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casamata
Senior Member
Joined 4263 days ago
237 posts - 377 votes 
Studies: Portuguese
| Message 33 of 63 08 May 2013 at 7:13pm | IP Logged |
Random review wrote:
casamata wrote:
2. Also, and I am repeating this for the umpteenth time, I'm not
saying that any one accent is better, just that certain accents are generally perceived
as more high-class. Learn whatever you want. |
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I'm not quite sure why you keep repeating it, though, as I never said you did claim
such a thing.
casamata wrote:
1. Amongst Americans learning Spanish, I would bet that the majority of Americans
consider the Spanish accent more prestigious than Mexican Spanish. And I would expect
that amongst Spanish *learners* in the world, the Spanish accent would be amongst the
most prestigious, if not the most highly-regarded
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casamata wrote:
But answering your question, I think the opinions of Spanish non-natives is very
pertinent; it reflects the perceptions that we have about the Spanish language. They
may very well "be blind", but they think what they think, due to mass media, personal
exposure, or whatever factors that have led them to conclude that X accent is more
prestigious than Y accent. |
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The vast majority of people that the OP will interact with will be native speakers by
far, so I disagree.
casamata wrote:
What is more prestigious? A Mercedes Benz S class costing 80,000+ with
all the bells and whistles or a Toyota Corolla? Many people would prefer having the
Corolla due to cost, but very few people in the world would say that a Toyota Corolla
is as prestigious as a Mercedes Benz S class. |
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You keep making these plausible sounding analogies to situations that aren't actually
analogous. |
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Ok, why don't you conduct a random online survey with at least 1,000 respondents as to whether the "Spanish" accent (though there are many types within Spain) is more prestigious than the Mexican accent. (Also many types) It won't be perfect since it will be asking the question to relatively well-off people with access to the internet but obviously no study is ever perfect. And it obviously won't be asked of specifically one country; but people in general to avoid bias. I'm sure that Mexicans or Spaniards will click one answer.
Then you can do the same with Latin American Spanish. You can put, "Mexican", "Argentine", "Colombian" and "Bolivian." Also put in "Brazilian" because some Americans are so bad/sad? that they think that Brazilians speak Spanish.
1 person has voted this message useful
| casamata
Senior Member
Joined 4263 days ago
237 posts - 377 votes
Studies: Portuguese
| Message 34 of 63 08 May 2013 at 7:15pm | IP Logged |
Juаn wrote:
In order to experience first-hand the contrast between different strands of Spanish you can listen here to an interview between an illustrious Argentinian economist and a Colombian intellectual and statesman.
Notice how though accent and style are divergent, mutual comprehensibility is complete. |
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I don't think anybody was saying that Spanish is not 99.9% understood between the Latino countries. :)
1 person has voted this message useful
| casamata
Senior Member
Joined 4263 days ago
237 posts - 377 votes
Studies: Portuguese
| Message 35 of 63 08 May 2013 at 7:17pm | IP Logged |
Juаn wrote:
Let me just say that to a native speaker's ears definitely not all accents sound the same. This is such an obvious fact and applies to all speech communities everywhere, however the excesses of political correctness impose stating it nonetheless.
In this case, Spanish as spoken in the Colombian coastal regions, Venezuela, and parts of the Caribbean does generate a particular impression upon an educated speaker which though colorful, may not always be favorable. |
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Hmm, more people (natives, for people that prefer that) saying that coastal Spanish is less prestigious than inland types. Maybe we are on to something....
And yes, I have a lot of experience with natives and have listened to them talk about this subject.
1 person has voted this message useful
| Medulin
Tetraglot
Senior Member
Croatia
Joined 4669 days ago
1199 posts - 2192 votes
Speaks: Croatian*, English, Spanish, Portuguese
Studies: Norwegian, Hindi, Nepali
| Message 36 of 63 08 May 2013 at 10:33pm | IP Logged |
What does it mean ''prestigious''?
