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Este video se conecta a la pregunta numero 21 porque habla sobre los idiomas del Romance y su separación del Latin. Da ejemplos de varias personas hablando 5 de los idiomas Romanos para poder comparar como se oye uno al lado de otro.

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Este articulo se conecta al tema porque habla del interés que los papas tienen en relación a que sus hijos sean bilingue desde su infancia. Se relaciona a las preguntas numero 30 y 31 del libro porque explica la facilidad en que pueden aprender un idioma nuevo los bebes en comparación a los adultos.

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Education | News releases | Social science

For years, scientists and parents alike have touted the benefits of introducing babies to two languages: Bilingual experience has been shown to improve cognitive abilities, especially problem-solving.

And for infants raised in households where two languages are spoken, that bilingual learning happens almost effortlessly. But how can babies in monolingual households develop such skills?

"As researchers studying early language development, we often hear from parents who are eager to provide their child with an opportunity to learn another language, but can't afford a nanny from a foreign country and don't speak a foreign language themselves," said Naja Ferjan Ramirez, a research scientist at the University of Washington Institute of Learning & Brain Sciences ( I-LABS).

A new study by I-LABS researchers, published July 17 in Mind, Brain, and Education, is among the first to investigate how babies can learn a second language outside of the home. The researchers sought to answer a fundamental question: Can babies be taught a second language if they don't get foreign language exposure at home, and if so, what kind of foreign language exposure, and how much, is needed to spark that learning?

The researchers took their query all the way to Europe, developing a play-based, intensive, English-language method and curriculum and implementing it in four public infant-education centers in Madrid, Spain. Sixteen UW undergraduates and recent graduates served as tutors for the study, undergoing two weeks of training at I-LABS to learn the teaching method and curriculum before traveling to Spain. The country's extensive public education system enabled the researchers to enroll 280 infants and children from families of varying income levels.

Based on years of I-LABS research on infant brain and language development, the method emphasizes social interaction, play, and high quality and quantity of language from the teachers. The approach uses "infant-directed speech" - often called "parentese" - the speech style parents use to talk to their babies, which has simpler grammar, higher and exaggerated pitch, and drawn-out vowels.

"Our research shows that parentese helps babies learn language," Ferjan Ramirez said.

Babies aged 7 to 33.5 months were given one hour of English sessions a day for 18 weeks, while a control group received the Madrid schools' standard bilingual program. Both groups of children were tested in Spanish and English at the start and end of the 18 weeks. The children also wore special vests outfitted with lightweight recorders that recorded their English learning. The recordings were analyzed to determine how many English words and phrases each child spoke.

The children who received the UW method showed rapid increases in English comprehension and production, and significantly outperformed the control group peers at all ages on all tests of English. By the end of the 18-week program, the children in the UW program produced an average of 74 English words or phrases per child, per hour; children in the control group produced 13 English words or phrases per child, per hour.

Ferjan Ramirez said the findings show that even babies from monolingual homes can develop bilingual abilities at this early age.

"With the right science-based approach that combines the features known to grow children's language, it is possible to give very young children the opportunity to start learning a second language, with only one hour of play per day in an early education setting," she said. "This has big implications for how we think about foreign-language learning."

Follow-up testing 18 weeks later showed the children had retained what they learned. The English gains were similar between children attending the two schools serving predominantly low-income neighborhoods and the two serving mid-income areas, suggesting that wealth was not a significant factor in the infants' ability to learn a foreign language. Children's native language (Spanish) continued to grow as they were learning English, and was not negatively affected by introducing a second language.

"Science indicates that babies' brains are the best learning machines ever created, and that infants' learning is time-sensitive. Their brains will never be better at learning a second language than they are between 0 and 3 years of age," said co-author Patricia Kuhl, co-director of I-LABS and a UW professor of speech and hearing sciences.

The results, Kuhl said, have the potential to transform how early language instruction is approached in the United States and worldwide:

"Parents in Madrid, in the United States and around the world are eager to provide their children with an opportunity to learn a foreign language early. The U.S. census shows that 27 percent of America's children under the age of 6 are now learning a language other than English at home. While these children are fully capable of learning both their parents' language and English, they often do not have adequate exposure to English prior to kindergarten entry and as a result, often lag behind their peers once they enter school," she said.

"I-LABS' new work shows we can create an early bilingual learning environment for dual-language learners in an educational setting, and in one hour per day, infants can ignite the learning of a second language earlier and much easier than we previously thought. This is doable for everybody," Kuhl said.

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For more information, contact Ferjan Ramirez at naja@uw.edu or 206-747-7850 and Kuhl at pkkuhl@uw.edu or 206-685-1921.

The study was supported by the Madrid Regional Ministry of Education, Youth and Sport, and the UW I-LABS Ready Mind Project.

Tag(s): Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences * I-LABS * Naja Ferjan Ramirez * Patricia Kuhl

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Bilingual babies: Study shows how exposure to a foreign language ignites infants' learning

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Education | News releases | Social science For years, scientists and parents alike have touted the benefits of introducing babies to two languages: Bilingual experience has been shown to improve cognitive abilities, especially problem-solving. And for infants raised in households where two languages are spoken, that bilingual learning happens almost effortlessly.

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El articulo habla sobre 8 de las equivocaciones mas vistas entre los hablantes nativos del español. Esto se conecta a la pregunta numero 32, dando mas ejemplos de algunas equivocaciones comunes.

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8 Common Spanish Mistakes Even Native Speakers Make

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Mispronunciations, malapropisms, and misuse of words. As a native English speaker, you are probably "guilty" of these all the time. And you are probably guilty of doing some mistakes yourself, which is totally fine. None of these things are limited to English speakers though.

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Idiomas Fáciles Para los Hablantes del Ingles

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Idiomas Fáciles Para los Hablantes del Ingles

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El articulo habla sobre 9 de los idiomas mas fáciles de aprender para los hablantes nativos del ingles. Describe el idioma y da una explicación sobre porque ese idioma se considera mas "fácil" de aprender.

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So you've decided to learn a language. (Good choice! We approve.) But there are so many options. Should you go for a more widely spoken language like Spanish, a politically relevant one like Russian, or one you can use on your next vacation? These are all valid motivations, but here's another: You're busy. We all are. Why not tackle a language that will be relatively easy to learn? With the help of language guru Benjamin Davies from Babbel's Didactics department, we've compiled a list of the 9 easiest languages for English speakers to learn. Hopefully, this will help you narrow down your options, so you can start learning right away!

1. Norwegian

This may come as a surprise, but we have ranked Norwegian as the easiest language for English speakers to pick up. Norwegian is a member of the Germanic family of languages - just like English! This means the languages share quite a bit of vocabulary, such as the seasons vinter and sommer (we'll let you figure out those translations). Another selling point for Norwegian: the grammar is pretty straightforward, with only one form of each verb per tense. And the word order closely mimics English. For example, "Can you help me?" translates to Kan du hjelpe meg? - the words are in the same order in both languages, so mastering sentence structure is a breeze! Finally, you'll have a lot more leeway with pronunciation when learning Norwegian. That's because there are a vast array of different accents in Norway and, therefore, more than one "correct way" to pronounce words. Sound appealing? Lace up your snow boots and give Norwegian a try!

2. Swedish

Our second easiest language also comes from Scandinavia and the Germanic family of languages. One reason Swedish is one of the easiest languages for English speakers to learn is the large number of cognates the two languages share (cognates are words in different languages that stem from the same ancestral language and look and/or sound very similar to one another). For instance, "grass" is gräs in Swedish - a clear cognate. Like Norwegian, Swedish has relatively simple grammar rules and similar word order to English. Thanks to IKEA, Swedish has something else working in its favor: exposure. English speakers around the world have been exposed to a number of Swedish words while simply shopping for furniture (and chowing down on some meatballs, I presume). The popular, minimalistic Lack tables are named after the Swedish word for "varnish." And the Stockholm rugs, of course, get their name from Sweden's capital. Business Insider has broken down IKEA's unique naming system in this article. Furniture lovers, perhaps Swedish is the language for you.

3. Spanish

This pick should come as no surprise. Spanish has always been a go-to language for English speakers to learn due to its practicality and wide reach. Well, it's also one of the easiest languages for English speakers to learn. Spanish is one of the Romance languages, which derive from Latin - as do many English words, so the name of the game here is cognates, cognates, cognates. Correcto means "correct," delicioso is "delicious," and pizza is "pizza," to name a few. Spanish pronunciation is fairly straightforward. It's a phonetic language - for the most part, its words are pronounced the way they're spelled. But grammar-haters beware: Spanish does have a number of different verb tenses and exceptions to grammar rules which can get confusing. However, the tenses largely align with ones we use in English, so they're not as difficult to learn as you may think. But perhaps the biggest pro to choosing to learn Spanish is its prevalence in our everyday lives. According to recent statistics, Spanish is the second most-spoken language in the world, with over 400 million native speakers. You've probably heard Spanish spoken on TV, on the radio, and even by members of your community. It's everywhere, so you already have a leg up on learning it!

4. Dutch

Dutch is another Germanic language on our list. It's spoken by the majority of citizens of the Netherlands, as well as a large portion of Belgium's population. It's the third most-spoken Germanic language, after German and English, which makes sense - due to shared vocabulary, Dutch sounds like a combination of German and English. A really interesting characteristic of Dutch is that many words are spelled exactly the same as they are in English, more so than in almost any other language. However, use caution because they're often pronounced differently. For instance, the word "rat" has the same spelling and meaning in both languages, but in Dutch it's pronounced like the English word "rot." Also, keep an eye out for false cognates, like the Dutch word wet, which actually means "law." If you stay vigilant, Dutch could still be the language for you.

Germanic languages nab three of the top four spots on this list, but English's other cousins, German and Danish, are absent - and for good reason. German didn't make the cut because, although it shares thousands of cognates with English, absolutely no one would describe its grammar as "easy." And while written Danish looks a lot like Norwegian and Swedish, the pronunciation can be too intimidating for casual learners. If you're up for the challenge, check back next week for another list you might find more interesting.

5. Portuguese

The fifth easiest language on our list is Portuguese, a member of the Romance language family that's spoken in both Portugal and Brazil. Like Spanish, this translates to a large number of shared vocabulary words, which always makes picking it up easier. But beware of false cognates. You might be really excited about getting Portuguese pasta, only to be handed a "folder." Portuguese ( particularly Brazilian Portuguese) is another language that gives learners the advantage of exposure. Brazilian food, drinks, music and films have been making frequent appearances in global pop culture, giving students of Portuguese plenty of opportunities to enhance their learning.

