Chilean Spanish


Chilean Spanish is any of several varieties of the Spanish language spoken in most of Chile. Chilean Spanish dialects have distinctive pronunciation, grammar, vocabulary, and slang usages that differ from those of Standard Spanish, with various linguists identifying Chilean Spanish as one of the most divergent varieties of Spanish.
The Royal Spanish Academy recognizes 2,214 words and idioms exclusively or mainly produced in Chilean Spanish, in addition to many still unrecognized slang expressions. Formal Spanish in Chile has recently incorporated an increasing number of colloquial elements.

Variation and accents

In Chile, there are not many differences between the Spanish spoken in the northern, central and southern areas of the country, although there are notable differences in zones of the far south—such as Aysén, Magallanes, and Chiloé—and in Arica in the extreme north. There is, however, much variation in the Spanish spoken by different social classes; this is a prevalent reality in Chile given the presence of stark wealth inequality. In rural areas from Santiago to Valdivia, Chilean Spanish shows the historical influence of the Castúo dialects of Extremadura, Spain, but some authors point to the Spanish province of Andalusia and more specifically to the city of Seville as an even greater influence on the historical development of Chilean Spanish. In general, the intonation of Chilean Spanish is recognized in the Spanish-speaking world for being one of the fastest-spoken accents among Spanish dialects and with tones that rise and fall in its speech, especially in Santiago and its surroundings; such intonation may be less strong in certain areas of the north of the country and more pronounced in southern areas. It is also not uncommon that other Spanish speakers, native and otherwise, have more difficulty understanding Chilean Spanish speakers than other accents.
As result of past German immigration, there are a few German influences in the vocabulary, accent, and pronunciation of southern Chile. Speakers of Chilean Spanish who also speak German or Mapudungun tend to use more impersonal pronouns. Dialects of southern Chile are considered to have a melodic intonation relative to the speech in Santiago and their accent is quite slower than Santiago. A survey among inhabitants of Santiago also shows that people in the capital consider southern Chilean Spanish to be variously affected by Mapudungun, have poor pronunciation, be of rural character and, in the case of Chiloé, to be rich in archaisms. The same study does also show a perception that the speech of northern Chile is influenced by the Spanish spoken in Peru and Bolivia.
Chile is part of a region of South America known as the Southern Cone. The region consists of Chile, Argentina, and Uruguay; sometimes it also includes Paraguay and some regions of Brazil. The vocabulary across the region is similar for Spanish speakers, and in some cases it's also shared by the Portuguese speakers in the Southern Cone parts of Brazil.
The Chilean Spanish dialect of Easter Island, most especially the accent, is influenced by Rapa Nui language.

Phonology

There are a number of phonetic features common to most Chilean accents, but none of them is individually unique to Chilean Spanish. Rather, it is the particular combination of features that sets Chilean Spanish apart from other regional Spanish dialects. The features include the following:
  • Yeísmo, the historical merger of the phoneme with . For speakers with yeísmo, the verbs cayó 's/he fell' and calló 's/he fell silent' are homophones, both pronounced. Yeísmo characterizes the speech of most Spanish-speakers both in Spain and in the Americas. In Chile, there is a declining number of speakers who maintain the distinction, mainly in some areas of southern Chile. In southern Chile the distinction was noted in 2003 to exist chiefly in Cautín Province, while in the north it was documented in a few places of the province of El Loa Province and more as more widespread in Parinacota Province next to Bolivia and Peru.
  • Like most other Latin American dialects of Spanish, Chilean Spanish has seseo: is not distinguished from. In much of the Andean region, the merged phoneme is pronounced as apicoalveolar, a sound with a place of articulation intermediate between laminodental and palatal. That trait is associated with a large number of northern Spanish settlers in Andean Chile.
  • Syllable-final is often aspirated to or lost entirely, another feature common to many varieties of Spanish in the Americas, as well as the Canary Islands and the southern half of Spain. Whether final aspirates or is elided depends on a number of social, regional, and phonological factors, but in general, aspiration is most frequent before a consonant. Complete elision is most commonly found word-finally but carries a sociolinguistic stigma. Thus, los chilenos ' Chileans' can be.
  • The velar consonants,, and are fronted or palatalized before front vowels. Thus, queso 'cheese', guía 'guide', and jinete 'rider/horseman' are pronounced respectively,, and. Also, is pronounced or in other phonological environments and so caja 'box' and rojo 'red' are pronounced ~ and ~ respectively. In the rest of the article, the back allophone of is transcribed with the phonemic symbol.
  • Between vowels and word-finally, commonly elides or lenites, as is common throughout the Spanish-speaking world); contado 'told' and ciudad 'city' are and respectively. Elision is less common in formal or upper-class speech.
  • The voiceless postalveolar affricate is pronounced as a fricative by many northerners and lower-class speakers, so Chile and leche. That pronunciation is greatly stigmatized, although not so much in the upmost northern regions where speakers may go back and forth between and. This pronunciation is also typical of southern Andalusia in Spain, north Mexico, and of several Caribbean dialects. Other variants are more fronted and include the alveolar affricate or an even more fronted dental affricate, mostly in the upper class of Santiago; thus, Chile and leche are pronounced or.
  • Word-final // is pronounced as a velar nasal only in north Chilean dialects.
  • Unstressed word-final vowels are often devoiced.
  • The phoneme represented by the letters and may be pronounced in variation with and ; in most other Spanish dialects, only and may appear as allophones of that phoneme.
  • Consonant cluster can be pronounced ,, or , making cuatro 'four' and trabajo 'work' pronounced as and [ respectively. This is an influence of Mapudungun.
  • Chilean Spanish frequently uses intonational plateaus, which occur in contexts in which they do not appear in other Spanish varieties. This is possibly due to the influence of Mapudungun as well.

