Sociogeographical differences in the pronunciation of Anglicisms in Spanish
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Linda Bäumler
Abstract
In this paper we propose a possible statistical analysis of sociogeographical differences in two Spanish varieties in the context of loanword phonology. For this purpose, we extracted formant frequencies of Anglicisms from corpus data from Mexico and Spain, with a particular focus on the realisation of the English vowel /ʌ/ (e.g., [bɾʌnt͡ʃ]). We used a Multilevel Bayesian regression model to infer various fixed effects on the phonic realisation. The analysis shows that geographical proximity to the U.S. does not impact the realisation in our data. Speakers’ exposure and affinity towards the English language, on the other hand, favour imitation of the English vowel. This seems to be especially relevant in our globalised world, where English media are ubiquitously available.
Abstract
In this paper we propose a possible statistical analysis of sociogeographical differences in two Spanish varieties in the context of loanword phonology. For this purpose, we extracted formant frequencies of Anglicisms from corpus data from Mexico and Spain, with a particular focus on the realisation of the English vowel /ʌ/ (e.g., [bɾʌnt͡ʃ]). We used a Multilevel Bayesian regression model to infer various fixed effects on the phonic realisation. The analysis shows that geographical proximity to the U.S. does not impact the realisation in our data. Speakers’ exposure and affinity towards the English language, on the other hand, favour imitation of the English vowel. This seems to be especially relevant in our globalised world, where English media are ubiquitously available.
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction 1
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Part I. Data collection
- On the validity of crowdsourced data 10
- Variation in space and society 34
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Part II. Methodology
- The Phonologie du français contemporain project in Quebec 60
- “Going standard” on a blank page 84
- Sociogeographical differences in the pronunciation of Anglicisms in Spanish 106
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Part III. Case studies
- Historical corpora and linguistic geography of Spanish 134
- Dialectology as a matter of gradience 154
- Testing Twitter data on a morphosyntactic variable 176
-
Part IV. Theory
- Sketching out a virtual framework for Romance geolinguistics 198
- Index 217
Chapters in this book
- Prelim pages i
- Table of contents v
- Introduction 1
-
Part I. Data collection
- On the validity of crowdsourced data 10
- Variation in space and society 34
-
Part II. Methodology
- The Phonologie du français contemporain project in Quebec 60
- “Going standard” on a blank page 84
- Sociogeographical differences in the pronunciation of Anglicisms in Spanish 106
-
Part III. Case studies
- Historical corpora and linguistic geography of Spanish 134
- Dialectology as a matter of gradience 154
- Testing Twitter data on a morphosyntactic variable 176
-
Part IV. Theory
- Sketching out a virtual framework for Romance geolinguistics 198
- Index 217