6. Indonesian

This selection may also come as a surprise, but Indonesian has several qualities that make it a logical choice for English speakers. For starters, Indonesian - spoken natively by nearly 23 million people - is one of the few Asian languages that uses the Latin alphabet we know and love. Many Asian languages are incredibly difficult for English speakers to master due to the unfamiliar characters in their writing systems, but not Indonesian. It's also a phonetic language, made up of words that are pronounced exactly the way they're spelled. Now, Indonesian grammatical structures are very different from those in English, but don't let that deter you! Its lack of rules make learning grammar a lot easier. There are no verb conjugations (you read that correctly!), no plurals (simply repeat the word twice), and no grammatical genders. If you're not a fan of grammar rules, Indonesian could be a match made in heaven!

7. Italian

Next up is another Romance language. Though not as widely spoken as Spanish or Portuguese, Italian still has more than 63 million native speakers. Its Latin roots allow for a sizable chunk of cognates English speakers will recognize, such as futuro ("future") and lotteria ("lottery"), two things we all wish we could controllare ("control"). Perhaps the best part of choosing Italian is the possibility to learn with food! Italian cuisine has become a staple of many Western countries, bringing a number of Italian words into our regular vocabularies. Penne all'arrabbiata translates to "angry pasta" (presumably because it's spicy!), and farfalle (the pasta shaped like bow ties) actually means "butterflies." Doesn't learning Italian sound delizioso?

8. French

There's one more major Romance language on our list, and this one is often a fan favorite. Although it's not as easy to learn as some of its language cousins, French is spoken by nearly 76 million people in many different parts of the world ( France, Canada, Belgium and Madagascar - to name only a few). As with the other Romance languages, the biggest benefit to choosing to learn French is the large amount of shared vocabulary. But this isn't solely due to its linguistic roots. During the lengthy history of wars and conquests between France and England, key language parts were passed from one country to the other. This mostly came in the form of French vocabulary added to the English language, such as avant-garde and à la carte, although the word-sharing went from English to French as well (e.g. week-end). French pronunciation is a bit tricky, at first, but we often hear French accents in pop culture, making them easier to replicate than you may think.

9. Swahili

The final language on our list, the "least easy" of the easiest languages, is a bit less conventional than the others. Swahili is widely used across eastern and southeastern Africa, including in Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania, among other countries, but usually as a lingua franca - a common language adopted among native speakers of different languages. Swahili words often sound just like they're spelled, and the pronunciation is relatively easy for English speakers to pick up. It's said to be the easiest African language for English natives to learn, partially because of the surprising amount of loan words taken from English, like penseli ("pencil") and mashine ("machine"). Finally, Swahili is fairly straightforward in terms of grammar. Verb conjugations utilize prefixes in a logical way, making them less difficult for English speakers to learn. If you want to try something different, see if Swahili is the language for you. However, if you want to pick up a new language as easily as possible, we recommend starting with something from the top of the list - like Spanish, Swedish or Norwegian.

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9 Easiest Languages For English Speakers To Learn

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So you've decided to learn a language. (Good choice! We approve.) But there are so many options. Should you go for a more widely spoken language like Spanish, a politically relevant one like Russian, or one you can use on your next vacation? These are all valid motivations, but here's another: You're busy.

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El articulo habla sobre la variedad de letras en español que no tienen sonido dependiendo de la estructura de la palabra en que se encuentra. Tambien da varios ejemplos auditorios de como se oye la palabra hablada. Este elemento conecta con la pregunta numero 48 del libro en donde habla sobre porque la "h" en español no tiene sonido.

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There are only 2 regular silent letters in the Spanish language.

You'll need to take care with both of these letters because they are silent in some words and pronounced in others.

In addition, when I say 'regular' silent letters I'm referring to the pronunciation of traditional Spanish words, not words that have been adopted from Greek or other languages.

In this post, I'll give an overview of the the two silent letters in Spanish including where and how you need to use them.

Since this post is about pronunciation, I'll also include some short mp3 recordings to demonstrate what the words sound like in order to avoid any confusion with phonetic spelling.

The letter H

The first silent letter in Spanish is the letter H. This letter is always silent unless it is next to the letter C.

When you see the letter C next to an H you need to make a ch sound. This sound is almost identical to the "ch" sound in English.

In the Spanish alphabet, the word that represents the letter H is hache. Since this word starts with an H and has a ch, it makes for a great first example to demonstrate the pronunciation of H and ch.

Here are two more examples of words that also start with H:

Here are two examples with the letter H in the middle of the word:

(notice how the H creates a 'gap' between the A and the O)

(similarly notice the H creates an elongation between the two middle O's)

To finish the section on the letter H, here are two examples with a ch:

The letter U

In the majority of Spanish words with a U, the sound you need to make to represent the U is like a double "oo" in English and rhymes with the English word "too".

Here are two examples of words with the typical pronunciation of the Spanish letter U:

In contract, the letter U is silent in Spanish words when it is next to a Q or sandwiched in between a G and an E or a G and an I as gui and gue.

Here are some examples with U after a Q:

Here are some examples with a gui:

Here are some examples with a gue:

To make things slightly more confusing, whenever you see a Ü in Spanish with a double dot, you need to pronounce the U sound. You will see this letter in situations like the last two examples as either a güe or a güi.

Here are some examples with a güi:

Here are some examples with a güe:

Adopted silent letters from other languages

At the start of the post I mentioned that there are silent letters that occur in words that have been adopted from other languages such as Greek.

Here are a few examples:

These are fairly low use words so I don't recommend you spend too much time on them (unless you are a psychologist and need this word to explain what you do).

Your Turn

Choose some examples from this post and practice the pronunciation by copying recordings. Also try them out with a Spanish native in a language exchange or with a teacher.

As a bonus for reading this post, if you sign up to the Real Fast Spanish School and mention this post in an email, I will offer you a free one-on-one Skype lesson as another opportunity to practice your pronunciation.

If you would like to learn more about pronunciation check out this podcast episode.

How can you remember the silent letters in Spanish?

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Silent Letters in Spanish: These are The Only Two You Need to Know

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There are only 2 regular silent letters in the Spanish language. You'll need to take care with both of these letters because they are silent in some words and pronounced in others. In addition, when I say 'regular' silent letters I'm referring to the pronunciation of traditional Spanish words, not words that have been adopted from Greek or other languages.

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En este video, enseñan el movimiento de la boca en la pronunciación de las vocales en español. Se ve como los labios cambian de posición dependiendo de la letra hablada. Como discutimos en clase, la posición de los labios y la lengua es distinta para cada vocal.

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European Spanish Pronunciation, Video 2: Spanish Vowels

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Este video da información sobre las reglas del español. Así como en clase, cubre algunas reglas como la explicación sobre porque unas letras tienen diferente sonido dependiendo de donde se haya en la palabra. En el libro, la pregunta numero 47 se relaciona con esto, hablando de lo diferentes sonidos de la letra "b".

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European Spanish Pronunciation, Video 3: Spanish Spelling Rules

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El articulo habla sobre como trabajar hacia la posibilidad de aprender como pronunciar "rr" correctamente en el vocabulario del español. Este elemento se conecta al capitulo numero 59. Afirma la idea del libro de que, la pronunciación si se puede aprender pero lleva practica.

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When you ask English speakers what the hardest part of learning Spanish is, you'll get a few responses over and over again:

Verb tenses. The subjunctive mood. The two forms of .

But for lots of Spanish learners, the language's trickiest challenge can be boiled down into two simple little letters: rr.

These letters produce what's called the trilled, hard or rolled r sound in Spanish and it can be tough for English speakers to reproduce.

If you're one of the many learners who struggle with making the Spanish rr sound, you might have already given up. Maybe you've even convinced yourself that you'll never be able to roll that r, no matter how hard you try.

Well, I'm here to tell you unequivocally that this isn't true: With the right kind of practice, anybody can learn to make the Spanish rolled rr sound.

Yes, even you.

This article contains some tried-and-true tips that'll have you mastering those tricky rr sounds in no time at all.

So, "r" you ready to dive in? If so, read on!

Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere.Click here to get a copy. (Download)

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What Is the Spanish Trilled rr Sound?

The letter r can make two different sounds in Spanish. Both of these sounds can be difficult for native English speakers who are learning Spanish, since neither sound exists in English.

The trilled r sound (also called a hard r or a rolled r, as previously mentioned) is the subject of this article. In fancy linguistics terms, it's called an alveolar trill and it's produced by a vibration of the tongue against the roof of the mouth.

In Spanish, you'll find a trilled r sound in two situations:

1. The first and most common place you'll encounter the sound is in the form of a double-r in the middle of a word. Here are some examples (click on any of these words to hear pronunciations by a native speaker):

2. You'll also find the rolled r sound in Spanish any time a word begins with the letter r. Again, here are some examples:

A Word of Encouragement: Anyone Can Make the Spanish rr Sound

I've seen a lot of misinformation on language-learning forums stating that the rolled r sound is "genetic" and that some native English speakers are simply incapable of making it.

Well, I'm here to tell you that this isn't true! According to Dr. Patricia Kuhl, a linguist at the University of Warwick, infants are born with the genetic ability to learn any sound in any language. That's why she calls them "language universalists."

It becomes more difficult to learn new sounds as one gets older, but there's absolutely no genetic reason why you (yes, you!) can't learn to roll your r's. It just takes practice.

Plus, the rolled r sound isn't always easy for native Spanish speakers, either! When I lived in Spain and worked as an English teacher, several of my younger students had still not fully mastered the sound. It takes practice even for kids who grow up listening to it.

So remember this when you feel stuck or frustrated: You can make this sound! Just keep at it!

1. Start with a soft (un-rolled) r sound and work from there.

As I mentioned earlier, Spanish contains two r sounds. We've already talked about the hard r, but what about the soft r? That's the sound that you'll encounter when there's a single r anywhere in the middle or at the end of a word.

So, how do you make the soft r sound?

Believe it or not, it's the same sound as the tt sound in the English word "butter" (pronounced with an American accent). Practice saying the word "butter" and pay attention to where your tongue lands in your mouth on the tt sound.

Another easy way to learn to make the soft r sound is to pronounce an English d, but with a slightly different tongue placement.

