Phonological history of Spanish coronal fricatives
In Spanish dialectology, the realization of coronal fricatives is one of the most prominent features distinguishing various dialect regions. The main three realizations are the phonemic distinction between and , the presence of only alveolar , or, less commonly, the presence of only a denti-alveolar that is similar to .
While an urban legend attributes the presence of the dental fricative to a Spanish king with a lisp, the various realizations of these coronal fricatives are actually a result of historical processes that date to the 15th century.
Origins
Castilian 'lisp'
A persistent urban legend claims that the prevalence of the sound in Spanish can be traced to a Spanish king who spoke with a lisp, whose pronunciation spread via prestige borrowing to the rest of the population. This myth has been discredited by scholars. traces the origins of the legend to a chronicle of Pero López de Ayala which says that Peter of Castile "lisped a little". However, Peter reigned in the 14th century and the sound began to develop in the 16th century. Moreover, a true lisp would not give rise to the systematic distinction between and that characterizes standard Peninsular pronunciation. For example, a lisp would lead one to pronounce and the same whereas in standard Peninsular Spanish they are pronounced and respectively.The misnomer "Castilian lisp" is used occasionally to refer to the presence of in Peninsular pronunciation.
Historical evolution
In the 15th century, Spanish had developed a large number of sibilant phonemes: seven by some accounts, eight by others, more than any current dialect. During the 16th and early 17th centuries these phonemes merged differently as they evolved into those of the different modern dialects. There were four pairs of voiceless versus voiced sibilants: dental/alveolar affricates vs. ; dental/alveolar fricatives vs. ; postalveolar affricates vs. ; and postalveolar fricatives vs.. Both and were spelled before or , and elsewhere. It is likely that deaffricated and merged with before the year 1500. The main difference between the prestige dialect of north central Spain and dialects to the south was that, in the north, the dental/alveolar continuants were more retracted than the affricates, keeping their phonemic distinction, while in the south they were homorganic. The first step away from that system was the deaffrication of in the first quarter of the 16th century. Because of a differing place of articulation, this still contrasted with in the prestige dialect of north central Spain, though it was a complete merger for southern dialects.| Pronunciation | Orthography | ||
| voiced affricate → fricative | postalveolar | → | before ⟨e⟩, ⟨i⟩; ⟨j⟩ elsewhere |
| voiceless fricative | postalveolar | ||
| voiceless affricate | postalveolar | ||
| voiced fricative | apicoalveolar | intervocalic | |
| voiceless fricative | apicoalveolar | in syllable onset or coda; between vowels | |
| voiced affricate → fricative | coronal | → | |
| voiceless affricate | coronal | before, ; before,, |
The second step was the devoicing of voiced sibilants. In the north, and were lost, but remained contrastive with its new pronunciation, because there had been no voiceless previously. This sound contrasted with two acoustically similar sounds: dentoalveolar and apicoalveolar. By 1600,, too, had deaffricated and merged with the earlier that had already developed from. Subsequent changes to the sound system of Spanish retained the contrasts while enhancing the segments by increasing articulatory distance amongst their rather subtle acoustic contrasts, an appropriate step due to the high productivity of these phonemes in differentiating frequently used minimal pairs. The dentoalveolar one was moved "forward" to interdental, losing its former sibilance in the process, and the prepalatal one was moved "backward" to velar, also losing its former sibilance, all in all resulting in the three-way distinction of modern Standard Peninsular pronunciation:
In the south, the devoicing process and deaffrication of gave rise to new fricatives that were indistinguishable from the existing ones. The process of increasing articulatory distance still applied, however, and retracted to in the south just as it did in the north. In a number of ceceo areas developed into a non-sibilant apico-dental, perceptually similar to the interdental used by Standard Peninsular speakers for orthographic /. In seseo areas |Seville] and Huelva, the resulting [phoneme developed a predorsal alveolar realization , perceptually similar to the apicoalveolar used by Standard Peninsular speakers for orthographic. This seseo variety was the pronunciation that most impacted Latin America, as many emigrants to the Americas were from Andalusian and Canarian ports. In addition, several generations of Spanish speakers had lived and grown in the Americas before appeared in Castilian.
The development of the sibilants in Ladino was more conservative, resulting in a system closer to that of Portuguese.
Modern changes
Many modern dialects debuccalize the /s/ to , some further undergo deletion and compensatory lengthening of nearby vowel or consonant.Distinction
Distinction refers to the differentiated pronunciation of the two Spanish phonemes written and or :- represents a voiceless alveolar sibilant ;
- and soft represent a dental fricative">Dental consonant">dental fricative .
In most of Spain, this distinction is between an apical and a dental. That said, in most regions of Andalusia which distinguish and, the distinction involves a laminal. According to, the distinction between a laminal and is native to most of Almería, eastern Granada, most of Jaén |Jaén], and northern Huelva, while the distinction between an apical and, as found in the rest of Peninsular Spanish, is native to the very northeastern regions of Almería, Granada and Jaén, to northern Córdoba |Córdoba], not including the provincial capital, and to a small region of northern Huelva.
Lack of distinction
In most Spanish-speaking regions and countries the phonemic distinction between and does not exist. These varieties of Spanish are sometimes said to exhibit as opposed to.Seseo
Seseo is a lack of distinction between /s/ and /θ/ with both being realized as. For example, the words and would be pronounced with the same sound. This can result in ambiguity but can usually be interpreted depending on the context of which the sentence is spoken. Seseo is the most widespread pronunciation among Spanish speakers worldwide and occurs in nearly all speakers in Hispanic America. While it is a minority pronunciation in Spain itself, seseo is considered standard in all varieties of Latin American Spanish, as well as in the Philippines. It coexists with distinción and ceceo in parts of Spain. Traditional dialect atlases show one variant or another used in adjacent regions. In Spain, seseo is considered "more socially acceptable or perhaps 'less substandard' than ceceo".Ceceo
Ceceo is a phenomenon found in a few dialects of southern Spain in which and are not distinguished and there is only one coronal fricative phoneme realized as the voiceless denti-alveolar sibilant, a sibilant sounding somewhat like, but not identical. Ceceo is found primarily in some varieties of Andalusian Spanish, and historically in two villages of southeastern Murcia. That said, Hualde reports that there is some evidence of the phenomenon in parts of Central America. A publication of the University of Oviedo also notes that ceceo can be found in Argentina and Chile. Other linguists have noticed the use of ceceo in parts of Puerto Rico, Honduras, and Venezuela. A similar sound characterized as a "voiceless apico-or corono-post-dental slit fricative" has been observed in Nicaragua, El Salvador, Honduras, Colombia, Puerto Rico, and Venezuela; In these places, ceceo is a largely rural pronunciation and is often stigmatized.In El Salvador, some speakers use a -like fricative in the syllable instead of the usual glottal,, or phonetic zero, rendering todos 'all' as, more usually pronounced or . Salvadoran Spanish occasionally weakens, but almost never completely deletes, in onset positions, and this allophone is more common in onset positions than coda ones. According to, this is the result of a gestural undershoot. It is on an acoustic continuum between and, representing an intermediate degree of lenition. identifies this with the ceceo of Andalusian and other dialects. The following table gives an example of the three pronunciation patterns discussed so far: