Talk:Examples of typical Puerto Rican vocabulary

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[edit] Puerto Rican, Caribbean, Latin American, or just Spanish?

A lot of these words are not especially Puerto Rican and are used in many spanish countries. It is absurd to consider chevere a Puerto Rican expression, and I doubt it is of African origin as it is used in countries with little African influence. It is even stranger to consider it a Yoruban word. Also, many of these words are used throughout the spanish caribean, such as batey.

In rebuttal to the above grievance

In response to the above concern; there seems no end to the art of hair splitting. Had the title of the article been Examples of Uniquely Puerto Rican Vocabulary, I would be in full agreement with the above grievance; however, this is not the case. We live in a world that grows smaller by the day and at this time there are very few languages or dialects that can truly claim to be free of borrowings of either vocabulary or grammatical syntax from other languages or dialects. The fact that there are vocabulary items listed in this article that are in use by Spanish speaking peoples other than Puerto Ricans does not mean that said examples are not typical of the daily vernacular within the Puerto Rican community.

As for your comment concerning your doubt of the African etymology of the word chevere, your doubt does not constitute academic fact. You further attempt to bolster this idea by mentioning that the word chevere is in use in countries having little African influence, making its African heritage unlikely. This statement is, in itself, completely ridiculous and lacking any modicum of academic savvy. The Basque term jai alai (as well as the game) is in daily use in the United States and I believe it is quite safe to say that the United States is a country with very little Basque influence. I, myself, am unsure as to the etymology of the word chevere, and you may very well be correct that it is not of African origin, but your current argument holds no water.

You mention that the word batey is not unique to Puerto Rico. Of course it is not. This word is, without any ‘doubt’, of Taino origin. Given that the Taino people were widespread throughout the Caribbean and parts of South America, I would find it unusual indeed if some Taino vocabulary did not linger on in other areas of the Caribbean and South America. Again, the author used the word typical within the title of the article and the word batey is very typical of the Puerto Rican vernacular and NOT very typical at all of the vernacular of the greater majority of the Spanish speaking peoples.Wreybies (talk) 16:00, 8 April 2008 (UTC)

The above (unfortunately unsigned) first comment is legitimate and to the point, and hardly "a grievance". What in reality might be regarded as offensive is the attempt to appropriate words that are of common use, or worse still, originating in other countries, even in Spain itself, and label them as belonging to the typical Puerto Rican vocabulary. If User:Wreybies has a valid argument for asserting that the word coño, for example, is just "typical" of Puerto Rico, I would like to read his/her views. I agree that this word may be as "typical" of Puerto Rico as the words 'casa' (house), or 'padre' (father), or 'agua' (water), which, according to the above reasoning, (sic)"said examples are ... typical of the daily vernacular within the Puerto Rican community" and accordingly should be included in the list as well. In this example (the word 'coño'), I believe there's no "doubt", academic or not. A number of words, 'coño' included, have no merits to be in this list, and hence I propose to delete them. Regards, --AVM (talk) 13:03, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Merge proposal

There is a clear redundancy with the article List of Puerto Rican slang words and phrases, even though that article, as its name implies, contains phrases in addition to single words. It is obvious that they deal basically with the same subject. Is is therefore worthy mergiing the two. --AVM (talk) 13:19, 11 June 2008 (UTC)