Do you notice that when you say d, the broad middle part of your tongue touches the roof of your mouth? Try to say d again, but instead, touch the tip of your tongue to the roof of your mouth. Congrats-you're basically making a soft r sound.

So, how will this help you with the trilled r? First of all, it'll help you get the tongue placement down, since it's the same for both. Second, it's the building block for the next tip:

2. Make the unrolled r sound twice in a row.

So now you can make a soft r sound. Next, try to make it twice in a row. Then three times, then four times-as quickly as you can.

The actual rolled r sound involves using your breath to create a vibration between your tongue and the roof of your mouth. If you make the soft r sound many times in a row as fast as you can, you're very likely to roll your r without even realizing it.

3. Work on your tongue placement.

Many English speakers get tripped up trying to roll their r's because they're too hung up on how they pronounce an English r, in which the tongue doesn't touch the roof of the mouth at all. Since, as we've mentioned, the rolled r requires vibration between the tongue and the roof of the mouth, this won't do at all!

So, try to get English pronunciation out of your head and make sure your tongue is in the right place.

To find the right tongue placement, put your tongue directly behind your top front teeth. Then, start moving your tongue toward the back of your mouth.

Eventually, you'll feel where the roof of your mouth stops being smooth and starts having ridges. This ridged area is where your tongue needs to be when making the rolled r sound.

4. Listen to people making the trilled rr sound.

Babies learn language sounds intuitively by listening to and watching native speakers make them.

Think about it this way: You probably don't remember anybody teaching you to pronounce an s or f sound (or an r sound, for that matter!) in English. You just learned by listening and observing.

Doing the same in Spanish can help your brain make sense of how to produce the Spanish rr sound. So, seek out some video and audio resources of native Spanish speakers and follow along.

You can use authentic videos from FluentU to hear how real native Spanish speakers make the rolled r sound.

FluentU takes real-world videos-like music videos, movie trailers, news and inspiring talks-and turns them into personalized language learning lessons.

Other sites use scripted content. FluentU uses a natural approach that helps you ease into the Spanish language and culture over time. You'll learn Spanish as it's actually spoken by real people.

FluentU has a wide variety of videos topics, as you can see here:

FluentU brings native videos within reach with interactive transcripts. You can tap on any word to look it up instantly. Every definition has examples that have been written to help you understand how the word is used.

Plus, if you see an interesting word you don't know, you can add it to a vocab list.

Review a complete interactive transcript under the Dialogue tab, and find words and phrases listed under Vocab.

Learn all the vocabulary in any video with FluentU's robust learning engine. Swipe left or right to see more examples of the word you're on.

The best part is that FluentU keeps track of the vocabulary that you're learning, and recommends examples and videos for you based on the words you've already learned. Every learner has a truly personalized experience, even if they're studying with the same video.

Start using FluentU on the website with your computer or tablet or, better yet, download the iOS or Android FluentU app.

5. Use YouTube resources.

When learning to make language sounds, an article will only get you so far. Luckily, there are hundreds of YouTube videos on this very topic.

Watching instructional videos will combine the passive learning technique from the previous task (listening to other people rolling their r's), with active learning strategies explained in the videos.

For some excellent instructionals on rolling the Spanish rr, check out:

If these three videos don't do the trick, don't worry-there are a ton more to try.Simply search for "Spanish rr" in YouTube to find one that works for you.

6. Sing along to Spanish music.

Singing along with Spanish music is a great way in general to work on your Spanish pronunciation. In this case, it can help you practice rolling your r's as you would in a conversation -in the middle of sentences and in many different words.

Plus, singing Spanish music is fun and a great way to learn about Hispanophone culture as you work on your accent.

Not sure where to start? Check out the Celia Cruz song "Rie y llora."

Throughout the song, Cruz uses the word rie (laugh) nearly a dozen times, making it a great way to practice that trilled r sound over and over again! This song is also a good place to start because rolling your r's at the beginning of a word (like rie) can be easier than rolling it on the middle.

You'll also hear the hard r sound at many other moments in the song, such as the words agarrate (hold on), relativo (relative), recordar (to remember) and ritmo (rhythm).

7. Use tongue-twisters.

Tongue twisters-or trabalenguas in Spanish-are a fantastic way to work on your pronunciation. You can find lots of great tongue twisters for practicing specific sounds.

For getting the hang of the rr sound, I recommend the following two:

Erre con erre cigarro, erre con erre barril. Rápido corren los carros, sobre los rieles del ferrocarril. (R with R cigar, R with R barrel. Quickly run the carriages on the rails of the railway.)

Si don Curro ahorra ahora, ahora ahorra don Curro. (If Mr. Curro saves now, now saves Mr. Curro.)

The article linked above also gives some great tips on how to effectively use tongue twisters in language learning. Give it a try!

If you're feeling demoralized about the Spanish rr sound-don't! Nothing good ever came without hard work, and language learning is no exception.

But with these simple techniques, anyone can learn how to make that challenging Spanish rr sound. I believe in you!

Download: This blog post is available as a convenient and portable PDF that you can take anywhere.Click here to get a copy. (Download)

If you liked this post, something tells me that you'll love FluentU, the best way to learn Spanish with real-world videos.
Experience Spanish immersion online!

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How to Make the Spanish rr Sound: 7 Steps to Rolled r "Perrfection"

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When you ask English speakers what the hardest part of learning Spanish is, you'll get a few responses over and over again: Verb tenses. The subjunctive mood. The two forms of . But for lots of Spanish learners, the language's trickiest challenge can be boiled down into two simple little letters: rr.

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En conexión a la pregunta numero 36 del libro, el articulo habla sobre el numero de palabras en el lenguaje español. Hace referencia al "Diccionario de la lengua española" escrito por la Real Academia Espanola, diciendo que el lenguaje tiene alrededor de 93,000 palabras. Explica algunos de los aspectos que se consideran antes de clasificar lo que cuenta como palabra. Tambien habla sobre el tema de la adquisición del lenguaje en respecto a cuales de estas palabras son mas esenciales e importante en este proceso de aprendizaje.

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Languages are constantly evolving to suit the needs of their speakers. The Spanish language, with its international community of speakers and long history of intercultural exchange, is no exception. Most often, a language expands when it comes into close contact with another language and begins to incorporate grammatical features and/or loan words from that language. Many English words, such as chocolate or barbeque (from barbacoa), came from interaction with the Spanish language, which had adopted these terms from indigenous languages of the newly "discovered" Americas. The most notable trend of vocabulary growth in present-day Spanish is due to loan words from English, especially in the technical domain. This dynamic nature of language is what makes determining the word count for a language a very complex task.

What counts as a "word?"

The space between

The most intuitive condition is that a word is what is separated by spaces in a language such as English or Spanish which uses an alphabet to create words (rather than characters). However, what about open compound words such as "ice cream?" Certainly, as Aristotle said, "the whole is greater than the sum of its parts."

Dictionary entries

With the above example in mind, an easy way to decide if something is one "word" is to check to see if it has its own dictionary entry. After all, there are people dedicated to maintaining dictionaries for just this reason, right? Though a language often has a few prominent dictionaries that are considered official, word counts often differ between these and diverge even further when compared with glossaries. Dictionaries even acknowledge the difficulty in pinning down a definitive count. Merriam Webster states that although they estimate the total count of English words (including technical acronyms, Latin species names, etc.) to be around 1 million, this number may be off by up to a quarter million.

Despite this, dictionaries are still a great starting place for sorting out individual words which have unique meanings attached to them. According to this condition, we would expect plural forms of words to be counted as one word (such as "bunny" and "bunnies"), as they are tied to one definition. This would also extend to conjugations of verbs, meaning that an infinitive verb and all of its conjugations, irregular or not, would count solely as one word. If you've ever taken a look at a Spanish conjugation table, you know that whether or not you count the inflected forms of a verb will seriously impact your final word count. For example, the verb estar ("to be") has nearly 100 different forms, depending on who is being addressed and when the action takes place.

Urban Dictionary

Even the most in-the-know among us have resorted to looking up the slang usage of a word or phrase in the Urban Dictionary. The most culturally relevant entries (such as ) generally make their way into the more official dictionaries, but what about the rest?

Some words may be tied to a specific community of speakers based on their region, age group, or common hobbies. Many multi-player cooperative video games allow microphone usage, meaning that certain gaming slang may be shared by speakers of a language across the globe. Though these words may never be relevant enough to popular society to make it into a dictionary, they are still used by native speakers and may even be shared by people with otherwise divergent regional dialects.

Which words to include

Whether or not to include all wordforms of a word (for example, the singular and plural form of a word) depends on the purpose of such a list. If you need a word list to feed an algorithm that powers the speech-to-text function of your phone, you probably want each of these distinct wordforms included. If you're making a vocabulary list to learn a language, you may prefer a more network-like description which allows you to learn related wordforms, such as the conjugations for a specific verb.

So, as a Spanish learner, the most relevant questions to ask are:

1. What is a widely accepted estimate of the number of words in Spanish?

2. How many words do I need to be familiar with to be conversationally fluent?

Diccionario Real Academia Española: 93,000 words

The Diccionario Real Academia Española is managed by the Royal Spanish Academy in Spain. It is one of the most commonly cited "official" sources of the Spanish language. When they "accept" a word, it means it has fulfilled their criteria, similar to how words are generally considered "official" when they're accepted into the Oxford English Dictionary (British English) or Webster-Merriam Dictionary (American English). The most recent edition of the dictionary was published in 2014 and includes more than 93,000 entries, including americanismos from Spanish spoken in the Americas. If you're a native English speaker, you can compare this with Oxford English Dictionary's reported 171,476 words in current use.

Fluency for Spanish learners

Some research suggests that learning approximately 2,000 words allows language learners to be competent in reading 80% of a given text. Written language generally employs more diverse vocabulary and complex sentences than spoken language, but it has the advantage of allowing you to deduce meaning from context clues and more clearly see verb conjugations. Spoken Spanish is usually much simpler, meaning that learning 2,000 of the most frequent Spanish words will get you pretty far in a spoken conversation.

Once again, your personal goals for learning a language will affect your idea of "fluency." Domain-specific words such as medical jargon or video gaming slang may be areas that you want to prioritize, or perhaps you plan to take a general placement exam, such as the Common European Framework for Languages Spanish exam. You can check your current level using this free Spanish proficiency test.

When asked about the amount of words necessary to feel "fluent," polyglot and linguist Dr. Alexander Arguelles created this helpful breakdown in a post on a well-known language learning forum:

250 words constitute the essential core of a language, those without which you cannot construct any sentence.

