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THESPANISH OF THE CANARY ISLANDS
Anindisputable influence in the formation of Latin American Spanish, oftenovershadowed by discussion of the `Andalusian' contribution, is the CanaryIslands. Beginning with the firstvoyage of Columbus, the Canary Islands were an obligatory way-station forSpanish ships sailing to the Americas, which often stayed in the islands forseveral weeks for refitting and boarding of provisions. Canary Islanders also participated activelyin the settlement and development of Spanish America.
TheCanary Islands merit a bizarre entry in the history of European geography,since the islands were well known to ancient navigators, only to pass intooblivion by the Middle Ages. After theearly descriptions of Pliny and other writers of the time, more than a thousandyears were to pass before the Canary Islands were mentioned in European texts,although contact between the indigenous Guanches and the nearby north Africancoast continued uninterrupted.
Spaincolonized the Canary Islands beginning in 1483, and by the time of Columbus'svoyages to the New World, the Canary Islands were firmly under Spanishcontrol. The indigenous Guanchelanguage disappeared shortly after the Spanish conquest of the islands, butleft a legacy of scores of place names, and some regional words. From the outset, the Canaries were regardedas an outpost rather than a stable colony, and the islands' livlihood revolvedaround maritime trade. Although someislanders turned to farming, particularly in the fertile western islands, moreturned to the sea, as fishermen and sailors. With Columbus's discoveries, the Canary Islands became obligatorystopover points en route to the New World, and much of the islands' productionwas dedicated to resupplying passing ships. Seville still held a monopoly on commerce, but an ever-growing Canarianmerchant class began to challenge that domination. The islands were ideally situated for influencing trans-Atlantictrade, and Canarian merchants began to implement their own agenda, fittingships to sail directly to the Americas. Many islanders signed on as sailors, joining hands with Andalusians,Galicians and Asturians in providing Spain with a trans-Atlantic seafaringclass. The Canary Islands were also thesite of the first Spanish-owned sugar plantations, and when sugar wasintroduced into the Antilles, it was from the Canary Islands, complete withCanarian experts in sugar cultivation. The flourishing Caribbean sugar industry overtook the originallyprosperous Canary Island production, initiating the economic decline of theislands which would ultimately result in heavy emigration to the Americas.
Withthe sugar industry already in disarray, islanders turned to winemaking, anactivity which still continues. Formore than a century, Canarian wines were in demand both in Spain and in theAmericas, but once again Peninsular winemaking overshadowed insular production,which was reduced to a cottage industry. The islands next turned to the harvest of dyestuffs, includingorchilla, made from a lichen, andcochinilla or cochineal, made from aninsect which infests cactus plants. Bythis time however, all possibilities for the Canary Islands to competeeconomically with Spanish America had disappeared, and in ever larger numbersthe islanders turned to emigration, temporarily or permanently.
Oncethe settlement of Spanish America was underway, Spain establishedadministrative centers in the Canary Islands, in an attempt to halt theflagrant contraband and illicit commerce between the islands and theAmericas. AJuzgado de Indias or judicial zone was established in the islandsin 1566. This entity undertook, amongother duties, the inspection of ships bound to and from the Americas, to assurecompliance with Spanish laws. For mostof the period of island trade, only Tenerife was authorized as a port ofexportation; later, Puerto de La Luz near Las Palmas de Gran Canaria alsobecame important. Islanders who endedup in the Americas were often from the two largest islands, whose speech hasalways showed more Andalusian traits and fewer archaic curiosities of the sortthat abound in the more isolated islands.
At theAmerican end, trade with the Canary Islands was extremely limited at first, dueto the strict Spanish monopolistic practices which limited official trade to ahandful of Latin American ports. Beginning in the 18th century and continuing until colonial independencein the 1820's, Spain loosened its grip, forced by the growing discontent amongcolonists and merchants at home. Canarian ships regularly travelled to Havana, Santiago de Cuba, SantoDomingo, La Guaira, Cumaná, Chagres, Portobelo, Riohacha, Santa Marta,Cartagena, Veracruz, Campeche, Omoa, and several smaller ports.
Theclimate of the Canary Islands is capricious. The easternmost islands receive hot winds off the Sahara Desert, andsupport only sparse vegetation and a few vegetable crops. The western islands are greener, but undergoperiodic droughts which make stable agriculture risky. Canary Islanders repeatedly petitioned theSpanish government for relief, but the Spanish Crown was more concerned withextracting wealth from its American colonies, and the Canarian pleas fell ondeaf ears. Since many islanders had alreadytravelled to the Americas as sailors or in pursuit of island-based commercialactivities, emigration to the New World was a logical next step. Emigration was not based only on economicnecessity, for the Spanish government at times actively recruited islanders forvarious settlement plans. Emigrationfrom the Canary Islands to the Americas began almost as soon as the latterregion became settled, in small numbers and leaving no verifiable linguistictraces. It was not until the 18thcentury that any large-scale emigration began, following well-established traderoutes to the Caribbean (Morales Padrón 1951, 1977). The Antilles and Venezuela were the preferred destinations,although Canary Islanders settled in other regions. In the last decade of the 18th century, Spain actively recruitedCanary Islanders to settle areas of Louisiana, establishing a territorialpresence against real or imagined French encroachment. These settlers were later abandonedfollowing the transfer of Louisiana to French and then American ownership, andthe descendents lived in relative isolation in central and extreme southeasternLouisiana. The latter group, theIsleñosof St. Bernard Parish, still retains the Spanish language (Armistead 1992,Lipski 1990c, MacCurdy 1950), while descendents of the first group, known asBrulis(Armistead 1978, 1983, 1985, 1991, 1992; MacCurdy 1959; Holloway 1998oH) have lost the Spanishlanguage. Canary Islanders were alsosettled in the western areas of Santo Domingo to counter the increasing Frenchpresence (Moya Pons 1980: 107-8,127). To this day, the speech of thisregion bears great similarity with the rustic vernacular of the Canary Islands.
Withthe coming of independence to most of Latin America in the early 19th century,Spanish trade with the New World diminished considerably. The Canary Islands increased theircommercial traffic with the United States, and emigration concentrated on thetwo remaining Spanish-American colonies, Puerto Rico and particularly Cuba. Alvarez Nazario (1972a) has traced thesuccessive waves of Canary Island immigration to Puerto Rico, where entirevillages were formed of relocated islanders. In Cuba, theisleño became a well-known personage, characterizedby a combination of industriousness and peasant superstition, and the speechand behavior of Canary Islanders figure prominently in Cuban literature of the19th and early 20th centuries.
Spainwas always ambivalent about the Canary Islands and its inhabitants. Islanders were viewed as provisioners ofpassing ships, and as a ready source of cheap labor, military conscripts, andsettlers for new colonies. During mostof the colonial period, Canary Islanders were officially prohibited fromtravelling to the American continent except as soldiers. In practice, this prohibition was seldomrespected. As traffic with theCaribbean grew, so did the number of Canary Islanders residing in theAmericas. Given the preferred traderoutes, the majority ended up in Venezuela, with a large number also reachingthe Antilles.
Somerepresentative figures hint at the magnitude and linguistic importance of theCanarian presence in Latin America. In1714, for example, the governor of Caracas observed that half the whitepopulation of the city was composed of Canary Islanders (Béthencourt Massieu1981: 18). Following the wars of colonial independence and until 1853,official Spanish policy allowed islanders to emigrate only to the remainingSpanish possessions: Cuba, Puerto Ricoand the Philippines. Few took the lastoption, but emigration to Cuba grew steadily during the remainder of the 19thcentury. In 1853, a royal decreepermitted emigration to all American territories, whether Spanish colonies orfree nations. This increased Canaryemigration to other Latin American areas, especially Argentina and Uruguay, aswell as providing more immigrants for Venezuela, but the majority continued tohead for Cuba. Accurate figures forimmigrants during the 19th century do not exist, but an approximate picture canbe reconstructed (Hernández García 1981). In the 20-year period from 1818-1838 for example, more than 18,000islanders emigrated to the Americas, most to Cuba and proportionately fewer toVenezuela and Puerto Rico. Thisrepresents a significant proportion of the islands' population, and given therelative size of cities in Latin America in the early 19th century, a notinconsiderable shift in the linguistic balance of such places as Caracas,Havana and Santiago de Cuba. In thehalf century from 1840 to 1890, as many as 40,000 Canary Islanders emigrated toVenezuela alone. In the period from1835-1850, more than 16,000 islanders emigrated to Cuba, a rate ofapproximately 1000 per year. In the1860's, Canary emigration to the Americas took place at the rate of over 2000per year, at a time when the total islands' population was perhaps240,000. In the 2-year period 1885-6,more than 4500 Canarians emigrated to Spanish possessions (including thePhilippines and Fernando Poo), of which almost 4100 went to Cuba and 150 toPuerto Rico. During the same timeperiod, some 760 Canary Islanders emigrated to Latin American republics, with550 going to Argentina/Uruguay and more than 100 to Venezuela. By the period 1891-1895, Canary emigrationto Argentina/Uruguay was slighly more than 400, to Puerto Rico was 600,immigrants arriving in Venezuela numbered more than 2000, and to Cuba more than17,000. By comparison, in the same halfcentury or so, emigration to Cuba from other regions of Spain included: 14,000 from Barcelona, 18,000 from Asturiasand more then 57,000 from Galicia. During the same period more than 18,000 Galicians arrived inArgentina/Uruguay, but only a handful arrived in Venezuela. These are only official figures; whenclandestine emigration is taken into account, the numbers would be much larger. For example, Guerrero Balfagón (1960) hasdocumented the illegal but significant immigration of Canary Islanders toArgentina and Uruguay in the first half of the 19th century.
Followingthe Spanish-American War of 1898, Cuba and Puerto Rico were no longer Spanishterritories, but Canary immigration to the Americas continued. Until the Spanish Civil War of 1936, mostislanders arrived in Cuba, and it is difficult to find a Canary Island familytoday in which some family member did not go to Cuba during the early decadesof the 20th century. In some of thepoorer regions, entire villages were left virtually without a young malepopulation. Many islanders returnedafter a few years, although some made several trips to Cuba or remainedindefinitely, thus increasing the lingusitic cross-fertilization between thetwo regions. Following the SpanishCivil War, which created even more severe economic hardships in the CanaryIslands, islanders once more turned to Venezuela as the preferred area ofemigration, a trend which continued until the early 1960's. Contemporary Venezuela still harbors a largeCanary-born population, which retains much of the vocabulary, traditions andspeech forms of the Canary Islands, more so than in any other region of LatinAmerica. In 19th century Cuba andPuerto Rico, Canary Islanders worked principally in agriculture, particularlythe sugar industry, and to a lesser extent in urban areas. In the 20th century, islanders in Cuba andVenezuela found more employment in cities, although some moved to rural areasin search of permanent homesteads.
Thelinguistic contributions of Canary Islanders are difficult to separate fromthose of Andalusia, given considerable similarities as well as the closelinguistic and cultural contacts between Andalusia and the Canaries. Few exclusively Canary lexical itemspenetrated Latin American Spanish, so the fact that a given term is used in theCanary Islands and also in Latin America does not automatically entail directtransfer. Sometimes the choice ofcompeting variants can be influenced by migratory trends. Thus, for example, Laguarda Trías(1982: 50) suggests that the preferencefordurazno instead ofmelocotón `peach' in the Southern Cone mayreveal a Canary influence. Cubans andVenezuelans know the wordgofio, although the word no longer designatesthe same mixture of ground toasted grains as in the Canary Islands. The word was once used in Argentina andUruguay, especially by thecanarios, a term coming to mean all ruraldwellers regardless of origin (Guarnieri 1978: 32-3). The termguaguaisused in Cuba, the Dominican Republic, Equatorial Guinea and Puerto Rico torefer to a city bus. At the turn of the20th century, the term referred to a horse-drawn wagon, andviajar de guaguameant `to ride for free.' The same termis found in the Canary Islands, with identical meaning, and is used even in themost remote regions, on all seven islands. Most analyses of Canary Spanish attribute this term to Cuban influence,brought back by returning islanders who had lived in Cuba. The use ofguagua in EquatorialGuinea (formerly Fernando Poo) has also been attributed to the Cuban exile andslave population which was sent to the island in the mid 1800's (GonzálezEchegaray 1959: 64). The form, however, bears the charactersticshape of Guanche words, and the existence of this word among theIsleñosof Louisiana, whose ancestors left the Canary Islands in the late 1700's,suggests the opposite route of transfer. The general absence of the word in the Spanish of Venezuela, where theCanary Island presence was also strong, adds to the confusion concerning theorigins ofguagua.
Severalsyntactic patterns found in the Caribbean region may be of Canary origin, ormay have been reinforced by the arrival of large numbers of Canary Islanders(Gutiérrez Araus 1991). One such caseis the combinationmás nada `nothing else,'más nunca `neveragain,'más nadie `no one else,' used very frequently in Caribbean andCanary dialects. Other Spanish dialectsprefer the reverse word order, although combinations beginning withmásare occasionally found in Andalusia and elsewhere in Latin America. These combinations bear a close resemblanceto Galician-Portuguese constructions, and in view of the documented Portuguese/Galicianinfluence in the Canary Islands, may be part of the Galician/Portuguesecontribution. In Cuba and Venezuela,the Canary influence cannot be entirely separated from the direct influence ofGalician Spanish speakers.