1. seen as prestigious within a country?
2. seen as prestigious in other Spanish speaking countries?
3. seen as prestigious by foreigners?
1.
Argentinian Spanish is prestigious within Argentina, especially the porteño variant.
Argentinians think highly of their usage, and they made RAE include voseo in the official paradigm.
Hadn't it been for them, voseo would still be regarded as dialectal, folksy, unnaducated by RAE.
2.
Most countries tend to respect their usage, even though they may find the usage in other countries ''more correct''. For example, even in Chile, people tend to say Peruvians speak better Spanish.
3.
In Brazil, Peninsular Spanish is considered prestigious, and Latin American Spanish is not.
That's why all schools teach Peninsular Spanish (with stress on vosotros, use of present perfect as '¿'Qué ha pasado?'', and even distinción.) The same thing happens in Italy.
---
As for Colombian Spanish,
there is no such thing as ''Colombian Spanish''
there are at least 10 different dialects/accents within Colombia: not only pronouns are different (vos in Medellín and Cali, informal usted in Bogotá, tú and vos and usted in other parts of Colombia), but the pronunciation and grammar can be different too. Colombian Spanish is one of the rare Spanish variants (along with Salvadoran) which contradicts the rules of Spanish phonology, so I'm not sure it can be considered as ''the most standard'' at all:
''
In Colombian Spanish, the voiced consonants /b/, /d/, and /ɡ/ are pronounced as plosives after and sometimes before any consonant (rather than the fricative or approximant that is characteristic of most other dialects). Thus pardo [ˈpaɹdo], barba [ˈbarba], algo [ˈalɡo], peligro [peˈliɡɾo], desde [ˈdezde/ˈdehde]—rather than the [ˈparðo], [ˈbarβa], [ˈalɣo], [peˈliɣɾo], [ˈdezðe/ˈdehðe] of Spain and the rest of Spanish America. '' (Wikipedia)
Spirantization (Softening) is the rule is neutral Spanish, unless one is speaking extremely slowly.
Failing to soften consonants as observed in Colombian/Salvadoran Spanish is not standard ''global'' Spanish, but a remnant of medieval pronunciation.
Foreign learners of Spanish think of Colombian variants as ''the clearest'' because they prefer b, d, g
to [β], [ð], [ɣ]. But, in standard Spanish [β], [ð], [ɣ] should be produced, no matter how ''muffled'' they might sound to foreigners.
Edited by Medulin on 08 May 2013 at 11:01pm
3 persons have voted this message useful
| casamata
Senior Member
Joined 4263 days ago
237 posts - 377 votes
Studies: Portuguese
| Message 37 of 63 08 May 2013 at 11:15pm | IP Logged |
Medulin wrote:
What does it mean ''prestigious''?
1. seen as prestigious within a country?
2. seen as prestigious in other Spanish speaking countries?
3. seen as prestigious by foreigners?
1.
Argentinian Spanish is prestigious within Argentina, especially the porteño variant.
Argentinians think highly of their usage, and they made RAE include voseo in the official paradigm.
Hadn't it been for them, voseo would still be regarded as dialectal, folksy, unnaducated by RAE.
2.
Most countries tend to respect their usage, even though they may find the usage in other countries ''more correct''. For example, even in Chile, people tend to say Peruvians speak better Spanish.
3.
In Brazil, Peninsular Spanish is considered prestigious, and Latin American Spanish is not.
That's why all schools teach Peninsular Spanish (with stress on vosotros, use of present perfect as '¿'Qué ha pasado?'', and even distinción.) The same thing happens in Italy.