750 words constitute those that are used every single day by every person who speaks the language.

2,500 words constitute those that should enable you to express everything you could possibly want to say, albeit often via awkward circumlocutions.

5,000 words constitute the active vocabulary of native speakers without higher education.

10,000 words constitute the active vocabulary of native speakers with higher education.

20,000 words constitute what you need to recognize passively in order to read, understand, and enjoy a work of literature, such as a novel by a notable author.

Which words to study?

Part of the beauty of learning a language is that you'll never really be finished. Language is a miraculous system, because, as early linguist Willhelm von Humboldt posited, it "makes infinite use of finite means." This defining feature of language means that we are able to spontaneously create brand new sentences that have never before been uttered from a finite alphabet. What makes learning Spanish so exciting is that you will continue to discover new words, some of which may be so regional or so new that they aren't defined anywhere in a dictionary!

If you're just starting out with Spanish, it is best, of course, to begin with the most frequently used words. Depending on where you plan to use your Spanish the most, Lingvist's online Spanish course allows you to select either Neutral or American Spanish. These most necessary words are organized into levels in Lingvist's Spanish course, with one level representing about 100 new words. Lingvist uses the half a billion learning events from its learners as data points to calibrate its courses. This means that the courses provide the most efficient balance of support for statistically challenging words and predictions for future learning based on a user's individual performance.

With the advantage of artificial intelligence to track your progress, Lingvist allows you to maximize your learning time by providing you with the opportunity to practice words that you haven't mastered while leaving out those you've already shown that you know well. Lingvist also employs techniques gleaned from memory and retention research, such as spaced repetition, which takes into account the "decay" of words in your memory over time that haven't been practiced recently. According to learning data analyzed by Lingvist's data scientists, it usually takes a learner about 17 hours to learn the 2,000 words needed to feel comfortable in a conversation.

What's the best way to acquire new vocabulary?

Lingvist uses a mixture of direct memorization and in-context exposure to vocabulary, which may come as a surprise to those accustomed to learning large vocabulary lists through flashcards or rote memorization. Though learning vocabulary within the context of conversations or text may not feel at first as productive as memorizing word lists, long-term retention is greatly improved when your memory has additional context to trigger recall.

Just like studying animal behavior in the wild versus in a lab, additional invaluable information is only accessible through studying words within their naturally occurring "habitat." For example, though a word like "large" may be a synonym to the word "big," only one of them will sound natural to a native speaker when placed in front of "mistake." The words that a given word traditionally occurs next to are called collocates. The best way to become aware of these kinds of implicit rules is exposure to vocabulary words in context.

Ready to start increasing your vocabulary? Try Lingvist's newly expanded Spanish course - now with more than 5,000 words!

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How Many Words Are There in the Spanish Language? | Lingvist

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Languages are constantly evolving to suit the needs of their speakers. The Spanish language, with its international community of speakers and long history of intercultural exchange, is no exception. Most often, a language expands when it comes into close contact with another language and begins to incorporate grammatical features and/or loan words from that language.

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Así como la pregunta numero 37 en el libro, el articulo habla sobre las palabras mas usadas entre hispanohablantes. Explica también la importancia de aprender estas palabras primero cuando estas aprendiendo el idioma porque serian las que vez mas frecuentemente. Da una lista de las 35 palabras sustantivas y los 25 verbos núcleos del idioma, los 31 adjetivos y adverbios básicos del idioma, y las 9 conjunciones y conectores mas comunes.

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Fluent in 3 months - Language Hacking and Travel Tips

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by Caitlin Sacasas

Full disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. ?

What if I told you that you could understand about 50% of Spanish by learning only 100 Spanish words?

Would you think I'm crazy, or would you give it a shot?

It's true! By learning the 100 most common Spanish words, you can begin to understand half of the language.

I know that sounds far fetched, but hear me out. We use a lot of the same words... all the time.

In English, words like "the", "a", "and", "I", "you", "is", and more are used in almost every sentence. The same is true in Spanish. This is good news, since many people struggle to learn thousands of words. But you don't need to!

That's why one of the best ways to go from 0-50% as a beginner Spanish speaker is to start off learning these 100 core Spanish words. It'll not only help you make the most out of your study time, but it'll give you a major leg up right away. After all, it doesn't take much to memorize your first 100 words!

Why Learn Spanish Words by Word Frequency?

These 100 Spanish words are chosen based on analyses of books, websites, newspapers, and more, by word frequency.

The word frequency method helps you learn the most common words first, so you can start understanding more of Spanish speech immediately.

This is a lot more effective than textbooks that start by teaching you Spanish words for the classroom, random careers or college majors. Most of those words you'll never use again after that. (Seriously, I learned how to say "economics" - ciencias económicas - but I've never once talked about that in Spanish.)

The words on this list you'll use, hear, or read all the time. That not only helps you understand faster, it helps you remember them faster, too, because you see them often. That's why this is my favorite method for learning new words when I first start learning a language.

And it's interesting because learning your first 100 words can get you up to 50% fluent, and 1,000 words can help you understand about 88% of what's spoken in Spanish.

Contrast that with 3,000 words, which would get you to about 94% fluency (only an 8% increase!). So those 100 common Spanish words give you a lot of mileage in the language.

That's not to say you shouldn't learn more words - you definitely should. But it just shows you the power of learning the most common words first. It's one way to study more effectively and get the most for your time right away.

Now, one thing about this article. I'll be skipping common Spanish articles like "el," "la," "un," "y," "o," "con," and other words like them. Why? Because these words mean "the," "an," "and," etc.. They're repetitive and quick to learn in a grammar lesson, rather than vocabulary. So, we'll be skipping over those here and focusing on other important words to know.

I'm also not including personal pronouns or the various conjugations of common verbs. Again, that goes back to learning grammar and conjugation. It's important to know, but most "word frequency lists" take up a lot of space with various conjugations of the same word. Instead, learn the dictionary form now and how to conjugate it later! You can learn your Spanish pronouns in this article, and basic verb conjugation here.

Once you know these 101 core Spanish words, it becomes much easier to build simple Spanish sentences and start speaking now!

36 Core Spanish Nouns

These will be your most helpful nouns starting out. Of course, you may have different nouns you use in everyday life... And you can change this list according to that! But since we're going by word frequency here, these words will be useful to know.

Spanish Nouns for Time

Spanish Nouns for Places

Spanish Nouns for Things

Spanish Nouns for People

25 Core Spanish Verbs

These are the most common Spanish verbs, and you can say quite a lot with only these 25 Spanish words! The first six verbs listed, especially. These verbs are often used with other verbs to create more complex sentences.

A couple of notes here. The first two verbs, ser and estar both mean "to be." But ser is used for permanent situations. For example, " soy Caitlin" means "I am Caitlin." ( Soy is ser conjugated for the first person.) We use soy because my name is Caitlin, and unless I decide to change it, it will always be Caitlin.

Estar is used for situations that could change. For example, " estoy bien" means "I'm fine." ( Estoy is estar conjugated for the first person as well.) We use estar for this because I'm fine right now... But tomorrow, who knows? Maybe it'll be a rough day, and I'm actually " estoy no bien." (Or "not well.")

The other note I have for you is that these verbs are unconjugated, so they're in their infinitive, or dictionary, form. Many are irregular Spanish verbs because they're so common. The more common words are, the more they change over time causing them to become irregular. But, these verbs are so common, it'll be easy to master once you get to it!

31 Basic Spanish Adjectives and Adverbs

These adjectives will come in handy all the time in Spanish! It's a good idea to memorize them in sets whenever possible. Like mucho for "a lot" and poco for "a few." This way you can associate the two words together, making them easier to remember.

And words like bueno can also be used as connecting words. Because bueno is so common, in some dialects like Mexican Spanish, it's used to say "well then", "okay", or "anyway..."

9 Common Spanish Words for Conjunctions and Connectors

Conjunctions and connectors help your speech flow in a natural way. They help you make more complex sentences, as well as pause for thought without adding awkward silence to your conversations. Conversation connectors are a valuable tool for your first conversations in Spanish. So here are the nine most common to help you get started:

Build Your Spanish Word Bank with The Most Common Words in Spanish

Now that you've looked over the 101 most common Spanish words, it's time to memorize them. Add these words to your Anki flashcard deck, or another app you use for memorizing vocab. After that, your next steps would be to learn how to conjugate Spanish verbs, build your Spanish conversation script, and study essential Spanish sentences and phrases.

Then it's time to find a Spanish language exchange partner and start speaking! Because if you don't use it, you lose it.

And don't forget to start building on this list with words you use every day. That will be unique to you, and help you really start learning Spanish you'll actually use. Learn words to talk about your career, your hobbies, your daily routine, or where you live. Build on that, so you can have a more expressive conversation!

Now tell me, what are the core words in your everyday vocabulary? Leave a comment and let me know - bonus points if you know it in Spanish!

Caitlin Sacasas View all posts by Caitlin Sacasas

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Learn these 100 Spanish Words & You'll Understand HALF of Spanish

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by Caitlin Sacasas Full disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. ? What if I told you that you could understand about 50% of Spanish by learning only 100 Spanish words? Would you think I'm crazy, or would you give it a shot? It's true!

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El video muestra un ejemplo de Eugenio Derbez hablando el Idioma F. Este idioma se habla repitiendo la vocal después de la F: fV. Es un juego del lenguaje conocido como una "jerigonza" en donde silabas adicionales se agregan a una palabra. Se conecta al tema tres porque se relaciona con la pregunta 66 en donde hablan y dan ejemplos de lenguajes como este en diferentes países.

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El articulo da 8 reglas necesarias para poder aprender como utilizar los artículos masculinos y femeninos correctamente cuando estas hablando en español. Ayuda entender la diferencia al usar masculino o femenino con palabras terminando con -o y -a en la forma singular o plural. En respecto al tercer tema, esto se conecta con la pregunta numero 72 del libro.

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Everything in Spanish is either male or female.

The language is charged with gender power.
If two words are not paired correctly, the imbalance creates waves of discomfort in its users.
Knowing Spanish gender separates the Spanish language learners from the fluent speakers.

If you already speak a Romance language (those that come from Latin), then you will not be confused by this characteristic. If you are used to speaking in neutral terms, be prepared to open a new avenue of perception in your mind. This will change the way you view the world.