Non-invertedquestions of the sort ¿qué tú quieres? `what do you want?' are usual inCuban, Puerto Rican and Dominican Spanish, somewhat less so in Venezuelan andPanamanian Spanish, and quite uncommon in the remainder of Latin America, aswell as being extremely rare in the Iberian Peninsula. In the Canary Islands, non-invertedquestions are not as common as in the Caribbean, but among older speakers inrural regions, the frequency rises appreciably, indicating a higher rate ofusage in the past, when the Canary influence on Caribbean Spanish wasstrongest. Galician/Portuguese alsoemploys non-inverted questions, but not due to the cliticization of subjectsbut rather to the general lack of subject-verb inversion. The tight concentration of non-invertedquestions in Latin American Spanish, limited to the Antilles and a few coastalCaribbean regions, correlates neatly with Canary Island influence, and alsowith recent Galician arrivals.
Foundthroughout the Caribbean are combinations in which an infinitive is preceded byan overt subject, usually following a preposition, withpara being themost common preposition: para yosalir `in order for me to leave,'para ellos entender `for them tounderstand,'antes de yo venir`before I came,' etc. Unlike noninverted questions or the wordguagua,preposed subjects of infinitives are not limited to the Antilles or theCaribbean, although they are most common in that area. On the other side of the Atlantic, suchconstructions are usual in the Canary Islands. In peninsular Spain, infinitives with preposed subjects are not unknownin Andalusia, although never common. InGalicia, such combinations occur in Spanish as translations of Galicianpatterns. In Latin America, theCanary/Galician contribution converged most strongly in the Caribbean, which iswhere infinitives with preposed subjects are most frequent. This distribution provides circumstantialevidence in favor of a Canarian contribution in the Caribbean zone (cf. Lipski1991).
Phonologically,Canary Island Spanish could easily be confused with Cuban, Panamanian orVenezuelan Spanish by the casual observer (cf. Almeida 1989a, 1989b, 1990;Alvar 1959, Catalán 1960, 1964; Lorenzo Ramos 1976; Samper Padilla 1990). Even members of these speech communities arenot always able to distinguish between a Canary Islander and a speaker ofCaribbean Spanish. Although some haveseen a direct Canary Island influence in Caribbean Spanish pronunciation (e.g.Alvarez Nazario 1972a), this cannot be objectively verified. The phonological patterns of the CanaryIslands continue the patterns of consonantal weakening found throughoutsouthern Spain, but do not differ qualitatively from Andalusian andExtremaduran dialects. Canary Islandimmigration to the Caribbean added to phonetic tendencies which were alreadywell-developed, but the overall Canarian contribution is largely supportiverather than innovative.
Portuguese presence in the Canary Islands
ThePortuguese presence in the Canary Islands began in the 15th century, andcontinued for several centuries thereafter. As a result, Canary Island Spanish has absorbed numerousPortuguese/Galician lexical items, and possibly some grammaticalconstructions. The Canary Islands wereknown to the ancients of the Mediterranean region, only to be collectively forgottenduring the Dark Ages. The developmentof the compass, the rudder, and the availability of more accurate maps spurredexploration of the near Atlantic beginning in the 13th century, and Genoese,Moroccans, and possibly even Castilians had visited the Canary Islands by theend of the century. In 1336 the Genoansailor Lancelotto Malocello arrived on the island of Lanzarote, whose name isderived from that of the Italian navigator. The first known map of the Canary Islands was drawn in Mallorca, in1339. In 1341 the king of Portugal senta military expedition to the islands, under the command of Niccoloso da Recco;Florentines, Genoese, Portuguese, and Castilians were included in the force. Four indigenous Canarians were captured andtaken as slaves; the soldiers also obtained samples ofgofio, the staple food made from toasted grains, Canarymillo or millet, and several culturalartefacts. During the following yearsthe king of Mallorca and the Avignon Pope Clement VI authorized settlements,and by 1352 a Catalan-Aragonese expedition, headed by Arnau Roger, left for theislands with the intent of establishing a colony and converting the nativeGuanche population to Christianity. Theshipwreck of a Castilian vessel in 1382 briefly brought a Castilian presence tothe islands, and by 1402 the newly arrived French conquerors described theactivities of previously-established Castilian and Aragonese pirates. By this time, hundreds of Guanches had beensold as slaves in Morocco and Andalusia, while European diseases had decimatedthe Guanche population remaining on the islands.
Thedefinitive European colonization of the Canary Islands began with the Frenchinvasions of 1402 and the succeeding years. The Guanches resisted tenaciously, but the French prevailed alongcoastal areas, and a few years later the `Kingdom of the Canaries' wasproclaimed. Indigenous uprisings andresistance did not cease until the final decades of the 15th century, and atbest the European colonies were no more than fortified coastal enclavessurrounded by hostile natives.
By 1424the ships of Portuguese Prince Henry `the Navigator' attempted to takepossession of the Canary Islands. Theseinitial skirmishes were followed by full-scale Portuguese invasions in 1446 and1468, although the Portuguese never wrested control of the islands from theFrench. By the end of the 15th centurythe Canary Islands already contained a considerable Portuguese population, thusbeginning the linguistic cross-fertilization that was to shape the emergingCanary Spanish dialect. With the deathof King Henry IV of Portugal in 1474 a fierce war between Portugal and Castilebroke out. The Catholic Kings Ferdinandand Isabella claimed the `Guinea Coast' (the Senegambia region and the Windwardcoast to the south), in an attempt to slow the Portuguese expansion in WestAfrica. The Portuguese responded bystepping up their agression against the Canary Islands. A peace treaty signed in Alcáçovas in 1479resulted in Castile's desisting in its claims to West Africa and the definitiverenunciation of navigation rights in African waters. The Portuguese agreed to stop their attacks on the CanaryIslands, but the Portuguese presence on the islands continued to grow, dominatingagriculture and commerce during the 16th century.
Spainlaunched its first serious effort to capture the Canary Islands in 1461, withattacks by Diego García de Herrera. In1478 the Catholic Kings sent another expedition headed by Juan Rejón, who builta fort on Gran Canaria. From this beachheadSpain began its systematic attacks on the native population, obtaining a finalsurrender in 1483. Spanish attacks onTenerife began in 1496, and by the end of the 15th century the Canary Islandswere under nominal Spanish control, although native insurrection continued formany more years.
TheSpanish occupation of the Canary Islands coincided with the massive deportationof Guanches, many of whom were sent as slaves to Spain and other Europeancountries. The Guanches who remained onthe islands were forced to work on the estates and in the businesses run by thenew masters. A contigent of SpanishJews expelled from the Iberian Peninsula arrived in the islands beginning in1492; following the establishment of the Inquisition in 1499 some emigrated tothe Americas.
AlthoughSpain effectively controlled the Canary Islands by the turn of the 16thcentury, heavy immigration of Portuguese and Genoan colonists continued,spurred by the liberal immigration policies of Alfonso Fernández de Lugo, thefirst governor of Tenerife and La Palma. Fernández de Lugo recognized that the islands contained much fertileland, and encouraged the planting of sugar cane. The first sugar mill was constructed in 1484 in Agaete, on GranCanaria. Another mill was built by aGenoan entrepreneur in 1501 in Gáldar, Gran Canaria, and much Genoan investmentcapital arrived to support the new sugar industry.
Duringthe 16th century numerous Portuguese immigrated to the Canary Islands. Many came from the Madeira islands, where theywere engaged in sugar cane cultivation. Others arrived directly from Portugal and worked in agriculture. Portuguese settlers also worked as artesansand laborers, and a considerable number managed to acquire smallproperties. At the beginning of thesugar industry in the Canary Islands the technical personnel were almost allPortuguese, having obtained their experience in Madeira, whence sugarcultivation techniques had arrived via Genoans and Sicilians, who hadtransplanted the sugar industry from the Mediterranean to the PortugueseAtlantic islands during the 15th century. Guanche slaves were eventually deported from the Canary Islands and sentto Madeira, thus forming a vicious circle of sugar and slavery, which would bereplicated a century later in the infamous sugar-slave-rum triangleencompassing Europe, West Africa, and the Caribbean.
As theGuanche population was diminishing--through deportations and Europeandiseases--the newly arrived colonists turned to the importation of black slavesfrom the Senegambia and from the nearby Barbary Coast (Lobo Cabrera 1982). The arrival of black slaves in the CanaryIslands coincides chronologically with the initial presence of West Africans inPortugal and Andalusia. Granda (1972)speculates as to whether abozalSpanish was ever formed in the Canary Islands, similar to the Afro-Hispanicpidgin which was to be found in major Peninsular cities during the 16th andpart of the 17th centuries. To date, nocredible evidence has come to date, but the sociodemographic conditions on someof the islands were similar to those which obtained in the IberianPeninsula. The Spanish also captured`Moorish' slaves from the neighboring coast of Morocco and Mauritania, therebycreating a linguistic and cultural mosaic which presaged the Africancommunities in the large cities of Spain during the 16th and 17thcenturies. Berber slaves arrived in theeastern Canary Islands, the `moriscos' who served as crewmembers on Canaryships. By the end of the 16th century,it is estimated that the `moriscos' constituted a majority of the population ofLanzarote.
By 1600the Guanches had for all intents and purposes vanished from Canary life,although a few remote settlements continued to exist in isolation. Portuguese emigration to the Canariesdwindled during the first decades of the 17th century, as Portugal fought tofree itself from Spanish domination. With the definitive independence of Portugal in 1640, Portugueseimmigration to the Canary Islands increased once more, spurred by the economicdevastation suffered in Portugal, asituation exacerbated by the war with the Dutch over African and South Americancolonies.
ThePortuguese presence in the Canary Islands profoundly affected the vocabulary ofCanary Spanish, and may have left traces in grammatical constructions aswell. The now somewhat moribundnon-inverted questions of the sort ¿Quétúquieres?,overt subject +infinitive (te digo eso para tuentender las consecuencias), and the combinationsmásnunca,másnada,másnadie, are all found both in Portuguese and in Canary IslandSpnaish, as well as in Latin American dialects heavily influenced by Canaryimmigration. Scholars have proposedthat dozens of lexical items also bear a Portuguese imprint. Of these,faca `dagger,'fechar,`to close, bolt shut,'guinchar `toscream,'jeito `cunningness,'rapadura `crystalized unrefined sugar'are the most notorious, but hundreds of other supposed Portuguese incursionshave been collected by Pérez Vidal (1991); Morera (1994a) gives a more detailedanalysis.. Many of these words have todo with meterological phenomena, particularly variants of light rain anddrizzle: cheire `thick fog/drizzle,'cherizo `cold drizzle,'chobasco `drizzle,'choricera `drizzle with strong breeze,'chumbar `persistent drizzle,'chumirisquear`intermittent drizzle,'chumisca`drizzle of short duration,'churiza`persistent drizzle with light breeze,'churume`drizzle with breeze,'churivisca/chuvisca `drizzle of short duration,'chuvizna `drizzle,'gargón `drizzle with northwest wind,'garubar `light rain with wind,'garuga`fine drizzle with fog,'garuja/jaruya `drizzle,'moliña `cold drizzle without wind,'moraliña `drizzle with wind,'morriña`drizzle,'muña `light rain,' etc.(Pérez Vidal 1991: 154-9). Most of these items are found onlyregionally and only among older rural residents, although some are knownthroughout the islands.
Studies of Canary Island Spanish
Numerousmonographs and articles have explored various facets of Canary Island Spanish,initially from a purely descriptive perspective, and more recentlyincorporating sociolinguistics, phonological theory, syntactic theory, andsemantics. Medina López (1996) surveysthe literature, and the remaining articles in Medina López and Corbella Díaz(1996) provide a useful cross-section of recent research. Almeida and Díaz Alayón (1988) and LorenzoRamos (1988) summarize many features of Canary Island Spanish. Medina López(1995, 1999) offers a trans-Atlantic perspective on Canary Spanish. Alvar (1975b) is a linguistic atlas of theCanary Islands, based on Alvars personal fieldwork. As with similar linguistic atlases from Spain and other Europeancountries, the principal methodology consisted in the elicitation of individualwordsoften monosyllabicin isolation, with the result that apparent patternsof regional variation appear which do not always correspond with observedspeech in the same regions. Alvar(1959) is an early monograph on the Spanish of Tenerife, while Alvar (1972)provides a first glimpse into social variation in Las Palmas de GranCanaria. Almeida (1989, 1990) providesmonographic treatments of rural and urban Gran Canaria speech, while SamperPadilla 1990, 1996) offers a sociolinguistic treatment of Las Palmas de GranCanaria utilizing contemporary variational methodology. Torres Stinga (1995) is a monographictreatment of Lanzarote Spanish, while Morera (1994b) describes the popularspeech of Fuerteventura. C. Alvar(1975) conducted a rudimentary survey in a fishing village on La Gomera, whileTrujillo (1970) is a monograph on the speech of a village on Tenerife. Lorenzo Ramos (1976) is an exceptionallydetailed monograph on another town on Tenerife, and many typically Canarian traitsare described in this book. Trujillo(1978) is a phonetic study of the whistled language of La Gomera, now virtuallydefunct. Piñero Piñero (2000) is astudy of verbal constructions in the educated speech of Las Palmas, while TroyaDéniz (1998) describes periphrastic constructions based on the infinitive inthe same dialect. Almeida (1999)examines aspects of rhythm in Canary speech.. Medina López (1993) gives a glimpse into the sociolinguistics ofpronominal usage in one rural community. Cáceres Lorenzo (1992) is a more general study of adverbialexpressions.