    Syntax and grammar

  • Doubling the object clitics me, te, se, lo, la and le before and after the verb is common in lower-class speech. For example, 'I'm going to go' becomes me voy a irme. 'I'm going to give them to you' becomes te las voy a dártelas.
  • Queísmo is socially accepted and used in the media, and dequeísmo is somewhat stigmatized.
  • In ordinary speech, conjugations of the [imperative mood of a few of verbs tend to be replaced with the indicative third-person singular. For example, the second-person singular imperative of poner 'to put', which is pon, becomes pone; that of hacer 'to do', which is haz, becomes hace; and that of salir 'to exit', sal, becomes sale: hace lo que te pedí 'do what I asked'. However, that is not done in formal speech. Chileans also replace the etymological second-person singular imperative of the verb ir 'to go', ve, with the second-person singular imperative of andar 'to walk', anda, and ve is reserved for the verb ver 'to see': ve la hora 'look at the time'.
  • Another feature to note is the lack of use of the possessive nuestro 'our', which is usually replaced by de nosotros 'of us': ándate a la casa de nosotros, literally 'go to the house of us', instead of ándate a nuestra casa 'go to our house'.
  • It is very common in Chile, as in many other Latin American countries, to use the diminutive suffixes -ito and -ita. They can mean 'little', as in perrito 'little dog' or casita 'little house', but can also express affection, as with mamita 'mummy, mommy'. They can also diminish the urgency, directness, or importance of something to make something annoying seem more pleasant. So, if someone says espérese un momentito literally 'wait a little moment', it does not mean that the moment will be short, but that the speaker wants to make waiting more palatable and hint that the moment may turn out to be quite long.

    Pronouns and verbs

Chileans use the voseo and tuteo forms for the intimate second-person singular. Voseo is common in Chile, with both pronominal and verbal voseo being widely used in the spoken language.
In Chile there are at least four grades of formality:
  • Pronominal and verbal voseo, the use of the pronoun vos :
vos sabí, vos vení, vos hablái, etc.
This occurs only in very informal situations.
  • Verbal voseo, the use of the pronoun tú:
tú sabí, tú vení, tú hablái, etc.
This is the predominant form used in the spoken language. It is not used in formal situations or with people one does not know well.
  • Standard tuteo:
tú sabes, tú vienes, tú hablas, etc.
This is the only acceptable way to write the intimate second-person singular. Its use in spoken language is reserved for slightly more formal situations such as child-to-parent, teacher-to-student, or peer-to-peer relations among people who do not know each other well.
  • The use of the pronoun usted:
usted sabe, usted viene, usted habla, etc.
This is used for all business and other formal interactions, such as student-to-teacher but not always teacher-to-student as well as "upwards" if one person is considered to be well respected, older or of an obviously higher social standing.
The Chilean voseo conjugation has only three irregular verbs in the present indicative: ser 'to be', ir 'to go', and haber 'to have'.