Philippine Spanish

Phonology

Philippine Spanish phonology has been described as conservative and refined, reflecting the socioeconomic status of its speakers, and exhibiting features largely present in the standard dialects of Peninsular Spanish as spoken in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with little influence from dialects such as Andalusian or Canarian nor from languages like Catalan or Galician despite significant immigration to the Philippines from those areas of Spain. Nevertheless, a number of phonological traits still distinguish Philippine Spanish from Spanish spoken elsewhere as a result of earlier contact with Latin American Spanish varieties, contact with the Philippine languages and the development of Chavacano, though unlike with Philippine English, Philippine Spanish phonology is generally uniform, with very little (if any) dialectical variation in terms of pronunciation between speakers of Spanish from different regions of the country.

Distinction between y and ll

As in some dialects in northern Spain and some bilingual zones (Bolivia, Paraguay, and Peru) of Latin America, Philippine Spanish has a phonological distinction between the sounds represented by ll () and y (). For example, calle ('street') is pronounced (Tagalog kalye) as opposed to the pronunciation found in most other present-day Spanish varieties. The phoneme may be realized closer to in the pronunciation of some younger Philippine Spanish speakers. Sometimes is depalatalized to in word-initial positions: for example, lluvia ('rain'), normally pronounced , is pronounced .

While yeísmo, which merges the two, is today considered extremely rare and idiosyncratic in Philippine Spanish, it has been suggested that a more yeísta pronunciation was previously standard owing to the influence of both Andalusian and Mexican Spanish speakers in the 16th and 17th centuries. This is suggested by words such as caballo ('horse'), pronounced in many Philippine languages and with the spelling reflecting this pronunciation (e.g. Tagalog kabayo), although others have instead borrowed the lleísta form (e.g. Ilocano kabalio). Speakers only shifted to a contrasting pronunciation, which was characteristic of the aristocratic Castilian pronunciation of the time, toward the end of the 19th century in the final years of Spanish colonization, although it has been suggested that a residual yeísmo continues to persist in the speech of modern-day Philippine Spanish speakers.

Newer generations of Spanish speakers have begun adopting phonological features closer to standard Peninsular Spanish, including yeísmo, as a result of being educated in that dialect, although the majority of those studying Spanish in the Philippines as a foreign language nonetheless continue to contrast both sounds.

Seseo

Like Latin American Spanish, Philippine Spanish practices seseo, where is normally not distinguished from . This is particularly evidenced by borrowings into the Philippine languages where, for example, circo ('circus'), pronounced in Peninsular Spanish, became Tagalog sirko (pronounced ). Although seseo remains the dominant pronunciation today, in a similar way to the introduction of a contrast between y and ll at the end of the 19th century, some native speakers have begun practicing distinción, where is distinguished from , but do not always do so consistently.

Newer generations of Spanish speakers have begun adopting distinción as a result of being educated in Peninsular Spanish, alongside a contemporary adoption of yeísmo. Among those studying Spanish in the Philippines as a foreign language, most practice distinción although a large group of students nonetheless practice seseo, and among those who do practice distinción, most do so inconsistently.

Pronunciation of plosive consonants

The consonants , and are uniformly pronounced as plosive (hard) consonants in Philippine Spanish, contrasting with other Spanish dialects where these are usually softened to either approximants or fricatives. While the softened pronunciations are also heard, this varies between speakers and even between individual phonemes.

Of particular note is the pronunciation of intervocalic , where it can even overlap with and is occasionally pronounced as as is the case in the Philippine languages. This trait has also carried over to Chavacano and has influenced how the Philippine languages have treated Spanish loans as in the case, for example, of Spanish pared ('wall') becoming Tagalog pader.

Intervocalic is also frequently elided, particularly with words ending in the suffix -ado.

Palatalization and affrication

Before the close vowel , and are often palatalized by Philippine Spanish speakers, becoming and respectively. Occasionally these may be affricated instead, becoming and respectively as in the case of Spanish loans to the Philippine languages (cf. yod-coalescence in English, or a similar phenomenon in Brazilian Portuguese). For example, Dios ('God'), normally pronounced , may be pronounced (Tagalog Diyos), or tiangue ('open-air market'), normally pronounced , may be pronounced (Tagalog tiyangge).

In a similar manner, speakers also occasionally palatalize to when placed before . For example, negocio ('business'), normally pronounced , may be pronounced (Tagalog negosyo), and ciudad ('city'), normally pronounced , may be pronounced (Tagalog siyudad).