Phonetics and phonology
Althoughthere is considerable regional and social variation in Canary Island Spanish,there is considerable homogeneity in pronunciation, with the majordifferentiators being social class and the rural/urban axis, together withage/generation. The principal featuresare:
(1) Syllable-final /s/ is uniformly aspirated inpreconsonantal and word-final prevocalic position throughout the CanaryIslands. Phrase-final /s/ is morefrequently lost. The isolated dialectof El Hierro is reputed to tenaciously retain syllable- and word-final /s/ as asibilant. While this may once have beentrue, currently such sibilant pronunciation is found only among the oldestrural residents, combined with high rates of aspiration and loss of /s/ in thesame positions. There are also someelderly speakers in isolated villages of La Gomera who spontaneously retainword-final /s/ as [s] in some instances.
(2) No Canary Island dialect distinguishes /s/and /θ/, despite occasional assertions that the dialects of El Hierromaintain this opposition. Ceceo or realization of all sibilants as[θ] is quite rare. The usualCanary Island /s/ is a plain alveolar fricative, similar to the /s/ foundwidely in Latin America and western Andalusia. Table 1 gives data on pronunciation of /s/ in key Canary Islanddialects, the vestigial Canary-derived speech of theisleños of Louisiana, and selected dialects of southern Spain andthe Caribbean.
(3) Phrase-final and word-final prevocalic /n/is usually velarized in Canary Island Spanish, and sometimes the velar nasaldisappears, leaving only a nasalized vowel. There is no evidence of a completely denasalized final vowel, e.g. inthe third person plural verbal paradigm, as sometimes occurs in vernacularAndalusian Spanish. At the same time,the rates of retention of alveolar [n] are higher in Canary Island dialectsthan in Andalusian and Caribbean Spanish. Moreover, in the more isolated islands such as El Hierro and La Gomera,where in rural areas the speech is in general more archaic, rates of retentionof final [n] are proportionately higher.
(4) Striking in the speech of all the islands isthe retentiongeneral in rural speech and increasingly less common in urbanspeechof the palatal liquid /λ/, which when present is always given aliquid pronunciation, and is never realized as a fricative. Generally considered an archaism in themodern Spanish-speaking world, retention of /λ/ in the Canary Islandscorrelates well with other archaic features found in the more isolated Canarydialects. Among Canary Islanders,awareness of the existence of /λ/ is high, but urban speakers report thatonly old speakers and those from totally rural areas use this phoneme. In reality, even many younger urban CanaryIslanders occasionally use /λ/, but its exclusive use appears to be on thedecline throughout the archipelago.
(5) There is considerable reduction andneutralization of syllable- and word-final liquids in Canary Spanish, with nosingle phonetic result predominating, even in the same dialect region. Word- and phrase-finally, total loss of /l/and /r/ is the most common manifestation, as it is throughout Andalusia,Extremadura, and surrounding areas, but lateralization of final /r/ to [l]occurs sometimes, particularly in Las Palmas. Word-internal preconsonantal liquids show a much greater variation, with[l], [r], [Ø], [h], doubling of the following consonant, and even [n] being themost common manifestations. Currentlythere is almost no trace of the vocalization of syllable-final /l/ and /r/ to[i], a trait once common in rural Canary Island speech.
(6) The affricate /č/ shows a variety ofrealizations throughout the Canary Islands, with a fronted variantapproximating [ty] being the most common alternative to theetymologically expected [č]. Deaffrication to [] is quite uncommon, in comparison with westernAndalusia where the fricative pronunciation predominates.
(7) Intervocalic /d/ is frequently lost in thedesinence ado and to a lesser extent in other contexts. Massive loss of intervocalic /d/ iscorrelated with the lower sociolinguistic registers. Word-finally, /d/ routinely elides, and often remains elided inplural forms.
