THE
SPANISH OF THE CANARY ISLANDS
An
indisputable influence in the formation of Latin American Spanish, often
overshadowed by discussion of the `Andalusian' contribution, is the Canary
Islands. Beginning with the first
voyage of Columbus, the Canary Islands were an obligatory way-station for
Spanish ships sailing to the Americas, which often stayed in the islands for
several weeks for refitting and boarding of provisions. Canary Islanders also participated actively
in the settlement and development of Spanish America.
The
Canary Islands merit a bizarre entry in the history of European geography,
since the islands were well known to ancient navigators, only to pass into
oblivion by the Middle Ages. After the
early descriptions of Pliny and other writers of the time, more than a thousand
years were to pass before the Canary Islands were mentioned in European texts,
although contact between the indigenous Guanches and the nearby north African
coast continued uninterrupted.
Spain
colonized the Canary Islands beginning in 1483, and by the time of Columbus's
voyages to the New World, the Canary Islands were firmly under Spanish
control. The indigenous Guanche
language disappeared shortly after the Spanish conquest of the islands, but
left a legacy of scores of place names, and some regional words. From the outset, the Canaries were regarded
as an outpost rather than a stable colony, and the islands' livlihood revolved
around maritime trade. Although some
islanders turned to farming, particularly in the fertile western islands, more
turned to the sea, as fishermen and sailors.
With Columbus's discoveries, the Canary Islands became obligatory
stopover points en route to the New World, and much of the islands' production
was dedicated to resupplying passing ships.
Seville still held a monopoly on commerce, but an ever-growing Canarian
merchant class began to challenge that domination. The islands were ideally situated for influencing trans-Atlantic
trade, and Canarian merchants began to implement their own agenda, fitting
ships to sail directly to the Americas.
Many islanders signed on as sailors, joining hands with Andalusians,
Galicians and Asturians in providing Spain with a trans-Atlantic seafaring
class. The Canary Islands were also the
site of the first Spanish-owned sugar plantations, and when sugar was
introduced into the Antilles, it was from the Canary Islands, complete with
Canarian experts in sugar cultivation.
The flourishing Caribbean sugar industry overtook the originally
prosperous Canary Island production, initiating the economic decline of the
islands which would ultimately result in heavy emigration to the Americas.
With
the sugar industry already in disarray, islanders turned to winemaking, an
activity which still continues. For
more than a century, Canarian wines were in demand both in Spain and in the
Americas, but once again Peninsular winemaking overshadowed insular production,
which was reduced to a cottage industry.
The islands next turned to the harvest of dyestuffs, including orchilla, made from a lichen, and cochinilla or cochineal, made from an
insect which infests cactus plants. By
this time however, all possibilities for the Canary Islands to compete
economically with Spanish America had disappeared, and in ever larger numbers
the islanders turned to emigration, temporarily or permanently.
Once
the settlement of Spanish America was underway, Spain established
administrative centers in the Canary Islands, in an attempt to halt the
flagrant contraband and illicit commerce between the islands and the
Americas. A Juzgado de Indias or judicial zone was established in the islands
in 1566. This entity undertook, among
other duties, the inspection of ships bound to and from the Americas, to assure
compliance with Spanish laws. For most
of the period of island trade, only Tenerife was authorized as a port of
exportation; later, Puerto de La Luz near Las Palmas de Gran Canaria also
became important. Islanders who ended
up in the Americas were often from the two largest islands, whose speech has
always showed more Andalusian traits and fewer archaic curiosities of the sort
that abound in the more isolated islands.
At the
American end, trade with the Canary Islands was extremely limited at first, due
to the strict Spanish monopolistic practices which limited official trade to a
handful of Latin American ports.
Beginning in the 18th century and continuing until colonial independence
in the 1820's, Spain loosened its grip, forced by the growing discontent among
colonists and merchants at home.
Canarian ships regularly travelled to Havana, Santiago de Cuba, Santo
Domingo, La Guaira, Cumaná, Chagres, Portobelo, Riohacha, Santa Marta,
Cartagena, Veracruz, Campeche, Omoa, and several smaller ports.
The
climate of the Canary Islands is capricious.
The easternmost islands receive hot winds off the Sahara Desert, and
support only sparse vegetation and a few vegetable crops. The western islands are greener, but undergo
periodic droughts which make stable agriculture risky. Canary Islanders repeatedly petitioned the
Spanish government for relief, but the Spanish Crown was more concerned with
extracting wealth from its American colonies, and the Canarian pleas fell on
deaf ears. Since many islanders had already
travelled to the Americas as sailors or in pursuit of island-based commercial
activities, emigration to the New World was a logical next step. Emigration was not based only on economic
necessity, for the Spanish government at times actively recruited islanders for
various settlement plans. Emigration
from the Canary Islands to the Americas began almost as soon as the latter
region became settled, in small numbers and leaving no verifiable linguistic
traces. It was not until the 18th
century that any large-scale emigration began, following well-established trade
routes to the Caribbean (Morales Padrón 1951, 1977). The Antilles and Venezuela were the preferred destinations,
although Canary Islanders settled in other regions. In the last decade of the 18th century, Spain actively recruited
Canary Islanders to settle areas of Louisiana, establishing a territorial
presence against real or imagined French encroachment. These settlers were later abandoned
following the transfer of Louisiana to French and then American ownership, and
the descendents lived in relative isolation in central and extreme southeastern
Louisiana. The latter group, the Isleños
of St. Bernard Parish, still retains the Spanish language (Armistead 1992,
Lipski 1990c, MacCurdy 1950), while descendents of the first group, known as Brulis
(Armistead 1978, 1983, 1985, 1991, 1992; MacCurdy 1959; Holloway 1998) have lost the Spanish
language. Canary Islanders were also
settled in the western areas of Santo Domingo to counter the increasing French
presence (Moya Pons 1980: 107-8,
127). To this day, the speech of this
region bears great similarity with the rustic vernacular of the Canary Islands.
With
the coming of independence to most of Latin America in the early 19th century,
Spanish trade with the New World diminished considerably. The Canary Islands increased their
commercial traffic with the United States, and emigration concentrated on the
two remaining Spanish-American colonies, Puerto Rico and particularly Cuba. Alvarez Nazario (1972a) has traced the
successive waves of Canary Island immigration to Puerto Rico, where entire
villages were formed of relocated islanders.
In Cuba, the isleño became a well-known personage, characterized
by a combination of industriousness and peasant superstition, and the speech
and behavior of Canary Islanders figure prominently in Cuban literature of the
19th and early 20th centuries.
Spain
was always ambivalent about the Canary Islands and its inhabitants. Islanders were viewed as provisioners of
passing ships, and as a ready source of cheap labor, military conscripts, and
settlers for new colonies. During most
of the colonial period, Canary Islanders were officially prohibited from
travelling to the American continent except as soldiers. In practice, this prohibition was seldom
respected. As traffic with the
Caribbean grew, so did the number of Canary Islanders residing in the
Americas. Given the preferred trade
routes, the majority ended up in Venezuela, with a large number also reaching
the Antilles.
Some
representative figures hint at the magnitude and linguistic importance of the
Canarian presence in Latin America. In
1714, for example, the governor of Caracas observed that half the white
population of the city was composed of Canary Islanders (Béthencourt Massieu
1981: 18). Following the wars of colonial independence and until 1853,
official Spanish policy allowed islanders to emigrate only to the remaining
Spanish possessions: Cuba, Puerto Rico
and the Philippines. Few took the last
option, but emigration to Cuba grew steadily during the remainder of the 19th
century. In 1853, a royal decree
permitted emigration to all American territories, whether Spanish colonies or
free nations. This increased Canary
emigration to other Latin American areas, especially Argentina and Uruguay, as
well as providing more immigrants for Venezuela, but the majority continued to
head for Cuba. Accurate figures for
immigrants during the 19th century do not exist, but an approximate picture can
be reconstructed (Hernández García 1981).
In the 20-year period from 1818-1838 for example, more than 18,000
islanders emigrated to the Americas, most to Cuba and proportionately fewer to
Venezuela and Puerto Rico. This
represents a significant proportion of the islands' population, and given the
relative size of cities in Latin America in the early 19th century, a not
inconsiderable shift in the linguistic balance of such places as Caracas,
Havana and Santiago de Cuba. In the
half century from 1840 to 1890, as many as 40,000 Canary Islanders emigrated to
Venezuela alone. In the period from
1835-1850, more than 16,000 islanders emigrated to Cuba, a rate of
approximately 1000 per year. In the
1860's, Canary emigration to the Americas took place at the rate of over 2000
per year, at a time when the total islands' population was perhaps
240,000. In the 2-year period 1885-6,
more than 4500 Canarians emigrated to Spanish possessions (including the
Philippines and Fernando Poo), of which almost 4100 went to Cuba and 150 to
Puerto Rico. During the same time
period, some 760 Canary Islanders emigrated to Latin American republics, with
550 going to Argentina/Uruguay and more than 100 to Venezuela. By the period 1891-1895, Canary emigration
to Argentina/Uruguay was slighly more than 400, to Puerto Rico was 600,
immigrants arriving in Venezuela numbered more than 2000, and to Cuba more than
17,000. By comparison, in the same half
century or so, emigration to Cuba from other regions of Spain included: 14,000 from Barcelona, 18,000 from Asturias
and more then 57,000 from Galicia.
During the same period more than 18,000 Galicians arrived in
Argentina/Uruguay, but only a handful arrived in Venezuela. These are only official figures; when
clandestine emigration is taken into account, the numbers would be much larger. For example, Guerrero Balfagón (1960) has
documented the illegal but significant immigration of Canary Islanders to
Argentina and Uruguay in the first half of the 19th century.
Following
the Spanish-American War of 1898, Cuba and Puerto Rico were no longer Spanish
territories, but Canary immigration to the Americas continued. Until the Spanish Civil War of 1936, most
islanders arrived in Cuba, and it is difficult to find a Canary Island family
today in which some family member did not go to Cuba during the early decades
of the 20th century. In some of the
poorer regions, entire villages were left virtually without a young male
population. Many islanders returned
after a few years, although some made several trips to Cuba or remained
indefinitely, thus increasing the lingusitic cross-fertilization between the
two regions. Following the Spanish
Civil War, which created even more severe economic hardships in the Canary
Islands, islanders once more turned to Venezuela as the preferred area of
emigration, a trend which continued until the early 1960's. Contemporary Venezuela still harbors a large
Canary-born population, which retains much of the vocabulary, traditions and
speech forms of the Canary Islands, more so than in any other region of Latin
America. In 19th century Cuba and
Puerto Rico, Canary Islanders worked principally in agriculture, particularly
the sugar industry, and to a lesser extent in urban areas. In the 20th century, islanders in Cuba and
Venezuela found more employment in cities, although some moved to rural areas
in search of permanent homesteads.
The
linguistic contributions of Canary Islanders are difficult to separate from
those of Andalusia, given considerable similarities as well as the close
linguistic and cultural contacts between Andalusia and the Canaries. Few exclusively Canary lexical items
penetrated Latin American Spanish, so the fact that a given term is used in the
Canary Islands and also in Latin America does not automatically entail direct
transfer. Sometimes the choice of
competing variants can be influenced by migratory trends. Thus, for example, Laguarda Trías
(1982: 50) suggests that the preference
for durazno instead of melocotón `peach' in the Southern Cone may
reveal a Canary influence. Cubans and
Venezuelans know the word gofio, although the word no longer designates
the same mixture of ground toasted grains as in the Canary Islands. The word was once used in Argentina and
Uruguay, especially by the canarios, a term coming to mean all rural
dwellers regardless of origin (Guarnieri 1978:
32-3). The term guagua is
used in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Equatorial Guinea and Puerto Rico to
refer to a city bus. At the turn of the
20th century, the term referred to a horse-drawn wagon, and viajar de guagua
meant `to ride for free.' The same term
is found in the Canary Islands, with identical meaning, and is used even in the
most remote regions, on all seven islands.
Most analyses of Canary Spanish attribute this term to Cuban influence,
brought back by returning islanders who had lived in Cuba. The use of guagua in Equatorial
Guinea (formerly Fernando Poo) has also been attributed to the Cuban exile and
slave population which was sent to the island in the mid 1800's (González
Echegaray 1959: 64). The form, however, bears the characterstic
shape of Guanche words, and the existence of this word among the Isleños
of Louisiana, whose ancestors left the Canary Islands in the late 1700's,
suggests the opposite route of transfer.
The general absence of the word in the Spanish of Venezuela, where the
Canary Island presence was also strong, adds to the confusion concerning the
origins of guagua.
Several
syntactic patterns found in the Caribbean region may be of Canary origin, or
may have been reinforced by the arrival of large numbers of Canary Islanders
(Gutiérrez Araus 1991). One such case
is the combination más nada `nothing else,' más nunca `never
again,' más nadie `no one else,' used very frequently in Caribbean and
Canary dialects. Other Spanish dialects
prefer the reverse word order, although combinations beginning with más
are occasionally found in Andalusia and elsewhere in Latin America. These combinations bear a close resemblance
to Galician-Portuguese constructions, and in view of the documented Portuguese/Galician
influence in the Canary Islands, may be part of the Galician/Portuguese
contribution. In Cuba and Venezuela,
the Canary influence cannot be entirely separated from the direct influence of
Galician Spanish speakers.
Non-inverted
questions of the sort ¿qué tú quieres? `what do you want?' are usual in
Cuban, Puerto Rican and Dominican Spanish, somewhat less so in Venezuelan and
Panamanian Spanish, and quite uncommon in the remainder of Latin America, as
well as being extremely rare in the Iberian Peninsula. In the Canary Islands, non-inverted
questions are not as common as in the Caribbean, but among older speakers in
rural regions, the frequency rises appreciably, indicating a higher rate of
usage in the past, when the Canary influence on Caribbean Spanish was
strongest. Galician/Portuguese also
employs non-inverted questions, but not due to the cliticization of subjects
but rather to the general lack of subject-verb inversion. The tight concentration of non-inverted
questions in Latin American Spanish, limited to the Antilles and a few coastal
Caribbean regions, correlates neatly with Canary Island influence, and also
with recent Galician arrivals.
Found
throughout the Caribbean are combinations in which an infinitive is preceded by
an overt subject, usually following a preposition, with para being the
most common preposition: para yo
salir `in order for me to leave,' para ellos entender `for them to
understand,' antes de yo venir `before I came,' etc. Unlike noninverted questions or the word guagua,
preposed subjects of infinitives are not limited to the Antilles or the
Caribbean, although they are most common in that area. On the other side of the Atlantic, such
constructions are usual in the Canary Islands.
In peninsular Spain, infinitives with preposed subjects are not unknown
in Andalusia, although never common. In
Galicia, such combinations occur in Spanish as translations of Galician
patterns. In Latin America, the
Canary/Galician contribution converged most strongly in the Caribbean, which is
where infinitives with preposed subjects are most frequent. This distribution provides circumstantial
evidence in favor of a Canarian contribution in the Caribbean zone (cf. Lipski
1991).
Phonologically,
Canary Island Spanish could easily be confused with Cuban, Panamanian or
Venezuelan Spanish by the casual observer (cf. Almeida 1989a, 1989b, 1990;
Alvar 1959, Catalán 1960, 1964; Lorenzo Ramos 1976; Samper Padilla 1990). Even members of these speech communities are
not always able to distinguish between a Canary Islander and a speaker of
Caribbean Spanish. Although some have
seen a direct Canary Island influence in Caribbean Spanish pronunciation (e.g.
Alvarez Nazario 1972a), this cannot be objectively verified. The phonological patterns of the Canary
Islands continue the patterns of consonantal weakening found throughout
southern Spain, but do not differ qualitatively from Andalusian and
Extremaduran dialects. Canary Island
immigration to the Caribbean added to phonetic tendencies which were already
well-developed, but the overall Canarian contribution is largely supportive
rather than innovative.
Portuguese presence in the Canary Islands
The
Portuguese presence in the Canary Islands began in the 15th century, and
continued for several centuries thereafter.
