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Spanish Language
After Chinese and English, Spanish is the third most spoken language in the world. Numerous Spanish speakers are found in Latin America, the rest of the Spanish population is spread between Spain, United States, Philippines and Africa. The total number of Spanish speakers worldwide is around 417 million people, a data which is make up by first as well as second languages speakers.History
Spanish is a romance language and it has evoluted from Latin through a process which started 3000 years ago. Apart from words of Latin origin, Spanish vocabulary includes Germanic nouns and Arabic lemmas. Indeed, in the 5th century the country was invaded by the Visigots and from 700 BC it suffered the long lasting Muslims' invasion-which ended 700 years later-so that the consequences of these two dominations had their direct influence on language.The process of standardization of the language received a great impulse when in 1713 it was set up the "Real Academia". This institution regulated the process of incorporation of neologisms and foreign words and always excercised a great influence as to define what "pure Spanish" was. The attitude of the Academia has always been a conservative one, as it rejected international words and new lemmas. In the end, the strict rules of the Academy brought to the creation of a static form of language which with time has became more and more different from spoken language. To have a further impulse in the evolution of Spanish, we have to wait the end of the 20th century, more exactly the end of Franco's dictatorship. After more than 30 years of censure, culture went through a process of revitalization which had its direct consequences on language. Spoken Spanish was about to become a colorful and live language. Scientific and technical advances brought new lemmas and, different from the past, when Anglicism had been forbidden, words of English origin started to enter the language. Nowadays, Spanish still is a langauge in evolution, as it is going through continuos changes, especially at spoken level.
Dialects
Catalan, Basque and Galician are, together with standard Spanish (or Castillano), the three officially recognised languages of Spain; therefore, it should be clear that they are proper languages and not dialects of Spanish.The main dialects of Spanish have derived from the language which was spoken in the region of Castilla. Castillano was recognised as the Standard Language in 1200, with a law issued by King Alfonso X. This was the national, correct form of Spanish, which became the language of politics, education and administration. With time, many variations have evoluted from standard language, both in Spain and in Latin America. In particular, the variations of Latin America differ as for intonation and in the use of some words: the pronoun for the 2nd person singular is "tu" is Spain but "vos" in Argentina.
Literature
Spanish literature counts with popular authors and works which have became classics.Literature had its first important period in the Renaissance, when Cervantes wrote "Don Quijote" and many important playwrights as Calderon de la Barca, Tirso de Molina or Lope de Vega produced charming works. In the 19th century, it was time for Benito Perez Galdos and his realistic novel as well as for poems by Machado and Garcia Lorca.
The end of the 19th century was characterised by the so called "Generation of '98", a group of writers who worked hard to give a new impulse to Spain's cultural life. During the Civil War many writers were exiliated and this resulted in a stasis in literary production.
When writers went back to Spain, it was time for a cultural rebirth, who had one of its protagonists in Camilo Jose Cela. After World War II the literary scene saw the debut of Miguel Delibes, who still is one of the most read writers nowadays. The novel of experimentation is a modern literary form, as it emerged only in the post-Franco period. Mendoza and Juan Benet were two popular authors of this genre.
Grammar and Slang
Although Spanish has always been strictly controlled by the Academy, it has developed a colorful and live slang language.The Academy exercised its authority especially as for grammar. Spanish is a language full of inflections in nouns, adjctives and verbs and this is partly due to the romance origins of the language. In the conjugation of verbs, you find a great number of tenses and modes (indicative, conditional and subjuntive). Spanish prepositions require an effort which is more than a simple memorization work. Indeed, in some cases it is necessary to stop and think for a while on which preposition to use: this is what happens with "por" and "para", which have the same meaning but are alternately used depending on context. "Por" indicates cause or reason while "para" expresses purpose or destination, a slight difference which drives beginners (and also those who no more are beginners) literally crazy.
It is known that the best way to learn a language is to have a full immersion in its culture and consequentely a trip to Spain is strongly reccomended. Spanish spoken language is so live and colorful that you will be completly captured by it (and also by the Spanish person who is teaching it to you!).
Spanish people use a lot of diminutives, in order to make a word sound softer and add a note of affection to their message. For instance, the diminutive of "niño" (boy), which is "niñito", (small boy, little tiny boy) is a nice diminutive which mothers use with their children.
And finally, you can have a look at the language of youngsters:
- ¡Pierde cuidado!: Don't worry!
- Es broma: Just kidding.
- Más vale tarde que nunca: Better late than never.
- Menudo pájaro es ese: I wouldn't trust him futher than I can throw him.
- ¡Anda a bañarte! (Chile) Go away!
- Dicho y hecho: No sooner said than done.