Getting the hang of Spanish gender can take time, but it is the next big step after getting a handle on the Spanish learning basics, such as learning how to self-teach, making Spanish words plural and knowing where to place accent marks. The following tips regarding Spanish gender will help train your brain to recognize, categorize and eventually produce gender accurately while speaking Spanish.

8 Simple Rules for Mastering Spanish Gender

A noun is born: Male or female?

A noun is a person, place, thing or idea. Every noun in Spanish has a specific article that denotes the gender of the word. They can be definite or indefinite and have four forms:
person
el niño → the boy la niña → the girl
los niños → the boys las niñas → the girls
place thing idea
Living Creatures are referred to by the gender they represent

This one is simple. Every living creature is either an or a If you are an English speaker you have always referred to creatures with the. The Spanish language is a lot more detailed in this respect. It loves to observe and categorize the differences. With this in mind, take note of the first two rules for mastering Spanish gender:

Rule #1

When speaking about living creatures, nouns that end in "o" are masculine.

Rule #2

When speaking about living creatures, nouns that end in "a" are feminine.

*Beware of the gender trap!*

There is a slight possibility that you might fall into a "gender thinking trap." This deception tricks you into thinking that everything associated with a male will automatically be masculine and everything associated with a female will automatically be feminine. This is false. Only distinct living creatures fall under this categorization.

The following examples clearly illustrate how objects commonly associated with each gender do not follow the rule.

To keep you from falling into this trap, a very important step you can take is to experience and interact with these nouns in real-world situations. How can you do that from home? Through online Spanish immersion with FluentU!

FluentU is a video-based Spanish learning site which helps you learn the language through real-world videos, such as movie trailers, commercials, news and inspiring talks. Just take a look at this very, very small sampling of the video content below.

You can get a pretty good idea of the diversity of the content from that little list alone, but I strongly encourage you to click over to the site and take a better look, up close and personal!

There are a few different ways you can go about playing (ahem, I mean, "learning") with FluentU. After choosing an individual video based on your skill level and personal interests, you'll be prompted to choose between "watch" and "learn" modes.

If you opt for "watch," you'll watch your videos as normal with interactive subtitles that are translated both by word and by sentence.

If you click on "learn," then you'll go straight to the personalized flashcard content using key vocabulary from the video, giving you a chance to practice either ahead of time or after watching the clip. This "learn mode" actually integrates pictures, video clips and example sentences into the flashcards, making for truly memorable in-context learning experiences.

You can start using FluentU on the website with your computer or tablet or, better yet, download the FluentU app from the iTunes or Google Play store for iOS and Android devices.

So, be sure to get in your authentic Spanish practice to really get these genders down. Ready for our last six rules?

The Masculine in Spanish

When there is a crowd or a group of people, animals, ideas or things that have a mixed gender, what gender is used?

If you answered, " the masculine gender is always used when there is a mixed group," you are already thinking in the same direction as the Spanish language.

Rule #3

When there is a group of mixed gender, no matter what the ratio is of females to males and males to females, the group is always referred to as masculine.

1 niño + 4 niñas = 5 niños 1 boy + 4 girls = 5 kids
3 gatos + 542 gatas = 545 gatos 3 male cats + 542 female cats = 545 cats

The masculine gender has more power than the female gender when it comes to making the rules. Although the words have the same value, the male acts as the default leader. To make the word feminine you simply add the feminine " a " touch.

Rule #4

Masculine nouns that end in consonants (non-vowels) have a corresponding feminine form that ends in "a"

el profesor → the male professor la profesora → the female professor
el doctor → the male doctor la doctora → the female doctor
el señor → the Mr. la señora → the Mrs.

Nouns, Gender and Professions

Some nouns that refer to professions do not change their forms. This does not mean that the importance of gender disappears. If the word does not change, the article is in full charge of specifying gender.

Rule#5

Some nouns that refer to professions have the same form for masculine and feminine. The article is the only thing that changes.

el piloto → the male pilot la piloto → the female pilot
el soldado → the male soldier la soldado → the female soldier
el modelo → the male model la modelo → the female model
el poeta → the male poet la poeta → the female poet
el atleta → the male athlete la atleta → the female athlete
el psiquiatra → the male psychiatrist la psquiatra → the female psychiatrist

Optional brain exercise* Make a list of nouns that currently surround you (wherever you are) in English (you decide on how many you want to attempt). Try to guess their gender in Spanish. Look up the words and see how many you got right and what rules you recognize.

Exclusive Endings

Some words are exclusively reserved for female articles and others are exclusively reserved for male ones. These will admit no opposite intervention, ever! The use of masculine articles with exclusively feminine endings and vice-versa will disrupt and distort your communication.

Rule #6

la exposición → the exhibition
la habitación → the room
la felicidad → the happiness
la solicitud → the application
la costumbre → the custom

Rule #7

Nouns that end in -ma require a masculine article

el problema → the problem
el emblema → the emblem
el enigma → the mystery

Exceptions That Create New Rules

Languages exist within a strict framework of rules, yet they are alive, they are dynamic, and the are continuously evolving. Therefore, there are always exceptions to the rules, and these exceptions, in turn, create new rules.

Rule #8

Some nouns that end in "a" are masculine

Some nouns that end in "o" are feminine

la foto → the photo
la mano → the hand
la radio → the radio
la moto → the motorcycle

Best Practices When Learning a Language

Remember, learning a new language is not a result but more of a process! It is important that you set a daily routine for your language learning that excites you and allows you to see results.

As it relates to gender, familiarize yourself with the rules. Listen carefully for them when watching your favorite movies. While reading a comic or newspaper, circle the gender agreements that most surprise you. Above all, find someone to practice with!

You will quickly catch on to the patterns, nuances and subtleties of the language this way. Think of how small children learn language for the first time. A ton of listening, a lot of gibberish, some clarity with mistakes, increase in vocabulary and finally fluency!

And One More Thing...

As mentioned earlier, FluentU is a fantastic platform of Spanish learning experiences through real-world videos-like music videos, sports games, video blogs and business videos. FluentU is designed to get you comfortable with everyday Spanish, by combining all the benefits of complete immersion and native-level conversations with easy-to-read subtitles.

You'll efficiently learn Spanish like you never have before, thanks to FluentU's huge selection of hand-picked videos-with topics like soccer, TV shows, business, speeches, movies and even magical realism-as you can see here:

FluentU brings native Spanish videos within reach with interactive captions. Did you miss a word? Just put your cursor on the captions to instantly view definitions and useful examples, while simultaneously pausing the video so you can start again once you're ready!

And FluentU is more than just videos-it's a complete language learning program. You can learn all the vocabulary in any video with FluentU's Learn Mode. Swipe left or right in the app to see more examples of the word you're learning. You'll be able to create vocab lists and track your progress as you advance through video after video.

The best part? FluentU keeps track of your vocabulary, and it recommends examples and videos to you, based on the words you've already learned. You have a 100% personalized experience.

Start using FluentU on the website with your computer or tablet or, better yet, download the FluentU App from the iTunes store.

If you liked this post, something tells me that you'll love FluentU, the best way to learn Spanish with real-world videos.
Experience Spanish immersion online!

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8 Simple Rules for Mastering Spanish Gender

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Everything in Spanish is either male or female.The language is charged with gender power.If two words are not paired correctly, the imbalance creates waves of discomfort in its users.Knowing Spanish gender separates the Spanish language learners from the fluent speakers.If you alread

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Todas las ordenes de palabras son basadas en la orden del sujeto (S), el verbo (V), y el objeto (O). La orden mas común en el español es el SV(O). El libro explico el interés de lo lingüistas en entender como ha cambiado el orden de palabras entre los lenguajes del romance porque varios de ellos usan el orden SV(O) aunque descendieron del Latin, un lenguaje que usaba el orden SOV.

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Grammar of Sentences: Word Order (Lesson 3 of 4)

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Un sintagma es una palabra o grupo de palabras que constituyen una unidad sintáctica y que cumplen una función determinada con respecto a otras palabras de la oración. Cada sintagma tiene un núcleo y esto es lo que determina el tipo de sintagma que es. Por ejemplo, si el núcleo es adverbio, seria un sintagma adverbial.

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Todas las oraciones pueden ser clasificadas entre oraciones simples o compuestas. Luego pueden ser separadas en grupos mas específicos basadas en su estructura. Una oración simple puede ser clasificada según lo que quiere decir el hablante o según la naturaleza del verbo. Las oraciones compuestas pueden ser clasificadas como oraciones coordinadas o oraciones subordinadas.

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La palabra 'se' se puede usar en casi cualquier manera. Como vimos, se puede usar en la forma singular o plural y en casi cada caso se usa con un verbo. Aunque nosotros aprendimos de 10, el articulo habla sobre los 5 usos mas comunes de 'se' en español y tambien da ejemplos.

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En esta sección vamos a repasar y resumir los usos del pronombre "se" que hemos aprendido en este curso.

The pronoun "se" can really be a nightmare for learners of Spanish. It comes up so often and can mean so many things and function in so many ways. Here we are going to review 5 common uses of "se".

1. El "se" reflexivo

"Se" is very often used to change a normal verb into a reflexive verb in Spanish. In reflexive constructions, the person or thing that does the action also receives the action. In English we use the pronouns "himself, herself, themselves"; in Spanish, you just add a "se" to an infinitive (when it makes sense) and it serves the same function. Obviously "se" is only used with infinitives and 3rd person constructions (él, ella, Ud, ellos, ellas, Uds., etc.); other forms use their corresponding reflexive pronouns (me, te, nos, etc.)

La madre baña al niño. (bañar=verbo normal, el niño recibe la acción)
The mother baths the child.

La madre se baña. (bañarse=verbo reflexivo, ella misma recibe la acción)
The mother baths herself.

2. El "se" recíproco

Sometimes the pronoun "se" is used to signal that multiple subjects are simultaneously doing the same action to each other; the action is reciprocal. Obviously the verb needs to be plural in order to obtain this reading.

Las chicas se saludan.
The girls greet each other.

Los amigos se abrazan.
The friends hug each other.

Los estudiantes se comunican por email.
The students communicate with each other by email.

This type of reciprocal action can also occur with groups in which you, the speaker, are included. These cases will use the nosotros form of the verb and the pronoun "nos":

Mi familia y yo nos apoyamos.
My family and I support each other.