As a result, Canary Island Spanish has absorbed numerous
Portuguese/Galician lexical items, and possibly some grammatical
constructions. The Canary Islands were
known to the ancients of the Mediterranean region, only to be collectively forgotten
during the Dark Ages. The development
of the compass, the rudder, and the availability of more accurate maps spurred
exploration of the near Atlantic beginning in the 13th century, and Genoese,
Moroccans, and possibly even Castilians had visited the Canary Islands by the
end of the century. In 1336 the Genoan
sailor Lancelotto Malocello arrived on the island of Lanzarote, whose name is
derived from that of the Italian navigator.
The first known map of the Canary Islands was drawn in Mallorca, in
1339. In 1341 the king of Portugal sent
a military expedition to the islands, under the command of Niccoloso da Recco;
Florentines, Genoese, Portuguese, and Castilians were included in the force. Four indigenous Canarians were captured and
taken as slaves; the soldiers also obtained samples of gofio, the staple food made from toasted grains, Canary millo or millet, and several cultural
artefacts. During the following years
the king of Mallorca and the Avignon Pope Clement VI authorized settlements,
and by 1352 a Catalan-Aragonese expedition, headed by Arnau Roger, left for the
islands with the intent of establishing a colony and converting the native
Guanche population to Christianity. The
shipwreck of a Castilian vessel in 1382 briefly brought a Castilian presence to
the islands, and by 1402 the newly arrived French conquerors described the
activities of previously-established Castilian and Aragonese pirates. By this time, hundreds of Guanches had been
sold as slaves in Morocco and Andalusia, while European diseases had decimated
the Guanche population remaining on the islands.
The
definitive European colonization of the Canary Islands began with the French
invasions of 1402 and the succeeding years.
The Guanches resisted tenaciously, but the French prevailed along
coastal areas, and a few years later the `Kingdom of the Canaries' was
proclaimed. Indigenous uprisings and
resistance did not cease until the final decades of the 15th century, and at
best the European colonies were no more than fortified coastal enclaves
surrounded by hostile natives.
By 1424
the ships of Portuguese Prince Henry `the Navigator' attempted to take
possession of the Canary Islands. These
initial skirmishes were followed by full-scale Portuguese invasions in 1446 and
1468, although the Portuguese never wrested control of the islands from the
French. By the end of the 15th century
the Canary Islands already contained a considerable Portuguese population, thus
beginning the linguistic cross-fertilization that was to shape the emerging
Canary Spanish dialect. With the death
of King Henry IV of Portugal in 1474 a fierce war between Portugal and Castile
broke out. The Catholic Kings Ferdinand
and Isabella claimed the `Guinea Coast' (the Senegambia region and the Windward
coast to the south), in an attempt to slow the Portuguese expansion in West
Africa. The Portuguese responded by
stepping up their agression against the Canary Islands. A peace treaty signed in Alcáçovas in 1479
resulted in Castile's desisting in its claims to West Africa and the definitive
renunciation of navigation rights in African waters. The Portuguese agreed to stop their attacks on the Canary
Islands, but the Portuguese presence on the islands continued to grow, dominating
agriculture and commerce during the 16th century.
Spain
launched its first serious effort to capture the Canary Islands in 1461, with
attacks by Diego García de Herrera. In
1478 the Catholic Kings sent another expedition headed by Juan Rejón, who built
a fort on Gran Canaria. From this beachhead
Spain began its systematic attacks on the native population, obtaining a final
surrender in 1483. Spanish attacks on
Tenerife began in 1496, and by the end of the 15th century the Canary Islands
were under nominal Spanish control, although native insurrection continued for
many more years.
The
Spanish occupation of the Canary Islands coincided with the massive deportation
of Guanches, many of whom were sent as slaves to Spain and other European
countries. The Guanches who remained on
the islands were forced to work on the estates and in the businesses run by the
new masters. A contigent of Spanish
Jews expelled from the Iberian Peninsula arrived in the islands beginning in
1492; following the establishment of the Inquisition in 1499 some emigrated to
the Americas.
Although
Spain effectively controlled the Canary Islands by the turn of the 16th
century, heavy immigration of Portuguese and Genoan colonists continued,
spurred by the liberal immigration policies of Alfonso Fernández de Lugo, the
first governor of Tenerife and La Palma.
Fernández de Lugo recognized that the islands contained much fertile
land, and encouraged the planting of sugar cane. The first sugar mill was constructed in 1484 in Agaete, on Gran
Canaria. Another mill was built by a
Genoan entrepreneur in 1501 in Gáldar, Gran Canaria, and much Genoan investment
capital arrived to support the new sugar industry.
During
the 16th century numerous Portuguese immigrated to the Canary Islands. Many came from the Madeira islands, where they
were engaged in sugar cane cultivation.
Others arrived directly from Portugal and worked in agriculture. Portuguese settlers also worked as artesans
and laborers, and a considerable number managed to acquire small
properties. At the beginning of the
sugar industry in the Canary Islands the technical personnel were almost all
Portuguese, having obtained their experience in Madeira, whence sugar
cultivation techniques had arrived via Genoans and Sicilians, who had
transplanted the sugar industry from the Mediterranean to the Portuguese
Atlantic islands during the 15th century.
Guanche slaves were eventually deported from the Canary Islands and sent
to Madeira, thus forming a vicious circle of sugar and slavery, which would be
replicated a century later in the infamous sugar-slave-rum triangle
encompassing Europe, West Africa, and the Caribbean.