Retraction of /x/ to [h]

The velar jota sound () is present in Philippine Spanish, similar to standard Peninsular Spanish, though this is mostly retracted to glottal , which also occurs in Andalusian, Caribbean, Canarian, Central American, and Colombian Spanish.

Merger of non-open vowels and bilabial consonants

Often interchanged in Philippine Spanish are the non-open vowels and , and , and the bilabial consonants and , following a similar tendency in the Philippine languages. For example, Filipinas ('Philippines') would be pronounced (Tagalog Pilipinas), tenía ('I had') would be pronounced , and comen ('they eat') would be pronounced .

No debuccalization of /s/

Unlike many Peninsular and Latin American dialects, syllable-final is not debuccalized, and is always pronounced as an alveolar sibilant () rather than as a glottal fricative (). For example, las moscas ('flies', as in the insect) is always pronounced . The retention of s is reflective of the influence of northern Peninsular Spanish dialects, although it is considered an unusual development in Philippine Spanish given the large number of Andalusian Spanish speakers among the last wave of Spanish migrants to the Philippines.

In contrast, Chavacano speakers do practice syllable-final s-dropping, most notably among older speakers of the Zamboagueño dialect spoken in the Zamboanga Peninsula.

Glottal stop

As a result of contact with the Philippine languages, the glottal stop regularly manifests in the speech of most (if not all) Philippine Spanish speakers, and is normally found in word-initial positions where the pronunciation begins with a vowel. For example, alma ('spirit') would be pronounced . This is also present when the word is preceded by a pause, which in other Spanish dialects would be subject to consonantal linking (similar to the liaison in French). For example, el hombre ('the man') would be pronounced as in Philippine Spanish but in other Spanish dialects.

The glottal stop also appears in some vowel sequences, serving to clearly delineate syllables from one another. For example, maíz ('corn') would be pronounced , and baúl ('trunk', as in the luggage) would be pronounced .

[ɾ]–[l] shift

Philippine Spanish clearly distinguishes between the use of and , similar to standard Peninsular Spanish. However, earlier speakers may have interchanged both sounds, with becoming and becoming as in Caribbean and southern Peninsular Spanish dialects, and which was retained in the various Chavacano dialects.

Despite this distinction certain words in the Philippine Spanish lexicon nevertheless reflect this earlier tendency to interchange both sounds, such as balasar, a variant of barajar ('to shuffle') which the dialect had preserved.

Treatment of tl

Similar to Latin American, Canarian and certain Peninsular Spanish dialects, Philippine Spanish pronounces the letter sequence tl in the same syllable. For example, the word atlas is pronounced , not as in standard Peninsular Spanish.

Morphology and syntax

Philippine Spanish has been described as having no particularly unique morphological features, although deviations from standard Spanish morphology and syntax have been reported as a result of Spanish's position as a minority language in the Philippines.

Pronouns

Alongside Equatoguinean Spanish, Philippine Spanish is one of only two Spanish dialects outside of Spain to use the second-person plural pronoun vosotros, although ustedes, standard in Latin America, has been reported as also being common in written texts. The second-person familiar pronoun tú is also freely used, even in situations where the polite pronoun usted would be used instead, and while voseo is absent in contemporary Philippine Spanish, which exclusively uses tú, it has been suggested that voseo previously existed in the dialect as evidenced by its residual use in expressions such as ¡rayo vos! (lit. 'go to hell!'), which in turn led to the development of voseo in Chavacano.

Unlike other overseas Spanish dialects, Philippine Spanish is said to employ leísmo, where the pronoun le is used when referring to third-person masculine direct objects instead of lo as is the case elsewhere, although others have said this only represents a minority of speakers and that Philippine Spanish speakers mostly use lo. However, for indirect objects, the use of le is predominant, with a minority of speakers using la (laísmo).

Possession and derivation

Indicating possession in Philippine Spanish is frequently expressed not through possessive adjectives, but rather by combining the object with the construction de ('of') and the possessor. For example, instead of nuestros parientes ('our relatives') as in standard Spanish, Philippine Spanish speakers would often say los parientes de nosotros (lit. 'the relatives of us'). This also happens with the third-person possessive pronoun su, which parallels Latin American usage with speakers alternating between, for example, Este perro es suyo (lit. 'This dog is theirs') and Este perro es de él (lit. 'This dog is of him'). A similar phenomenon also defines the naming of certain flora, with fruit trees sometimes being called the tree of that fruit. For example, while Spanish has an actual word for an orange tree, naranjo, Philippine Spanish speakers would sometimes say árbol de naranja instead.