3. El "se" como parte del verbo sin motivo obvio

They are many other verbs that have "se" stuck on the end with no obvious purpose. They are certainly not reflexive verbs (even though they are often called that) because the subject does not receive the action of the verb. This use of "se" is often called the "lexical se" because the infinitives of these verbs end in "se" in the dictionary. For example, verbs like:

olvidarse (de) El hombre se olvidó de la cita.
to forget The man forgot the appointment.

darse cuenta (de) María se dio cuenta del problema.
to realize María realized the problem.

morirse Mi abuelo se murió el año pasado.
to die My grandfather died last year.

despedirse (de) Los niños se despiden de su maestra.
to say goodbye (to) The children say goodbye to their teacher.

4. El "se" de las construcciones impersonales

Perhaps the most common use of "se" in Spanish is to de-emphasize the agent of the sentence. All this means is that the speaker does not specify who or what is doing the action. In English we use the pronouns "one" or "they" and passive constructions to accomplish this same goal. (That is why many Spanish grammar explanations referred to this use as the "passive se")

Si se estudia mucho, se ganan buenas notas.
If one studies a lot, good grades are earned. (No specific person is studying or earning grades)

Se dice que la economía va mejor.
They say that the economy is going better. (The speaker does not mention who says this.)

Se habla español en los EE.UU.
Spanish is spoken in the U.S. (There is no emphasis on who is speaking Spanish.)

Se mandan los emails todos los días.
Emails are sent everyday. (The speaker does not mention who is doing the sending.)

As you can see in the examples above, the verb can be conjugated in the 3 rd person singular or plural, depending on what follows it. As you can see in the first three examples, when followed by an adverb or adjective, "que", a singular noun, or an infinitive, the verb will be in the 3rd person singular. It will only become plural when followed by a plural noun, as in the first and last examples. However if the unspecified agent is acting on one or more persons, the construction with "se" is always in the singular, and "a" marks the object to avoid a reflexive reading.

En la Segunda Guerra Mundial se mató a muchas personas.
In WWII many people were killed. (There is no focus on who was doing the killing.)
In WWII they killed many people.

*En la Segunda Guerra Mundial se mataron muchas personas
* In WWII many people killed themselves. (Yikes! This is not what I meant.)

5. El "se" que reemplaza le y les

In Unidad 5 we learned that when both an indirect and a direct object pronoun are combined in the same sentence, le or les becomes "se". Here are some examples to refresh your memory:

La instructora les asignó la tarea a los estudiantes ayer.
The instructor assigned the homework to the students yesterday.

La instructora se la asignó ayer.
The instructor assigned it to them yesterday.

Now you are ready to practice these 5 uses of "se" in Acceso Hub: Forma y Función (LingroLearning).

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En esta sección vamos a repasar y resumir los usos del pronombre "se" que hemos aprendido en este curso. The pronoun "se" can really be a nightmare for learners of Spanish. It comes up so often and can mean so many things and function in so many ways.

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Cual de los siguientes es clasificación de una oración simple?
a. oración coordinada adversativa
b. oración subordinada sustantiva
c. oración exclamativa psicológica
d. oración subordinada adverbial locativa

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El Siglo de Oro empezó alrededor de 1492 y duro hasta alrededor de 1681. Fue un tiempo en el cual hubieron muchos logros en varias formas de arte. El pintor Diego Velazquez fue el mejor de esa era, con trabajos especialmente para el Rey Felipe IV. La literatura fue otro aspecto de esta era, con publicaciones como "Don Quijote" y "La Vida Es Sueno".

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¿Qué es el siglo de oro? - El siglo de oro español y la literatura

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El Latin Vulgar era un language casi exclusivamente en lenguaje nada mas hablado. Se derivo de el Latin Clásico y era mas como lenguaje "de la calle" porque fue hablada por gente normal a comparación al Latin Clásico hablado por la realeza. De un lenguaje a orto, hubo muchos cambios como por ejemplo la perdida del genero neutral.

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La evolución del español a visto muchos cambios en la estructura de las palabras. Una causa de esto es la diferencia entre la geografía de los hispano-hablantes. En medio de la evolución, la distancia creada por inmigrantes causo un cambio en la pronunciación y estructura de muchas palabras. En el video se ve un ejemplo de sincopa, en la cual Shakira omite algunos sonidos.

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Hay muchas predicciones de como variantes de lenguaje, en general, se ha diversificado. El mas popular es de la historia bíblica de la Torre de Babel. En estudios mas científicos, han deducido que las familias de lenguajes varían a causa del movimiento de la gente. La geografía, el clima y otros variantes del medio ambiente son algunos de las aspectos que han causado estos cambios léxicos entre lenguajes. El video da algunos teorías sobre el origen y la evolución.

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La semántica estudia el significado de las palabras, frases, y oraciones. Este Quizlet, da ejemplos de algunas relaciones semánticas y da sus definiciones.

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Relaciones semánticas Flashcards | Quizlet

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Repaso del tema del Significado para 2º Learn with flashcards, games, and more - for free.

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Las palabras homónimas son palabras que se escriben o pronuncian igual pero tienen significado diferentes. Se clasifican en dos distintos grupos: las palabras que se escriben iguales se llaman homografas y las palabras que se pronuncian iguales se llaman homofonas. El video da varios ejemplos de algunas palabras que van entre estas clasificaciones y también las definen.

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La deixis se relaciona con palabras que señalan la orientación o ubicación espacial o temporal de entidades o personas, tomando algún punto de referencia, generalmente el del hablante. La pagina web incluye un video y da varios ejemplos de los diferentes tipos de deixis que hay.

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¿Qué es la deixis y de qué tipos las hay?

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La deixis es la propiedad de las palabras deícticas, que son las que relacionan directamente con el tiempo, con el espacio (lugar) o con las personas.

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La pragmática del discurso considera el conocimiento que tienen los hablantes de las normas lingüísticas y sociales de interacción y como eso se manifiestan en el uso de la lengua. Uno de los aspectos de la pragmática es la clasificación de los actos de habla. Algunas de estas clasificaciones son: directivos, compromisivos, expresivos, declaraciones, y asertivos.

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Los seres humanos somos los únicos que al comunicarnos adoptamos una postura expresiva, la que está cargada de elementos emocionales y éstos implican grados de subjetividad.
Es así, que cuando interactuamos nuestras palabras tienen una serie de componentes afectivos y ello nos permite desenvolvernos dentro del mundo y la sociedad, participar en ellos y no sólo describirles desde afuera.
Actos de habla es cuando utilizamos el lenguaje para dialogar, para opinar de hechos o realizar cualquier tipo de intervención - oral o escrita - en la vida diaria, ahí estamos enunciando y esa enunciación tiene una connotación lingüística. Posee un sentido, un para qué y un por qué se dice.
El enunciado en sí es una unidad de la lengua que posee una intención comunicativa, pues contiene una idea de parte del hablante, sea ésta un reclamo, una petición, una pregunta u otros.

En los actos de habla se deben considerar:

El decir: acto LOCUTIVO

La intención de ese decir: acto ILOCUTIVO

El efecto que ese decir tiene en el receptor: acto PERLOCUTIVO

Desde ese punto se distinguen los siguientes actos de habla (orales o escritos):

Es cuando la intención del emisor es completamente comprendida por el destinatario, pues está clara y no necesita mayor explicación.

Levántate, tienes que ir al colegio

En este caso, la oración refleja nítidamente lo que quiere decir el emisor y es por ello que es un acto de habla directo.

Indirectos

Es cuando el mensaje no queda totalmente expreso, sino que éste se presta para confusiones u otras interpretaciones por parte del receptor.

Mañana te despertaré temprano

En la oración anterior no queda clarificado el para qué se efectuará esa acción, con qué fin el receptor será despertado al día siguiente a una hora temprana. Si bien, tomando el primer ejemplo, podemos inferir que será para ir al colegio, esa intención no está tácita en la secuencia de palabras.

Clasificación de los Actos de Habla

Asertivos o representativos

El emisor AFIRMA O NIEGA algo con mucha convicción, con la idea de aclarar lo que desea decir o informar.

Estoy en desacuerdo contigo
El lunes es una fecha especial, estoy de aniversario de matrimonio

Expresivos

Quien habla transmite su interioridad, su estado afectivo o emocional.

Lo siento mucho, no supe antes
Eres tan tierno conmigo...

Directivos o apelativos

El hablante busca persuadir al oyente o lector y lograr que realice una acción determinada, puede ser una orden en forma de pregunta, solicitud o simplemente utilizando el imperativo.

¿Has visto a mi padre?
Dame un par de minutos, ya regreso

Compromisorios

El emisor adquiere un fin, asume un compromiso, independiente si lo cumple o no.

Te prometo que el viernes será inolvidable
Juro amarte y respetarte hasta que la muerte nos separe

Declarativos

El hablante busca modificar alguna situación, para ello posee un grado de autoridad al enunciar ciertas palabras, pudiendo enmarcársele en contextos solemnes.

Se subentiende que quien pronuncie esos enunciados cuenta con un reconocimiento oficial o público, que le da valor y peso a sus palabras en ciertos momentos (sea juez, religioso, policía, jefe, etc.).

Los declaro marido y mujer
Se condena a prisión por el delito de homicidio simple

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Los seres humanos somos los únicos que al comunicarnos adoptamos una postura expresiva, la que está cargada de elementos emocionales y éstos implican grados de subjetividad. Es así, que cuando interactuamos nuestras palabras tienen una serie de componentes afectivos y ello nos permite desenvolvernos dentro del mundo y la sociedad, participar en ellos y no sólo describirles desde afuera.

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De cuantos vocálicos cambio el latín clásico al español ?
A. 10 -> 5
B. 7 -> 5
C. 10 -> 7
D. no hubo cambio

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La diglosia es la situación en la que coexisten dos lenguas en una comunidad de hablantes, de tal forma que, por gozar una de ellas de mayor prestigio social que la otra, se emplean en ámbitos o circunstancias diferentes. Un ejemplo de esto seria la forma en que algunos hispano-hablantes van al trabajo y hablan el ingles todo el día, luego llegan a casa y hablan solo español con su familia. El video da unos ejemplos y explica las diferencias entre las razones de porque hacemos esto.

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Las isoglosas son perímetros geográficos más o menos asociados con varios
aspectos de un mismo fenómeno lingüístico. Por ejemplo, en los estados unidos se dice "you guys" de varias formas dependiendo de donde te encuentras en el país. La imagen de abajo ensena las isoglosas del español que se encuentran en latino américa.