As the
Guanche population was diminishing--through deportations and European
diseases--the newly arrived colonists turned to the importation of black slaves
from the Senegambia and from the nearby Barbary Coast (Lobo Cabrera 1982). The arrival of black slaves in the Canary
Islands coincides chronologically with the initial presence of West Africans in
Portugal and Andalusia. Granda (1972)
speculates as to whether a bozal
Spanish was ever formed in the Canary Islands, similar to the Afro-Hispanic
pidgin which was to be found in major Peninsular cities during the 16th and
part of the 17th centuries. To date, no
credible evidence has come to date, but the sociodemographic conditions on some
of the islands were similar to those which obtained in the Iberian
Peninsula. The Spanish also captured
`Moorish' slaves from the neighboring coast of Morocco and Mauritania, thereby
creating a linguistic and cultural mosaic which presaged the African
communities in the large cities of Spain during the 16th and 17th
centuries. Berber slaves arrived in the
eastern Canary Islands, the `moriscos' who served as crewmembers on Canary
ships. By the end of the 16th century,
it is estimated that the `moriscos' constituted a majority of the population of
Lanzarote.
By 1600
the Guanches had for all intents and purposes vanished from Canary life,
although a few remote settlements continued to exist in isolation. Portuguese emigration to the Canaries
dwindled during the first decades of the 17th century, as Portugal fought to
free itself from Spanish domination.
With the definitive independence of Portugal in 1640, Portuguese
immigration to the Canary Islands increased once more, spurred by the economic
devastation suffered in Portugal, a
situation exacerbated by the war with the Dutch over African and South American
colonies.
The
Portuguese presence in the Canary Islands profoundly affected the vocabulary of
Canary Spanish, and may have left traces in grammatical constructions as
well. The now somewhat moribund
non-inverted questions of the sort ¿Qué
tú quieres?, overt subject +
infinitive (te digo eso para tu
entender las consecuencias), and the combinations más nunca, más nada,
más nadie, are all found both in Portuguese and in Canary Island
Spnaish, as well as in Latin American dialects heavily influenced by Canary
immigration. Scholars have proposed
that dozens of lexical items also bear a Portuguese imprint. Of these, faca `dagger,' fechar,
`to close, bolt shut,' guinchar `to
scream,' jeito `cunningness,' rapadura `crystalized unrefined sugar'
are the most notorious, but hundreds of other supposed Portuguese incursions
have been collected by Pérez Vidal (1991); Morera (1994a) gives a more detailed
analysis.. Many of these words have to
do with meterological phenomena, particularly variants of light rain and
drizzle: cheire `thick fog/drizzle,' cherizo `cold drizzle,' chobasco `drizzle,' choricera `drizzle with strong breeze,' chumbar `persistent drizzle,' chumirisquear
`intermittent drizzle,' chumisca
`drizzle of short duration,' churiza
`persistent drizzle with light breeze,' churume
`drizzle with breeze,' churivisca/chuvisca `drizzle of short duration,' chuvizna `drizzle,' gargón `drizzle with northwest wind,' garubar `light rain with wind,' garuga
`fine drizzle with fog,' garuja/jaruya `drizzle,' moliña `cold drizzle without wind,' moraliña `drizzle with wind,' morriña
`drizzle,' muña `light rain,' etc.
(Pérez Vidal 1991: 154-9). Most of these items are found only
regionally and only among older rural residents, although some are known
throughout the islands.
Studies of Canary Island Spanish
Numerous
monographs and articles have explored various facets of Canary Island Spanish,
initially from a purely descriptive perspective, and more recently
incorporating sociolinguistics, phonological theory, syntactic theory, and
semantics. Medina López (1996) surveys
the literature, and the remaining articles in Medina López and Corbella Díaz
(1996) provide a useful cross-section of recent research. Almeida and Díaz Alayón (1988) and Lorenzo
Ramos (1988) summarize many features of Canary Island Spanish. Medina López
(1995, 1999) offers a trans-Atlantic perspective on Canary Spanish. Alvar (1975b) is a linguistic atlas of the
Canary Islands, based on Alvar’s personal fieldwork. As with similar linguistic atlases from Spain and other European
countries, the principal methodology consisted in the elicitation of individual
words—often monosyllabic—in isolation, with the result that apparent patterns
of regional variation appear which do not always correspond with observed
speech in the same regions. Alvar
(1959) is an early monograph on the Spanish of Tenerife, while Alvar (1972)
provides a first glimpse into social variation in Las Palmas de Gran
Canaria. Almeida (1989, 1990) provides
monographic treatments of rural and urban Gran Canaria speech, while Samper
Padilla 1990, 1996) offers a sociolinguistic treatment of Las Palmas de Gran
Canaria utilizing contemporary variational methodology. Torres Stinga (1995) is a monographic
treatment of Lanzarote Spanish, while Morera (1994b) describes the popular
speech of Fuerteventura. C. Alvar
(1975) conducted a rudimentary survey in a fishing village on La Gomera, while
Trujillo (1970) is a monograph on the speech of a village on Tenerife. Lorenzo Ramos (1976) is an exceptionally
detailed monograph on another town on Tenerife, and many typically Canarian traits
are described in this book. Trujillo
(1978) is a phonetic study of the whistled language of La Gomera, now virtually
defunct. Piñero Piñero (2000) is a
study of verbal constructions in the educated speech of Las Palmas, while Troya
Déniz (1998) describes periphrastic constructions based on the infinitive in
the same dialect. Almeida (1999)
examines aspects of rhythm in Canary speech..
