Accent
Puerto Rican accents, both in Spanish and English language, could be described as a reflection of Puerto Rico's culture.
To understand the concept of the Puerto Rican accent in Spanish, one must remember that every country in Latin America has different accents in this language, many of which are very similar. The Argentine and Uruguayan accents, for example, were heavily influenced by the presence of Italians in those countries.
In Puerto Rico's case, Spaniards arrived from many regions within Spain and brought with them their own regional dialects/accents. However, the great majority of European immigrants to Puerto Rico throughout its history came from the Hispano-Arabic area of Spain known as Andalusia. Another great majority arrived from North Africa, most notably the Canary Islands. When visiting Tenerife or Las Palmas (Islas Canarias, Spain), Puerto Ricans are usually taken at first hearing for fellow-Canarians from a distant part of the Canary archipelago. It is the accents of these regions which served as the basis of the style of Spanish spoken in Puerto Rico.
Arawak indigenous culture (in Puerto Rico, specifically that of the Taíno Amerindian), though destroyed by Spanish slave owners, survived through its miscegenated descendants and, as the first fusion of a non-European language to Spanish, became the major tying force which brought together all the other cultural contributions which would soon come. The Arawak language, Lokono, has left behind thousands of words. It has added to Puerto Rican Spanish the pleasant speaking tone which is often said to roll off the tongue like a song.
Africans in Puerto Rico were brought in as slave labor, the majority for work on coastal or lowland sugar plantations. They contributed hundreds of words, colloquialisms, intonations, and rhythm.
Chinese Puerto Ricans and other Asians that have established themselves in Puerto Rico also adopt the accent, but also keep a tinge of an east Asian accent.
The Puerto Rican accent is very strikingly similar to the accents used by those from the Spanish-speaking Caribbean basin, including: Cuba and the Dominican Republic and those from the Caribbean/coastal regions of Venezuela, Colombia, Panama, Honduras, and Nicaragua (particularly to a non-Puerto Rican). It also continues to be similar to the accent of the Canary Islanders and Andalusians in southern Spain. However, many Puerto Ricans find a great distinction between their accent and other Caribbean accents.
Read more about this topic: Puerto Rican Spanish
Famous quotes containing the word accent:
“The accent of a man’s native country remains in his mind and his heart, as it does in his speech.”
—François, Duc De La Rochefoucauld (1613–1680)
“An accent mark, perhaps, instead of a whole western accent—a point of punctuation rather than a uniform twang. That is how it should be worn: as a quiet point of character reference, an apt phrase of sartorial allusion—macho, sotto voce.”
—Phil Patton (b. 1953)
“I lost my ridiculous accent without acquiring another”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)