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La variación dialéctica también ha causado otros cambios. Por ejemplo, la variación lexica entre países del mismo habla. Algunas causas de estas variaciones dialécticas y léxicas son: variación geográfica, variación social, variación contextual, y variación histórica. El articulo da muchos ejemplos de esto, ensenando como varias palabras pueden significar la misma cosa.

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Se conoce a las variantes léxicas a las palabras que son características de un lugar determinado, pero no tienen el mismo significado en otro lugar aunque...

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Igual como los idiomas verbales, las lenguas de sena también tienen variación. Entre comunidades que no son sordomudos, creo que es común pensar que la lengua de la sena solo es una pero igual que cual quier otra, diferencia en colonizadores y geografía ha causado se variación. Así como fue mencionado en el libro, el video nos muestra algunos ejemplos.

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American vs Spanish Sign Language: Beginners Vocab

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El dialecto de un idioma depende de que país eres, en que estado te encuentras, que generación eres, y de donde son tus padres. El video da siete ejemplos de lo diferentes acentos que se pueden oír en varios estados de lo estados unidos. Algunos de los estados que mencionan son Florida, California, Nueva York, y Virginia.

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7 acentos del español en EE.UU. por la comediante Joanna Hausmann | BBC Mundo

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Hay varios factores que afectan como lo hispanos hablan el español en casa. Ademas de importar de donde son sus papas, el estado en que se encuentran afecta el acento que llevan también. Por ejemplo, siendo mexicana en tejas, me a ayudado mantener mi acento como persona de acento mexicano, si viviera en otro estado tal vez cambiaría mi acento un poco. El articulo habla sobre la población hispano hablante en los estados unidos y las estadísticas relacionadas con la variedad de dialectos que se encuentran en este país.

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Patricia Sulbarán Lovera

BBC Mundo, "¿Hablas Español?"*

"Vamos a llevar al nene al high school y después nos vamos a Downtown a firmar el lease del apartamento".

"Ese candidato está corriendo como alcalde de la ciudad".

"No te olvides de parquear la troca en las calles autorizadas".

Esas expresiones podrían escucharse de la boca de cualquier latino en las calles de alguna ciudad de Estados Unidos.

Frases en español que tienen sentido y que, a su vez, reciben préstamos del inglés hasta el punto de alterar este idioma y darle un nuevo significado.

La identidad latina en Estados Unidos está ligada con el español, un idioma que hablan más de 41 millones de personas en ese país, la gran mayoría con raíces en Latinoamérica.

En el censo y otras instituciones estadounidenses, los hispanos o latinos son agrupados en un solo bloque, al igual que otras minorías como la asiática.

El inglés, por su parte, también influencia en la dinámica de la lengua. Entonces, ¿se puede decir que existe un un español de Estados Unidos?

Una pregunta difícil

El tema ha sido estudiado durante décadas por sociolingüistas y no conduce a una definición concreta.

A su juicio, continuó la lingüista, la influencia del inglés "es esencial" si se habla del español estadounidense. No a manera de contacto cultural, como pasa en los países de Latinoamérica, sino directo.

Algo similar acota Ana Celia Zentella, profesora emérita de la Universidad de California en San Diego (UCSD, por sus siglas en inglés).

De acuerdo a un análisis del observatorio publicado en 2017, existen dos principales "subvariedades" del español estadounidense, según describe su autor, Francisco Moreno-Fernández:

La primera, referida como "español estadounidense general", que se adquirirá a través de la familia y también en la escuela de predominancia oral, pero que también puede encontrarse en "manifestaciones escritas, con una influencia más o menos acusada del inglés".

La segunda, "que suele recibir la etiqueta de Spanglish", adquirida "exclusivamente" de modo oral, "donde la influencia del inglés se haría más evidente en forma de alternancia de lenguas, préstamos y calcos utilizados de modo intensivo", explica.

Anglicismos de uso frecuente entre los latinos de Estados Unidos

Voces que mantienen su forma inglesa original: p.e. "High School"

Acepciones específicas del español de EE.UU.: p.e. felonía

Voces características de EE.UU.: p.e. aplicar, flu

Otras voces de uso más popular: p.e. janguear, troca

Source: Observatorio del Instituto Cervantes de la Universidad de Harvard (EE.UU., 2017).

Moreno-Fernández analizó también cien anglicismos de uso frecuente entre los latinos que han nacido o residen en el país norteamericano.

"Un tercio son voces que mantienen su forma inglesa original (por ejemplo: downtown, High School, teenager)", describe el escrito publicado hace dos años.

"Una quinta parte son acepciones específicas del español estadounidense, aunque la voz sea de uso más general en español (p.e., felonía, parada, relativo, soportar)."

Felonía se desprende del sustantivo felony en inglés, que significa delito en español. Parada, por su parte, viene de parade en inglés, que en español significa desfile.

"Y otra quinta parte son voces características de EE.UU., aunque algunas puedan aparecer también en otros países hispanohablantes (ejemplos: aplicar, barista, barténder, carpeta, flu, mapear, pícher)", sigue el estudio.

Además "quedan otras voces de uso más popular (ejemplo: janguear, liquear, troca)", añade el autor.

Liquear, por ejemplo, se desprende del verbo en inglés leak que se traduce en gotear en español.

No solo influye el inglés, sino el contacto entre diferentes variedades de español que se da en EE.UU., especialmente en metrópolis como Nueva York o Los Ángeles.

"En ese trasvase cultural, lingüístico, de tantos hispanos, se está creando ya un español de Estados Unidos", dijo en una entrevista de 2013 Gerardo Piña-Rosales, director de la Academia Norteamericana de la Lengua Española (ANLE).

¿Hay variedades que dominan?

Depende de en qué parte de Estados Unidos se esté, es lo primero que advierten los expertos.

El suroeste del país, donde están California, Arizona, Nuevo México y Texas, el español de México es el más visible, mientras que en el este (Florida, Nueva York, New Jersey), están asentados el español de Puerto Rico y Cuba.

No sin importancia, esos países de origen son los que componen la mayoría de población hispana o latina en EE.UU. México con el 62%, Puerto Rico (9,5%) y Cuba (3,94%), de acuerdo a estimaciones de 2018 del censo de EE.UU.

Este panorama, sin embargo, está atravesando cambios. La inmigración de mexicanos ha caído en un 6% entre 2007 y al menos 2015, mientras que la población centroamericana registró un aumento en su inmigración en el mismo periodo (25%), según el Centro Pew de Investigaciones.

También pasa que los diferentes "tipos" de español (mexicano, salvadoreño) empiezan a entremezclarse debido al contacto de distintas comunidades latinas en un territorio.

El profesor Phillip Carter cita el ejemplo de la ciudad de Miami, en la que podría hablarse del español de Cuba como tradicionalmente dominante, pero influenciado por el contacto con las variedades de Colombia y Venezuela, por ejemplo.

"El habla depende de la cultura que rodea a la persona, de la edad que tenía a su llegada a EE.UU. o si nació en EE.UU., de la concentración de hispanohablantes en su comunidad...", menciona Carter, profesor de la Universidad Internacional de Florida (FIU, por sus siglas en inglés), como algunos factores condicionantes.

Antes del inglés

Una serie de variedades del español se han mantenido en Estados Unidos por más de cuatro siglos, acota el profesor Carter en un ensayo de su autoría reproducido por la televisión pública estadounidense PBS en su sitio web.

"En el suroeste del país hay grupos que mantienen la palabra 'hispano' para mostrar que su origen es de España", agrega Zentella.

Pero pese al deseo de diferenciarse, "ha habido influencia de los mexicanos que han llegado en las últimas décadas a vivir en esos estados", apunta.

La "mala" connotación del español

Así como ha sido motivo de orgullo de la identidad latina, el español en EE.UU. también ha sido asociado con criminalidad o escasa educación y recursos económicos, señalan los expertos.

Esfuerzos institucionales en décadas pasadas, como prohibir y castigar el uso del español en las aulas de clase, provocó que inmigrantes latinos no enseñaran el idioma a sus hijos, nacidos en EE.UU., o les aconsejaran que solo lo hablaran en casa.

El idioma y su influencia y prevalencia, acota Zentella, tiene relación directa con el estatus socioeconómico, el nivel educativo y el poder de la comunidad que lo hable.

Como ejemplo, la académica pone a la comunidad puertorriqueña en San Diego (California): "Tiene estudios superiores y una variedad más amplia de profesiones que la comunidad mexicana. Hay otro acercamiento al español, un sentido de orgullo, de que es algo que les pertenece y defienden", dice.

¿Español "mocho"?

La cuestión de mezclar el español con el inglés ha sido también objeto de prejuicio, advierte Zentella.

" El español de aquellos nacidos o criados en EE.UU. es atacado tanto por sus propias comunidades como desde afuera", escribió la lingüista en un artículo titulado "Dime con quién hablas y te diré quién eres": Linguistic (in)security and Latina/o identity.

"Se les acusa de no saber ni inglés ni español, o sea, de ser semilingües", añade.

"El término más extendido para describir su discurso esSpanglish, pero los puertorriqueños también le llaman 'hablar mata'o', mientras los mexicanos utilizan 'mocho' y Tex Mex para describir el fenómeno", describe.

No solo en los hogares se comparte esta percepción, advierte Zentella. La propia Real Academia Española, en su primera definición de espanglish en 2012, lo definió como: "Modalidad del habla de algunos grupos hispanos de los Estados Unidos, en las que se mezclan, deformándolos, elementos léxicos y gramaticales del español y del inglés".

La controvertida referencia a la deformación fue editada y no aparece en la actual definición.

Esa especie de subvaloración del español de EE.UU. es señalada por sociolingüistas como algo que debe cambiar.

"No solamente que (hay que) darle prestigio, un cambio de actitud, sino también darle una norma. La normalización para usarlo en niveles altos sin vergüenza y sin prejuicios", dijo la académica Domnita Dumitrescuen un evento del Instituto Cervantes en Harvard en 2017.

¿Cómo es el futuro del español en Estados Unidos?

El Instituto Cervantes habla de una "pérdida gradual" del español en las generaciones que han seguido a la inmigración masiva de latinos en décadas anteriores.

¿En qué estado está el español en Estados Unidos?

78% de latinos/hispanos hablaban español en casa en 2006

73% de latinos/hispanos hablaban español en casa en 2015

97% de padres inmigrantes les hablan en español a sus hijos

71% padres latinos de 2ª generación hablan español a sus hijos

49% padres desde la 3ª generación que hablan español a sus hijos

Source: Centro Pew de Investigaciones

Mientras que casi todos (97%) los padres inmigrantes les hablan en español a sus hijos, según una encuesta de 2015 de Pew, el 71% de los padres latinos de segunda generación lo hace, y el porcentaje baja a 49% entre padres latinos de tercera o mayor generación.