Medina López (1993) gives a glimpse into the sociolinguistics of
pronominal usage in one rural community.
Cáceres Lorenzo (1992) is a more general study of adverbial
expressions.
Phonetics and phonology
Although
there is considerable regional and social variation in Canary Island Spanish,
there is considerable homogeneity in pronunciation, with the major
differentiators being social class and the rural/urban axis, together with
age/generation. The principal features
are:
(1) Syllable-final /s/ is uniformly aspirated in
preconsonantal and word-final prevocalic position throughout the Canary
Islands. Phrase-final /s/ is more
frequently lost. The isolated dialect
of El Hierro is reputed to tenaciously retain syllable- and word-final /s/ as a
sibilant. While this may once have been
true, currently such sibilant pronunciation is found only among the oldest
rural residents, combined with high rates of aspiration and loss of /s/ in the
same positions. There are also some
elderly speakers in isolated villages of La Gomera who spontaneously retain
word-final /s/ as [s] in some instances.
(2) No Canary Island dialect distinguishes /s/
and /θ/, despite occasional assertions that the dialects of El Hierro
maintain this opposition. Ceceo or realization of all sibilants as
[θ] is quite rare. The usual
Canary Island /s/ is a plain alveolar fricative, similar to the /s/ found
widely in Latin America and western Andalusia.
Table 1 gives data on pronunciation of /s/ in key Canary Island
dialects, the vestigial Canary-derived speech of the isleños of Louisiana, and selected dialects of southern Spain and
the Caribbean.
(3) Phrase-final and word-final prevocalic /n/
is usually velarized in Canary Island Spanish, and sometimes the velar nasal
disappears, leaving only a nasalized vowel.
There is no evidence of a completely denasalized final vowel, e.g. in
the third person plural verbal paradigm, as sometimes occurs in vernacular
Andalusian Spanish. At the same time,
the rates of retention of alveolar [n] are higher in Canary Island dialects
than in Andalusian and Caribbean Spanish.
Moreover, in the more isolated islands such as El Hierro and La Gomera,
where in rural areas the speech is in general more archaic, rates of retention
of final [n] are proportionately higher.
(4) Striking in the speech of all the islands is
the retention—general in rural speech and increasingly less common in urban
speech—of the palatal liquid /λ/, which when present is always given a
liquid pronunciation, and is never realized as a fricative. Generally considered an archaism in the
modern Spanish-speaking world, retention of /λ/ in the Canary Islands
correlates well with other archaic features found in the more isolated Canary
dialects. Among Canary Islanders,
awareness of the existence of /λ/ is high, but urban speakers report that
only old speakers and those from totally rural areas use this phoneme. In reality, even many younger urban Canary
Islanders occasionally use /λ/, but its exclusive use appears to be on the
decline throughout the archipelago.
(5) There is considerable reduction and
neutralization of syllable- and word-final liquids in Canary Spanish, with no
single phonetic result predominating, even in the same dialect region. Word- and phrase-finally, total loss of /l/
and /r/ is the most common manifestation, as it is throughout Andalusia,
Extremadura, and surrounding areas, but lateralization of final /r/ to [l]
occurs sometimes, particularly in Las Palmas.
Word-internal preconsonantal liquids show a much greater variation, with
[l], [r], [Ø], [h], doubling of the following consonant, and even [n] being the
most common manifestations. Currently
there is almost no trace of the vocalization of syllable-final /l/ and /r/ to
[i], a trait once common in rural Canary Island speech.
(6) The affricate /č/ shows a variety of
realizations throughout the Canary Islands, with a fronted variant
approximating [ty] being the most common alternative to the
etymologically expected [č].
Deaffrication to [š] is quite uncommon, in comparison with western
Andalusia where the fricative pronunciation predominates.
(7) Intervocalic /d/ is frequently lost in the
desinence –ado and to a lesser extent in other contexts. Massive loss of intervocalic /d/ is
correlated with the lower sociolinguistic registers. Word-finally, /d/ routinely elides, and often remains elided in
plural forms.