---
As for Colombian Spanish,
there is no such thing as ''Colombian Spanish''
there are at least 10 different dialects/accents within Colombia: not only pronouns are different (vos in Medellín and Cali, informal usted in Bogotá, tú and vos and usted in other parts of Colombia), but the pronunciation and grammar can be different too. Colombian Spanish is one of the rare Spanish variants (along with Salvadoran) which contradicts the rules of Spanish phonology, so I'm not sure it can be considered as ''the most standard'' at all:
''
In Colombian Spanish, the voiced consonants /b/, /d/, and /ɡ/ are pronounced as plosives after and sometimes before any consonant (rather than the fricative or approximant that is characteristic of most other dialects). Thus pardo [ˈpaɹdo], barba [ˈbarba], algo [ˈalɡo], peligro [peˈliɡɾo], desde [ˈdezde/ˈdehde]—rather than the [ˈparðo], [ˈbarβa], [ˈalɣo], [peˈliɣɾo], [ˈdezðe/ˈdehðe] of Spain and the rest of Spanish America. '' (Wikipedia)
Spirantization (Softening) is the rule is neutral Spanish, unless one is speaking extremely slowly.
Failing to soften consonants as observed in Colombian/Salvadoran Spanish is not standard ''global'' Spanish, but a remnant of medieval pronunciation.
Foreign learners of Spanish think of Colombian variants as ''the clearest'' because they prefer b, d, g
to [β], [ð], [ɣ]. But, in standard Spanish [β], [ð], [ɣ] should be produced, no matter how ''muffled'' they might sound to foreigners. |
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Of course there is just not "one" Colombian Spanish. Colombia has a ton of accents, partly due to the geography of the country which isolated many people and led to many accents. But the premise was that the "Colombian accentS as a whole" were more prestigious than the Bolivian accent, for example. I'm not going to list all the accents like Cali, Bogotá, Medellin, etc.
1. Is it really that hard for people to believe that an accent in Spanish would be considered more prestigious by people in general? If we had an internet poll asking if the Dominican accentS or the Spanish accentS were more prestigious, does anybody really think that the majority would say the Dominican accentS?
2. In case you don't believe with point 1, I find it hard to think that it would be difficult to think that *within* a country *at least*, some accents are more highly thought of than others. In America, most Americans will think that the midwestern accent is more highly thought of than the Southern one, for example.
In Spain, most will say that a Valladolid resident speaks "better" than an Andalucian. I've asked a lot of Spaniards that are *not* from either area and when I ask them where the "most prestigious" Spanish is spoken, they all literally say Valladolid.
Of course, there seems to always be one person that says, "Uh no. I think that the Dominican accentS are the most prestigious and it doesn't matter if 95% of the polled people disagree with me it's my opinion and you're wrong." (a hypothetical scenario in which 95% said that the Spanish accentS were more prestigious than the Dominican accentS)
1 person has voted this message useful
| Random review
Diglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5784 days ago
781 posts - 1310 votes
Speaks: English*, Spanish
Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German
| Message 38 of 63 08 May 2013 at 11:21pm | IP Logged |
casamata wrote:
Ok, why don't you conduct a random online survey with at least 1,000 respondents as to
whether the "Spanish" accent (though there are many types within Spain) is more
prestigious than the Mexican accent. (Also many types) It won't be perfect since it
will be asking the question to relatively well-off people with access to the internet
but obviously no study is ever perfect. And it obviously won't be asked of specifically
one country; but people in general to avoid bias. I'm sure that Mexicans or Spaniards
will click one answer.
Then you can do the same with Latin American Spanish. You can put, "Mexican",
"Argentine", "Colombian" and "Bolivian." Also put in "Brazilian" because some Americans
are so bad/sad? that they think that Brazilians speak Spanish.
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I'm not in a position to do that. I'm a pot-washer from the UK with no affiliation to
any recognised academic institution and no money to set up such a thing, not an
academic researcher.
However, I could say the same to you! I could just as reasonably ask you to back up
your claim that there is a universal prestige dialect with such a survey. Why are you
holding me to a higher standard of evidence than you yourself provide to back up your
claim?