El fenómeno ha sido descrito como no exclusivo de los latinos en EE.UU., sino como una consecuencia natural del contacto con el inglés y la vida en el país norteamericano.

La tasa de bilingüismo entre latinos, sin embargo, es superior a la de otros grupos étnicos en el país, pero no hay garantías de que esta situación se mantenga con el tiempo.

"Aunque vengan más hispanohablantes de otros países, todo va a depender de las actitudes con las que vengan", advierte Zentella.

Según la académica, el plan migratorio del actual presidente, Donald Trump, de exigir niveles avanzados de inglés y de estudios a los inmigrantes podría afectar la situación.

"Si los inmigrantes llegan aquí y ven una actitud antiespañol, les dirán a sus niños que aquí solo se hablará inglés para poder progresar", concluye.

*Esta nota es parte de la serie "¿Hablas español?", un viaje de BBC Mundo por Estados Unidos para mostrar el poder de nuestro idioma en la era de Trump.

Ahora puedes recibir notificaciones de BBC Mundo. Descarga la nueva versión de nuestra app y actívalas para no perderte nuestro mejor contenido.

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De costa a costa, cómo cambia el español que se habla en EE.UU. y qué variedades predominan - BBC News Mundo

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En Estados Unidos más de 41 millones de personas hablan español, pero es una lengua que cambia sustancialmente en dependencia de la zona del país y de la influencia del inglés. ¿Se puede hablar de un español de Estados Unidos?

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La alternancia de códigos tiene que ver con el cambio que la gente que habla mas de un idioma hace dependiendo de la situación en la que se encuentra. Similarmente, esta frase también se puede relacionar con el cambio de actitud de una persona que hacen dependiendo de la situación en la que se encuentran. Este video me gusto mucho porque no solo da un ejemplo pero ensena la importancia de poder hacer y entender este concepto del idioma.

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The Cost of Code Switching | Chandra Arthur | TEDxOrlando

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Aunque ahora hay muchos hispano hablantes en lo estados unidos, cuando las generaciones del futuro se desarrollan, hara una perdida del lenguaje propio del español. Generalmente, esto es lo que afecto la transmisión de la lengua porque los padres paran de enseñarles a sus hijos o las influencias en sus alrededores causa que no lo aprendan. El articulo habla sobre la importante relación entre el idioma y la migración de una población hispano hablante.

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En Estados Unidos existe un debate constante bastante acalorado sobre la inmigración, pero hay un tema que suele pasar de largo: el idioma. Nadie habla de la posible amenaza de lengua de los inmigrantes hispanohablantes para el dominio del inglés en los Estados Unidos.

El lenguaje y la inmigración siempre han ido de la mano en los Estados Unidos, sobre todo en términos políticos. Cuando en 2006 la ciudad de Farmers Branch del estado de Texas introdujo la " normativa" de solo hablar inglés, Tim O'Hare, el alcalde por aquél entonces, la justificó diciendo que "es necesario hacer frente al tema de la inmigración ilegal en nuestra ciudad y tenemos que actuar ya".

El consejo de la ciudad de Farmers Branch votó por unanimidad para abolir la controvertida ordenanza en noviembre del año pasado, pero sigue habiendo 31 estados y cientos de ciudades en los Estados Unidos donde existen leyes locales sobre el uso exclusivo del inglés o sobre "el inglés como lengua oficial".

Mucha gente cree que la inmigración latina ha hecho que el español margine o incluso supere al inglés como lengua de uso en los Estados Unidos. Después de todo, el español es el segundo idioma más hablado en el país, después del inglés. Lo hablan 48,6 millones de personas: 34,8 millones son hablantes de español mayores de 5 años y de diferentes nacionalidades, 11 millones son inmigrantes latinoamericanos indocumentados y se estima que hay 2,8 millones de personas que no son latinas y que utilizan el español en casa.

Los datos demográficos del censo de EE.UU prevén que para el año 2060 la población latina de los EE.UU (el grupo que más habla español) crecerá un 115 por ciento hasta llegar a los 119 millones.

Pero estas cifras no cuentan toda la historia. Como lingüista, he estudiado el bilingüismo español-inglés en Texas, California, Florida y otros estados de Estados Unidos. Puedo asegurar que el español no está conquistando el país, sino todo lo contrario: a pesar de los temores de los políticos, el español tiene una posición más bien débil en el país.

El corte de la tercera generación

¿Cómo puede ser que la población de latinos crezca tan rápido y que el número de hispanoparlantes se mantenga? La respuesta está en las peculiaridades que se pasan por alto en cuanto a los datos del censo y en la particular historia lingüística de los Estados Unidos.

Si echamos un vistazo a los tipos de inmigración durante los últimos cincuenta años, es verdad que en los Estados Unidos cada vez hay más hispanoparlantes. Desde 1965 a 2005 casi la mitad de los inmigrantes procedían de países de América Latina, algo que supuso añadir unos 30 millones de personas a la población estadounidense, la mayoría hablantes de español.

NEW: Use of Spanish declines among Latinos in major U.S. metros https://t.co/kgn6IQvEo1 pic.twitter.com/OtiT2Br0qo
- PewResearch Hispanic (@PewHispanic) 31 de octubre de 2017

Pero es solo la mitad de la historia. Aunque los nuevos inmigrantes hablen español, la investigación demuestra que sus hijos suelen ser bilingües y que la mayoría prefieren hablar inglés. Como resultado, es probable que los nietos de los inmigrantes solamente hablen inglés. Los lingüistas llaman a este fenómeno " el patrón de las tres generaciones". Resumiendo, significa que las lenguas en Estados Unidos que no sean inglés se pierden en la segunda o en la tercera generación.

Esto es algo que se muestra en los datos del centro de estudios hispánicos. Las encuestas demuestran que en el año 2000 un 48 por ciento de las personas adultas latinas de entre 50 y 68 años hablaban " solo inglés" o tenían "un alto nivel de inglés" y que el porcentaje era del 73 por ciento en los niños latinos de entre 5 y 17 años.

Para e año 2014 dichas cifras habían pasado del 52 al 88 por ciento, respectivamente. En otras palabras, el cambio de español a inglés está ocurriendo en todo el país, con el paso del tiempo y entre generaciones.

¿Por qué el inglés es la lengua dominante?

El cambio de idioma no es un fenómeno que ocurra de forma natural, sino que se trata de una consecuencia de las presiones culturales que hacen que los hablantes se sientan presionados para dejar de hablar una lengua a favor de otra. Estas presiones incluyen las leyes restrictivas del idioma que prohíben formalmente el uso del español en ambientes educativos o gubernamentales, tal y como ocurrió en la ciudad de Farmers Branch hace 11 años.

Los colegios también son responsables del patrón de tres generaciones. Aunque los padres latinoamericanos suelan hablar a sus hijos nacidos en Estados Unidos en español, dichos niños suelen asistir a colegios donde solo se habla inglés. En dichos centros aprenden que el éxito académico se logra hablando inglés. Como resultado, los hijos de primera generación amplían su vocabulario y sus conocimientos en inglés, no en español.

También puede que tengan experiencias negativas hacia el español por parte de los profesores y de sus compañeros. Por ejemplo, en octubre de 2017, un profesor de un instituto de Nueva Jersey fue grabado en vídeo reprimiendo a tres estudiantes por hablar español y pidiéndoles que hablaran "americano". El hecho de que ese idioma ni exista deja el mensaje bastante claro.

La presión social para hablar inglés es tan fuerte que los padres inmigrantes latinos pueden ver como sus hijos evitan habla español en casa desde la guardería. Una generación después, aunque los abuelos sigan usando el español en casa, los nietos muchas veces les responderán en inglés.

Los numerosos blogs, páginas webs y guías dedicados a ayudar a los padres latinos a comprender el bilingüismo son un indicador de la normalidad del cambio de idiomas. De hecho, cuando les pregunto a mis alumnos latinos sobre qué idioma hablan y con quién, la respuesta es casi siempre la misma: español con los padres e inglés con el resto.

El inglés sigue al alza

Esto es algo que sigue ocurriendo en ciudades pequeñas y grandes, en la Costa Este y en la Costa Oeste, y en ciudades con poblaciones latinas grandes y pequeñas. Desde Chicago a Carolina del Sur, los hijos de los inmigrantes hispanohablantes prefieren hablar inglés. El cambio de español a inglés también ocurre en Miami, donde más del 65 por ciento de la población es latina y donde hablar español tiene claros beneficios. De hecho en Miami hay problemas para encontrar suficientes profesores que hablen español para dar clase en los colegios públicos.

El español no es la única lengua de inmigrantes que ha tenido problemas para mantener su hueco en los EE. UU. Los alemanes, los italianos, los polacos y los suecos vivieron cambios similares de idiomas en los siglos XIX y XX. Estas lenguas también fueron vistas en su día como una amenaza para la identidad americana.

Tanto entonces como ahora, el miedo entre los americanos sobre el papel del inglés en la sociedad es algo completamente infundado. En los casi 150.000 años de historia del lenguaje humano, nunca ha habido una lengua más segura que el inglés.

En el mundo existe más gente que habla chino mandarín o español como lengua materna, pero con casi 400 millones de hablantes nativos y más de 500 millones de hablantes de inglés adoptivos, el inglés tiene una posición a nivel mundial superior a cualquier otra de las 6.000 lenguas que se hablan en el mundo desde hace medio siglo.

Si el número de inmigrantes latinos desciende notablemente en los Estados Unidos, el cambio de idioma podría hacer que el español desaparezca del país. El inglés, por el contrario, no se va a ir a ninguna parte de momento.

Imagen | Molly Adams/Flickr
Autor: Phillip M Carter, Florida International University. Este artículo ha sido publicado originalmente en The Conversation. Puedes leer el artículo original aquí. Traducido por Silvestre Urbón.

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El idioma español está en caída libre en EEUU pese al aumento de la inmigración latina

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En Estados Unidos existe un debate constante bastante acalorado sobre la inmigración, pero hay un tema que suele pasar de largo: el idioma. Nadie habla de la posible amenaza de lengua de los inmigrantes hispanohablantes para el dominio del inglés en los Estados Unidos.