(8) The
most striking departure from a simple rule of `continuant spreading' comes in
the Spanish dialect of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, in the Canary Islands. In Las Palmas Spanish (LPS), as in all other
Canarian varieties, voiced obstruents receive a continuant pronunciation
following syllable‑final consonants, thus falling in line with
`mainstream' Spanish dialects. However,
among the lower sociolinguistic strata, although /b/, /d/ and /g/ are uniformly
fricative following [h] < /s/, when preconsonantal /s/ is elided altogether,
the following obstruent receives a stop articulation
(cf. Almeida 1989: 57; 1990: 48‑52; Alvar 1971: 100; Catalán 1960, 1964; Felix 1979; Samper
Padilla 1990: chap. 3; Trujillo
1981: 164‑5). This results in minimal pairs such as
[laβaka] la vaca vs. [labaka(h)] las vacas `the
cow(s).' Catalán (1960) describes
the situation thus: `la aspiración, al
desaparecer, convierte a la consonante sonora inmediata en una oclusiva [b],
[d], [g],' noting that residents of Tenerife, for whom voiced obstruents are
always fricative following any manifestation of /s/, interpret Las Palmas
speech as containing an /n/ (after which voiced obstruents are stops in all
Spanish dialects): lambaca < las
vacas, landó < las dos, etc. Catalán (1964) notes that this `refuerzo de la explosión' also
occurs before voiceless obstruents, citing the novel by Pancho Guerra
(1977: 67) in which the author
transcribes Las Palmas as Lan Parmas, in mimicking the speech of
the latter city. Almeida (1990: 48-52)
and Samper Padilla (1990: chap. 3)
provide data on the sociolinguistic stratification of this pronunciation, while
Almeida (1989: 57) provides data
suggesting a rural origin for this process, which is not found elsewhere in the
Canary Islands. The phonetic particulars
of the stop/fricative alternation in LPS have been described by several
observers, with results which do not always converge. Alvar (1972: 100) asserts that the stop pronunciation is most frequent in the
case of /b/: `se produce una tensión articulatoria
que lleva a la h al alargamiento de la fase tensiva de la b con
relación siempre oclusiva ... y a veces, parecía percibirse un conato de
ensordecimiento.' Alvar (1972: 102) also observed the apparent nasalization
of preconsonantal /s/, although noting that gemination of the voiced obstruent
was more common: `entonces, la posición
débil de la h y fuerte de la b permitió la atracción de la
primera a la realización de la segunda:
es el grupo -bb-, que se documenta sin dificultades ... la doble b
... exige una tensión articulatoria muy fuerte que ... obliga a la
diferenciación de un mismo sonido articulado en dos momentos diferences ... la
lengua resuelve la cuestión eliminando una de esas oclusivas.' Trujillo (1981: 165) also claims prior gemination of the voiced obstruent in
compensation for the loss of /s/: `...
una geminación, acompañada de gran tensión articulatoria, aunque en
pronunciación rápida se reduce normalmente a una simple oclusiva de efecto
acústico muy semejante a la geminada, pues mantiene siempre toda su tensión.' Trujillo
(1981: 164-5) explains the matter thus:
... ante consonante sonora continua que pudiera tener
variante oclusiva, la sonorización de [-h] y su posterior asimilación resultaba
perfectamente viable, porque se mantenía la integridad silábica, alargando la
articulación y dividiéndola en dos, con una oclusión en medio ... debió
pasarse, pues, de la sonorización de la aspirada a la igualación de ambas
consonantes en una articulación única, partida por una oclusión que, al mismo
tiempo, aumentaba considerablemente la intensidad de la consonante ... el
resultado ... es con frecuencia una geminación, acompañada de gran tensión
articulatoria ... en todo caso, geminada, alargada o más o menos breve, lo que
se conserva inconmovible es la tensión fuerte.
Trujillo (1981: 165) claims prior gemination of the voiced
obstruent in compensation for the loss of /s/:
`... una geminación, acompañada de gran tensión articulatoria, aunque en
pronunciación rápida se reduce normalmente a una simple oclusiva de efecto
acústico muy semejante a la geminada, pues mantiene siempre toda su tensión.' For Trujillo, partial assimilation of [h] to a following
consonant, first voicing and then point of articulation, eventually provoked an
increased articulatory tenseness.
Almeida (1982, 1989) suggests the opposite course of events, namely that
increased articulatory tension has induced gemination and/or shortening of the
preceding vowel.
According
to Trujillo's description, preconsonantal /s/ is never realized as [h] in LPS,
so that the only realizations of the combination /s/ + voiced obstruent
are a single or geminate voiced stop (preconsonantal sibilant [s] is artificial
and unnatural in this dialect and is not to be considered as a legitimate
phonological variant). Almeida (1982),
on the other hand, tabulated many instances where /s/ remained as [h], but
where a single or geminate stop instantiated the following voiced obstruent. Felix (1979) provides a somewhat different
description of LPS, claiming that /d/ is realized as a stop following /r/ (as
in orden) and following sibilant [s] (as in desde). /b/ is pronounced as a stop following
sibilant [s]. The stop articulation is
retained when the /s/ is aspirated or deleted altogether. Felix also states that the stop articulation
following elided /s/ occurs only after final plural -/s/ or final /-s/ in words
like pues, dos and más, and suggests a functional
hypothesis. In second person singular
verb forms ending in elided /-s/, Felix claims that a following voiced
obstruent is realized as a fricative.
Many of these conclusions, particularly the noncontinuant realization of
/d/ following [s] and [r], are contradicted by other researchers, including Samper
Padilla (1990: 67). My own fieldwork, carried out on LPS in 1983
and involving extensive recorded materials, confirms occlusive pronunciation of
voiced obstruents following elided /s/, but reveal a dearth of conclusive cases
involving [h] followed by a voiced obstruent.
Regardless of discrepancies among different observers, and of
differences in research technique (Alvar 1972 and Trujillo 1981 relied on
real-time transcription, Felix 1979 employed tape recordings, while Almeida
1982 not only taped examples, but subjected them to spectrographic analysis), a
common core of observations remains, which challenges currently available
models of Spanish phonology.
(9) There is some voicing of
intervocalic/word-initial postvocalic /p/, /t/, and /k/ throughout the Canary
Islands (Torres Stinga 1995:62-4; Trujillo 1980a; Morera 1994:55).
(10) Intervocalic /s/ is occasionally aspirated
or lost, although not to the extent found, e.g., in Honduras, El Salvador, and
New Mexico (Torres Stinga 1995:73-5).
Morera (1994:65) reports on the scarcity of this variant in
Fuerteventura.
Canary Islanders abroad.