Instead I've focussed on giving examples of features of one of the dialects that you
gave as an example of a prestigious dialect (that of Northern Spain) that I know to be
seen as not at all seen as prestigious by many Latin Americans. I also gave an example
of a dialect feature (voseo) that is seen as low prestige in some countries but as
perfectly good Spanish in at least one (Argentina). You still haven't
countered these points.
You also still haven't addressed my point that all the examples you give are regional
phenomena and not universal perceptions throughout the Spanish world, nor have you
yourself provided any statistical evidence of the sort you seem to demand of me.
casamata wrote:
Juаn wrote:
Let me just say that to a native speaker's ears
definitely not all accents sound the same. This is such an obvious fact and applies to
all speech communities everywhere, however the excesses of political correctness impose
stating it nonetheless.
In this case, Spanish as spoken in the Colombian coastal regions, Venezuela, and parts
of the Caribbean does generate a particular impression upon an educated speaker which
though colorful, may not always be favorable. |
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Hmm, more people (natives, for people that prefer that) saying that coastal Spanish is
less prestigious than inland types. Maybe we are on to something.... |
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You see, this is yet another case in point. It is well-known that within Columbia the
perception you describe is widespread, you can easily find plenty of studies actually
showing this just by using google! This is simply not the same as saying that the
coastal dialects of Columbia are seen as less prestigious than that of Bogota by most
native Spanish speakers. Not at all.
casamata wrote:
And yes, I have a lot of experience with natives and have listened to
them talk about this subject. |
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Is that addressed at me? I never said you hadn't.
Edited by Random review on 08 May 2013 at 11:23pm
2 persons have voted this message useful
| Random review
Diglot
Senior Member
United Kingdom
Joined 5784 days ago
781 posts - 1310 votes
Speaks: English*, Spanish
Studies: Portuguese, Mandarin, Yiddish, German
| Message 39 of 63 08 May 2013 at 11:25pm | IP Logged |
Medulin wrote:
What does it mean ''prestigious''?
1. seen as prestigious within a country?
2. seen as prestigious in other Spanish speaking countries?
3. seen as prestigious by foreigners?
1.
Argentinian Spanish is prestigious within Argentina, especially the porteño variant.
Argentinians think highly of their usage, and they made RAE include voseo in the
official paradigm.
Hadn't it been for them, voseo would still be regarded as dialectal, folksy,
unnaducated by RAE.
2.
Most countries tend to respect their usage, even though they may find the usage in
other countries ''more correct''. For example, even in Chile, people tend to say
Peruvians speak better Spanish.
3.
In Brazil, Peninsular Spanish is considered prestigious, and Latin American Spanish is
not.
That's why all schools teach Peninsular Spanish (with stress on vosotros, use of
present perfect as '¿'Qué ha pasado?'', and even distinción.) The same thing happens in
Italy.
---
As for Colombian Spanish,
there is no such thing as ''Colombian Spanish''
there are at least 10 different dialects/accents within Colombia: not only pronouns are
different (vos in Medellín and Cali, informal usted in Bogotá, tú and vos and usted in
other parts of Colombia), but the pronunciation and grammar can be different too.
Colombian Spanish is one of the rare Spanish variants (along with Salvadoran) which
contradicts the rules of Spanish phonology, so I'm not sure it can be considered as
''the most standard'' at all:
''
In Colombian Spanish, the voiced consonants /b/, /d/, and /ɡ/ are pronounced as
plosives after and sometimes before any consonant (rather than the fricative or
approximant that is characteristic of most other dialects). Thus pardo [ˈpaɹdo], barba
[ˈbarba], algo [ˈalɡo], peligro [peˈliɡɾo], desde [ˈdezde/ˈdehde]—rather than the
[ˈparðo], [ˈbarβa], [ˈalɣo], [peˈliɣɾo], [ˈdezðe/ˈdehðe] of Spain and the rest of
Spanish America. '' (Wikipedia)
Spirantization (Softening) is the rule is neutral Spanish, unless one is speaking
extremely slowly.