In expressing derivation, the most commonly used suffix for creating diminutives in Philippine Spanish is -ito, although -illo is also encountered but less commonly. For augmentatives, the most commonly used suffix is -ón, followed by -azo and -ote in order of frequency. Meanwhile, for forming collective nouns, the most common suffix is -ada, followed by -aje when referring to people. For plants and produce, the most common suffix is -al, followed by -ero and -ar, but noun phrases formed by combining the name of the plant or produce, either with or without the standard suffixes depending on the plant or produce being discussed, with plantación (de) ('plantation [of]'), campo (de) ('field [of]') or sementera (de) ('land sown with') are also commonly employed.

Negation

In certain cases, Philippine Spanish expresses negation in a manner broadly similar to other Spanish varieties. For example, the determiner más ('more' or 'else') is used to amplify nunca ('never'), nadie ('no one'), nada ('nothing') and ninguno ('nobody') and is normally found in a postnominal (after the word) position, but occasionally this is reversed by Philippine Spanish speakers with más appearing in the prenominal (before the word) position.

Other cases exhibit deviations from standard Spanish usage. The negative adverbial phrase no más ("no more"), for example, is used in one of three ways in Philippine Spanish:

• To express exactness (Lo tiene al lado mismo no más; lit. 'He/she has it exactly right next to him/her').
• As an emphatic suffix (Estaba bromeando no más; lit. 'I was only joking'). This use of no más is also found in Latin American Spanish, and is equivalent to the use of solo or solamente in standard Spanish.
• To express finiteness (No hay más carruajes; lit. 'There aren't carriages any more'). This use of no más may have come about as a result of English influence, and is equivalent to the use of ya no in other Spanish varieties.

Adverbial no is also regularly paired with other adverbs to express negation, even if the pairing would be considered redundant in standard Spanish. For example, Philippine Spanish speakers often pair adverbial no with tan and tanto (or even tantito), both implying extent, as a substitute for no muy ('not very') and no mucho ('not much') respectively. In a similar manner, Philippine Spanish speakers also often substitute tampoco ('neither') with también no (lit. 'also no'), which has been formally proscribed in standard Spanish, and even tampoco itself is paired with no to create the redundant double negative tampoco no (lit. 'neither no'), which in standard Spanish is likewise normally considered incorrect.

Vocabulary

Over the centuries Philippine Spanish has developed a corpus of filipinismos (lit. 'Philippinisms'), vocabulary and expressions that are unique to the dialect, of which some have even entered Spanish more broadly and others which have influenced the native languages of the Philippines. Philippinisms in Philippine Spanish are usually derived from a number of sources: words borrowed into Spanish from the Philippine or other foreign languages, Spanish words that have since fallen out of use in Spain or in Spanish more broadly, and Spanish expressions made by Philippine Spanish speakers or are otherwise unique to the country. Since the mid-20th century, the Philippine Spanish lexicon has also been significantly influenced by English, similar to the situation with Spanish in Puerto Rico and the United States.

Although there are efforts in documenting filipinismos, and people studying Spanish as a foreign language today still learn and use Philippine Spanish vocabulary, many of them are in danger of disappearing due to the "foreignization" of Spanish language education in the Philippines (as Peninsular instead of Philippine Spanish is taught in schools), alongside poor documentation practices which lead to, among others, some expressions not being documented and some whose origin is obscured, and a lack of a stronger effort to compile a comprehensive dictionary of these expressions, or at least to include them in the Diccionario de la lengua española.

From Latin American Spanish

Philippine Spanish incorporates a number of words and expressions from Latin American Spanish varieties, most notably from Mexican Spanish but also including influences from other dialects. Some of the vocabulary said to be derived from Mexican Spanish, however, has been described as instead being direct loans to Philippine Spanish from Aztecan languages like Nahuatl as opposed to coming to the Philippines through Mexican Spanish. Words like metate, jícara, and chongo reflect this influence, as well as the use of certain hypocorisms.

Latin American influence in Philippine Spanish is also reflected in the use of Americanisms like maní to describe peanuts and hincarse to describe kneeling, instead of the Peninsular Spanish equivalents cacahuete (or even the Mexican variant cacahuate) and arrodillarse.