The
frequent emigration of Canary Islanders over the past four centuries resulted
in numerous transplanted Canarian communities throughout North and South
America. Linguistic traces of Canary
Island Spanish continue to persist in the Caribbean, particuarly in the
Dominican Republic, Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Venezuela. During the course of the 18th century, Spain sent large numbers
of settlers from the Canary Islands to hold the line against French incursions
at the western edge of the Spanish colony of Santo Domingo. The significant proportion of Canary
Islanders in rural western regions and also in the capital city may account for
some of the features of Dominican Spanish, particularly the use of non-inverted
questions. Golibart (1976) believes
that vocalization of syllable-final /s/ and /r/ (e.g. mujer > mujei, carta > caita, algo > aigo) in the northern Cibao region of
the Dominican Republic is of Canary Island origin, although this pronunciation
is very rare in contemporary Canary Spanish.
Megenney (1990a: 80f.) hints at
an African origin for the same pronunciation.
Few other areas of Latin America have ever manifestated this
phenomenon. Puerto Rican jíbaro
speech of the 19th century apparently had this trait, now absent in all Puerto
Rican dialects (Alvarez Nazario 1990:
80f.). Vocalization of liquids
was also prevalent among the negros curros of 19th century Cuba, free
blacks living in Havana who adopted a distinctive manner of speaking (Bachiller
y Morales 1883, Ortiz 1986), more related to Andalusian than to Afro-Hispanic
patterns. It is thus possible that
vocalization of liquids was once more common in many Spanish-speaking regions,
being now reduced to a few small areas.
Granda (1991) believes that liquid vocalization is due primarily to
sociolinguistic marginality, rather than to substrate influences.
In
Cuba, immigration from Spain was especially heavy in the second half of the
19th century, particularly from Galicia/Asturias and the Canary Islands. Canarian immigration peaked in the first
decades of the 20th century, and was responsible for a not inconsiderable
amount of linguistic transfer between the two territories. So concentrated was Spanish immigration that
Cubans began to refer to all Spaniards from the Peninsula as gallegos `Galicians,'
and to the Canary Islanders as isleños `islanders.' Alvarez Nazario (1972) gives an overview of
the Canary Island influence on Puerto Rican Spanish.
Table
1: Behavior of /s/ in Canary Island and
other Spanish dialects
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
/sC/ /s#C/ /s##/ /s#V/ /s/#v
[s] [h] [Ø] [s]
[h] [Ø] [s] [h] [Ø] [s] [h] [Ø] [s] [h] [Ø]
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Isleño
11 76 13 3 62
35 4 11
85 49 30
21 10 57
33
Fuerteventura (rural)
3 82
15 0 88
12 0 17
83 53 46
1 1 92
7
La Gomera (rural)
5 93
2 2 94
4 11 12
77 84 11
5 4 93
3
Gran Canaria (rural)
0 88
12 0 87
13 0 11
88 73 21
6 0 94
6
El Hierro (rural)
46 54 0 15 84 1 70
16 14 89 9 2 13 87
0
Lanzarote (rural)
7 82 11 0 83
17 0 20
80 74 24
2 3 80
17
La Palma (rural)
3 89
8 1 93
6 2 18 80 48 52
0 3 94
3
Tenerife (rural)
2 66 32 0 90
10 3 19
78 84 16
0 3 87
10
Sevilla
0 95
5 0 91
9 5 2
93 69 10
21 1 46
54
Granada
0 82
18 0 85
15 1 2
97 0 15
85 2 50
48
Cuba
3 97
0 2 75
23 61 13
26 48 28
25 10 53
27
Dominican Republic
8 17
75 5 25
70 36 10
54 50 5
45 17 22
61
Panama
2 89
9 1 82
17 25 6
69 69 17
14 2 39
59
Puerto Rico
3 92
5 4 69
27 46 22
32 45 32
23 16 53
31
Venezuela
7 40
53 3 47
50 38 16
46 57 26
17 15 52
33
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Legend: C = consonant; # = word boundary; ## =
phrase boundary;
V = stressed vowel; v = unstressed
vowel
Table
2: Behavior of word‑final /n/ in
Canary Island and other dialects
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Dialect /n/## /n/#V
[n] [ŋ]
[Ø] [n]
[ŋ] [Ø]
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Isleño 82 2
16 94 0 6
Fuerteventura 30 54
16 50 37 13
(Pto. Rosario)
Fuerteventura 17 26
57 56 21
23
(rural)
La Gomera 27 51
22 55 34 11
(S. Sebastián)
La Gomera (rural) 49 18 33 80 11
9
Las Palmas de G. C. 18 49 33 54 34 12
G. Canaria (rural) 29 29
42 73 10 17
El Hierro 71 5
24 96 0 4
(Valverde)
Lanzarote 39 32
29 57 17 26
(Arrecife)
Lanzarote (rural) 31 8 61 76 4
20
La Palma (S. Cruz) 3 63
34 55 23 22
La Palma (rural) 34 32 32 61 18
21
S. Cruz de Tenerife 13 51
36 63 19 18
Tenerife (rural) 36 35 29 63 26
11
Sevilla 2 42
36 40 38 22
Granada 0 77
23 48 35 17
Cuba 8 54
38 3 59 38
Panama 1 88
11 5 80 15
Puerto Rico 22 69
9 8 79 13
Venezuela 1 86
13 13 72 15
-------------------------------------------------------------
Legend: /n/ ## = phrase-final (muy bien); /n/ #V = word‑final prevocalic (bien
hecho)