Peruvian Spanish

Peruvian Spanish has been spoken in Peru since 1532. There are four varieties spoken in the country, by about 80% of the population.^{[citation needed]}

History

The Spanish language first arrived in what is today Peru in 1532 in the dialects of Extremaduran, Andalusian and Canarian.^{[citation needed]} A little later there was a strong influence from Castilian.^[1]

At first, the language was only spoken by the Spanish and mestizos in the cities. The rural Andean regions continued speaking Quechua and other indigenous languages for four centuries, being the majority until the first half of the 20th century. After that,^[2] discrimination against the indigenous populations, the forced imposition of Spanish language by the Peruvian government, the growth of mass media and migration to the cities after 1940 reconfigured the dialectical map of Peru.

Peruvian dialects

Andean Spanish

Andean Spanish the most common dialect in the Andes (more marked in rural areas) and has many similarities with the "standard" dialect of Ecuador and Bolivia.

Principal characteristics

The phonology of Andean Peruvian Spanish is distinguished by its slow time and unique rhythm (grave accent), assibilation of /rr/ and /r/, and an apparent confusion of the vowels /e/ and /o/ with /i/ and /u/. (In reality, they are producing a sound between /e/ and /i/, and between /o/ and /u/.^[3]) Furthermore, the "s" (originally apical and without aspiration) is produced with more force than that of the coast; this is also generally true of the other consonants, at the loss of the vowels. Other distinctive features are the preservation of the sound of the "ll", sometimes over-corrected, and the change of the implosive "c" and "g" for "j" /x/.

The morphosyntactic characteristics are typical:

• Confusion or unification of gender and number

A ellas lo recibí bien.. La revista es caro.

• Confusion or unification of gender and number

esa es su trenza del carlos.

• Overuse of the diminutives –ito e –ita

Vente aquicito.. Sí, señorita, ahí están sus hijos.

• Loísmo

Lo echan la agua. Lo pintan la casa

• Duplication of the possessives and objects

Su casa de Pepe.. Lo conozco a ella.

• The absence or redundant use of articles

Plaza de Armas es acá. La María está loca.

• Uncommon use of the preposition "en" in front of locative adverbs

Todo caerá en su encima

• The use of "no más" and "pues" after the verb

Dile nomás pues.

• The use of the verb at the end of the phrase

Está enojada dice.

• The use of the simple tense to express the preterite and of the indicative in place of the subjunctive in subordinates.

Peruvian coast Spanish

Coastal Spanish is spoken by the upper classes in Lima, or those who have been in the capital or the coast (having little contact with social migrants) for a long time. In earlier times, it had the reputation (in pronunciation) of being one of the "purest" dialects in all of coastal Latin America.^[4][5][6] Despite being spoken by a minority, it has the reputation of being the base of "normal" or standard Peruvian Spanish.^[7]

Characteristics

• The vowels are pronounced clearly and with the same length of time.
• /rr/ and /r/ are pronounced clearly, without any fricativization.
• The "s" is pre-dorsal and aspirated (at times transformed into a silent velar fricative) in front of a consonant (but not syllable final as in Chile or Andalucia)
• The "j" and "g" (before e-i) has a pronunciation more palatal than velar and aspirated.
• The "n" is velar when syllable final (not alveolar like in Mexico or Argentina).
• The final /d/ is converted to /t/ or is elided.
• Yeísmo exists.
• The tendency to eliminate hiatus in word with an -ear suffix.

General Spanish phrases from the Americas are common but there are also phrases that originate in the Lima coastal area, such as frequent traditional terms and expressions; the most ingrained "quechuaism" in common speech is the familiar calato, meaning "naked".

Andean-Costal Spanish or neolimeño

Born in the most recent 30–50 years with a mixture of the speech of Andean migrants and the speech of Lima. This dialect is the speech that is most typical of Peru.

Characteristics

This dialect has the usual Andean syntactics, like lack of agreement in gender and number, the frequent use of diminutives or augmentatives, loísmo, double possessives and ending phrases with "pues", "pe" or "pue".

As far as the lexicon is concerned, there are numerous neologisms, influences from Quechua, and slang among the youth often heard in the streets.

Amazonic Spanish

This dialect has developed uniquely, with contact from Andean Spanish and the Spanish of Lima with the Amazonian languages. It has a distinctive tonal structure.

Phonetically it is characterized by:

• The sibilant /s/ resisting aspiration
• A confusion of "j" (aspirated in interior positions) with "f" (always bilabial)

For example, San Juan becomes San Fan

• There is occlusion of the intervals /b/ /d/ /g/ in tonal ascension with aspiration and lengthening of the vowels.
• The phonemes /p/ /t/ and /k/ are pronounced with aspiration
• The /y/ tends to become an affricate (as opposed to Coastal Peruvian Spanish)
• Also, there is assibilation and weak trills.

On the other hand, the syntactic order most recognized is the prefixation of the genitive:

De Antonio sus amigas

There are also disorders of agreement, gender, etc.

Equatorial Spanish

Dialect map of Ecuador and Peru.

This dialect is spoken in the region of Tumbes.

References