From Peninsular Spanish

Much of the basic vocabulary of Philippine Spanish is also derived from Peninsular Spanish. For example, Philippine Spanish uses patata to describe a potato, the same as in Spain. Some words do take on a different meaning in Philippine Spanish: for example, while speakers use the Latin American camarón to describe a shrimp (e.g. camarón rebozado), the Peninsular equivalent gamba is also used but with a slightly more specialized meaning (in this case, a shrimp smaller than a camarón).

In certain cases some words are used by speakers in a more-or-less equal proportion, such as with the Peninsular melocotón and the Latin American durazno to describe a peach. In others, the Peninsular equivalent isn't used at all: for example, to describe an apartment the Latin American terms apartamento and departamento are used exclusively as opposed to the Peninsular piso.

From English

Anglicisms in Philippine Spanish can be classified into three types: those that are present in standard Spanish, those that are also found in Spanish as spoken in the United States, and a much smaller number of words that were borrowed into the language but still carry their original spelling and meaning from English. These include words like planta for 'plant' (instead of fábrica), sugestión for 'suggestion' (instead of sugerencia) and the direct importation of English words like avocado, jeepney and overol ('overalls').

Because most Spanish-speaking Filipinos are also fluent in English, English pronunciation also affects how Philippine Spanish speakers pronounce certain words. Some speakers, for example, would pronounce Europa ('Europe') as , as in English, instead of .

Unique words and expressions

Many words and expressions used by Spanish speakers in the Philippines are unique to Philippine Spanish, though a number of these have since entered the Diccionario de la lengua española and other publications of the Royal Spanish Academy (RAE). Some of the first filipinismos incorporated by the RAE into its publications include words like caracoa, barangay and parao, which entered the broader lexicon in the late 18th and early 19th century, and the number of filipinismos has ostensibly grown over time, forming a corpus where unique words and expressions in Philippine Spanish can be broadly placed into four categories:

• Words and expressions borrowed into Philippine Spanish, or even Spanish more broadly, as a result of contact with the Philippine languages (such as bolo, which was borrowed from the Tagalog bolo, or baguio to describe typhoons). However, the extent of borrowing has varied: borrowing from the Philippine languages, or even from other languages like Chinese, into Philippine Spanish has been described as either being mainly limited to flora and fauna, contrasting with the significant influence played by Philippine languages in the development of Chavacano, or as being more varied but with loans largely being limited to sociocultural domains like food.
• Words and expressions that have fallen out of use in other Spanish dialects, but were retained in Philippine Spanish (such as aparador to describe a wardrobe, whereas other Spanish dialects would use armario, the use of aeroplano instead of avión to describe an airplane, or the use of the dated phrase ¿Cuál es su gracia? [lit. 'What is your grace?'] to ask for someone's name, which has since died out in other countries)
• Words and expressions that have undergone a semantic change in Philippine Spanish (such as lenguaje to refer to a national language, or morisqueta to refer to cooked white rice)
• Words and expressions in Philippine Spanish that were developed in the Philippines by Spanish speakers and have no (or other) equivalents in other Spanish dialects (such as abrazador to describe a bolster pillow, abogadillo to describe a paralegal, barcada to describe a group of friends, or código to describe a cheat sheet)

In his observations of the language as spoken in the Philippines, Wenceslao Retana classifies filipinismos as belonging into one of five grammatical types:

• Words derived from Spanish that are commonly used in the Philippines and which could be reasonably understood by Spanish speakers in other countries (such as abanico, abogado, palenque and petaca)
• Words which appear to be Spanish but are not Castilian in origin, coined by Philippine Spanish speakers either out of whim or necessity (such as dobladora and tinola)
• Words borrowed into Philippine Spanish from the Philippine languages but modified to fit Spanish prosody (such as buyo and molave)
• Words which contain Spanish suffixes, regardless if the term is formed from a Spanish root or from the Philippine languages (such as abacalero)
• Words specific to Philippine Spanish which were developed by Spanish-speaking Filipinos, and whose use had since been adopted by Spanish speakers arriving in the country from Spain or elsewhere (such as casillas and corrido)

Many filipinismos that are commonly used in the Philippines, such as pan de sal and cundimán, by both Spanish and non-Spanish speakers alike have yet to be recognized by the RAE, and calls have been made for their inclusion.