Failing to soften consonants as observed in Colombian/Salvadoran Spanish is not
standard ''global'' Spanish, but a remnant of medieval pronunciation.
Foreign learners of Spanish think of Colombian variants as ''the clearest'' because
they prefer b, d, g
to [β], [ð], [ɣ]. But, in standard Spanish [β], [ð], [ɣ] should be produced, no
matter how ''muffled'' they might sound to foreigners. |
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Good post, man.
1 person has voted this message useful
| casamata
Senior Member
Joined 4263 days ago
237 posts - 377 votes
Studies: Portuguese
| Message 40 of 63 09 May 2013 at 12:44am | IP Logged |
Random review wrote:
casamata wrote:
Ok, why don't you conduct a random online survey with at least 1,000 respondents as to
whether the "Spanish" accent (though there are many types within Spain) is more
prestigious than the Mexican accent. (Also many types) It won't be perfect since it
will be asking the question to relatively well-off people with access to the internet
but obviously no study is ever perfect. And it obviously won't be asked of specifically
one country; but people in general to avoid bias. I'm sure that Mexicans or Spaniards
will click one answer.
Then you can do the same with Latin American Spanish. You can put, "Mexican",
"Argentine", "Colombian" and "Bolivian." Also put in "Brazilian" because some Americans
are so bad/sad? that they think that Brazilians speak Spanish.
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|
|
I'm not in a position to do that. I'm a pot-washer from the UK with no affiliation to
any recognised academic institution and no money to set up such a thing, not an
academic researcher.
However, I could say the same to you! I could just as reasonably ask you to back up
your claim that there is a universal prestige dialect with such a survey. Why are you
holding me to a higher standard of evidence than you yourself provide to back up your
claim?
Instead I've focussed on giving examples of features of one of the dialects that you
gave as an example of a prestigious dialect (that of Northern Spain) that I know to be
seen as not at all seen as prestigious by many Latin Americans. I also gave an example
of a dialect feature (voseo) that is seen as low prestige in some countries but as
perfectly good Spanish in at least one (Argentina). You still haven't
countered these points.
You also still haven't addressed my point that all the examples you give are regional
phenomena and not universal perceptions throughout the Spanish world, nor have you
yourself provided any statistical evidence of the sort you seem to demand of me.
casamata wrote:
Juаn wrote:
Let me just say that to a native speaker's ears
definitely not all accents sound the same. This is such an obvious fact and applies to
all speech communities everywhere, however the excesses of political correctness impose
stating it nonetheless.
In this case, Spanish as spoken in the Colombian coastal regions, Venezuela, and parts
of the Caribbean does generate a particular impression upon an educated speaker which
though colorful, may not always be favorable. |
|
|
Hmm, more people (natives, for people that prefer that) saying that coastal Spanish is
less prestigious than inland types. Maybe we are on to something.... |
|
|
You see, this is yet another case in point. It is well-known that within Columbia the
perception you describe is widespread, you can easily find plenty of studies actually
showing this just by using google! This is simply not the same as saying that the
coastal dialects of Columbia are seen as less prestigious than that of Bogota by most
native Spanish speakers. Not at all.
casamata wrote:
And yes, I have a lot of experience with natives and have listened to
them talk about this subject. |
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Is that addressed at me? I never said you hadn't.
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You are completely right. All the types of English and Spanish that you speak off are equally prestigious and recognized by people in the world. When I turn on CNN I am greeted by a southern drawl from the rural US, and when I read elpais.es, all the articles are written in the same language as "los santos innocentes" by Miguel Delibes. (rural Spanish) No languages are more prestigious than others. Americans think that Spanish and French are equally prestigious. Similarly, all arabic dialects are considered as high-class; the Egyptian variety is not seen as more desired than others. The Quebec French is just as popular as Parisian French. We are all the same. Kumbayah.
2 persons have voted this message useful
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