mexican, Colombian and Andalusian writers together. I would challenge any of you to say who is who, I bet you would fail hopelessly. A third thing I would say is that in the case of Spain, there is in that collective...thing I said a strong commandment "thou shalt never ever ever change accents or sounds". Those of us who apparently-miraculously have "flexibility of the organs of speech" as Mezzofanti allegedly said, have a problem when reading aloud anything foreign: what to do not to be hated but you yourself not feel ridiculous? That said, there's a bit more I can bring up as an exception to this referred to, specifically, Spain. I hope no Andalucian lurks around here, but in this case some connotation does exist, I am afraid. One of them is positive, of friendliness and talkativeness, but then... an Andalucian girl complained once that, if you look at tv soaps all Andalusian are servants, or not very intelligent... I can tell you, and it is not an opinion, is a reaction I cannot control, an Andalucian accent is an instant turn off in girls, "I don't want to marry a yokel" kind of thing. And above all, Andalusian is the official accent for joke telling. A popular comedian called Chiquito de la Calzada, with a strong accent and an idiolect he created, kept the whole ccountry chuckling our asses off for a couple of years. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Lucia Diglot Senior Member Spain Joined 6820 days ago 146 posts - 147 votes Speaks: English, Spanish* Studies: German | Message 7 of 35 14 June 2006 at 9:59am | IP Logged | ||
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Should I deduce from your post that Mexican,Columbian and Andalusian writers sound as yokels to you ? Would you throw in Llanito Spanish too ?
Iīm Andalusian,just like Juan Ramon Jimenez (literature Nobel prize ),Antonio Machado,,Federico Garcia Lorca,Antonio Muņoz Molina etc. etc. Well ,I can tell you that guys that canīt get their lorry driver accent right turn me off too. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Guanche Hexaglot Senior Member Spain danielmarin.blogspot Joined 7046 days ago 168 posts - 178 votes Speaks: Spanish*, EnglishC2, GermanC1, RussianB1, French, Japanese Studies: Greek, Mandarin, Arabic (Written) | Message 8 of 35 14 June 2006 at 12:30pm | IP Logged | ||
wow, I've never imagined I'd see Chiquito de la Calzada mentioned in this forum. He's a real myth in Spain and we should open a new thread to discuss his contributions to the Spanish vocabulary. ;-) On the other hand, my favourite Spanish accent is that spoken in Catalonia. Besides, I also find Madrid accent too harsh for my taste. Probably because the Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands tends to be softer and closer to that spoken in Venezuela. Edited by Guanche on 14 June 2006 at 12:35pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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