(8) Themost striking departure from a simple rule of `continuant spreading' comes inthe Spanish dialect of Las Palmas de Gran Canaria, in the Canary Islands. In Las Palmas Spanish (LPS), as in all otherCanarian varieties, voiced obstruents receive a continuant pronunciationfollowing syllable‑final consonants, thus falling in line with`mainstream' Spanish dialects. However,among the lower sociolinguistic strata, although /b/, /d/ and /g/ are uniformlyfricative following [h] < /s/, when preconsonantal /s/ is elided altogether,the following obstruent receives astoparticulation(cf. Almeida 1989: 57; 1990: 48‑52; Alvar 1971: 100; Catalán 1960, 1964; Felix 1979; SamperPadilla 1990: chap. 3; Trujillo1981: 164‑5). This results in minimal pairs such as[laβaka]la vaca vs. [labaka(h)]las vacas `thecow(s).' Catalán (1960) describesthe situation thus: `la aspiración, aldesaparecer, convierte a la consonante sonora inmediata en una oclusiva [b],[d], [g],' noting that residents of Tenerife, for whom voiced obstruents arealways fricative following any manifestation of /s/, interpret Las Palmasspeech as containing an /n/ (after which voiced obstruents are stops in allSpanish dialects): lambaca <lasvacas,landó <las dos, etc. Catalán (1964) notes that this `refuerzo de la explosión' alsooccurs before voiceless obstruents, citing the novel by Pancho Guerra(1977: 67) in which the authortranscribesLas Palmas asLan Parmas, in mimicking the speech ofthe latter city. Almeida (1990: 48-52)and Samper Padilla (1990: chap. 3)provide data on the sociolinguistic stratification of this pronunciation, whileAlmeida (1989: 57) provides datasuggesting a rural origin for this process, which is not found elsewhere in theCanary Islands. The phonetic particularsof the stop/fricative alternation in LPS have been described by severalobservers, with results which do not always converge. Alvar (1972: 100) asserts that the stop pronunciation is most frequent in thecase of /b/: `se produce una tensión articulatoriaque lleva a lah al alargamiento de la fase tensiva de lab conrelación siempre oclusiva ... y a veces, parecía percibirse un conato deensordecimiento.' Alvar (1972: 102) also observed the apparent nasalizationof preconsonantal /s/, although noting that gemination of the voiced obstruentwas more common: `entonces, la posicióndébil de lah y fuerte de lab permitió la atracción de laprimera a la realización de la segunda: es el grupo -bb-, que se documenta sin dificultades ... la dobleb... exige una tensión articulatoria muy fuerte que ... obliga a ladiferenciación de un mismo sonido articulado en dos momentos diferences ... lalengua resuelve la cuestión eliminando una de esas oclusivas.' Trujillo (1981: 165) also claims prior gemination of the voiced obstruent incompensation for the loss of /s/: `...una geminación, acompañada de gran tensión articulatoria, aunque enpronunciación rápida se reduce normalmente a una simple oclusiva de efectoacústico muy semejante a la geminada, pues mantiene siempre toda su tensión.'Trujillo(1981: 164-5) explains the matter thus:
... ante consonante sonora continua que pudiera tenervariante oclusiva, la sonorización de [-h] y su posterior asimilación resultabaperfectamente viable, porque se mantenía la integridad silábica, alargando laarticulación y dividiéndola en dos, con una oclusión en medio ... debiópasarse, pues, de la sonorización de la aspirada a la igualación de ambasconsonantes en una articulación única, partida por una oclusión que, al mismotiempo, aumentaba considerablemente la intensidad de la consonante ... elresultado ... es con frecuencia una geminación, acompañada de gran tensiónarticulatoria ... en todo caso, geminada, alargada o más o menos breve, lo quese conserva inconmovible es la tensión fuerte.
Trujillo (1981: 165) claims prior gemination of the voicedobstruent in compensation for the loss of /s/: `... una geminación, acompañada de gran tensión articulatoria, aunque enpronunciación rápida se reduce normalmente a una simple oclusiva de efectoacústico muy semejante a la geminada, pues mantiene siempre toda su tensión.'For Trujillo, partial assimilation of [h] to a followingconsonant, first voicing and then point of articulation, eventually provoked anincreased articulatory tenseness. Almeida (1982, 1989) suggests the opposite course of events, namely thatincreased articulatory tension has induced gemination and/or shortening of thepreceding vowel.
Accordingto Trujillo's description, preconsonantal /s/ is never realized as [h] in LPS,so that the only realizations of the combination /s/ +voicedobstruentare a single or geminate voiced stop (preconsonantal sibilant [s] is artificialand unnatural in this dialect and is not to be considered as a legitimatephonological variant). Almeida (1982),on the other hand, tabulated many instances where /s/ remained as [h], butwhere a single or geminate stop instantiated the following voiced obstruent. Felix (1979) provides a somewhat differentdescription of LPS, claiming that /d/ is realized as a stop following /r/ (asinorden) and following sibilant [s] (as indesde). /b/ is pronounced as a stop followingsibilant [s]. The stop articulation isretained when the /s/ is aspirated or deleted altogether. Felix also states that the stop articulationfollowing elided /s/ occurs only after final plural -/s/ or final /-s/ in wordslikepues,dos andmás, and suggests a functionalhypothesis. In second person singularverb forms ending in elided /-s/, Felix claims that a following voicedobstruent is realized as a fricative. Many of these conclusions, particularly the noncontinuant realization of/d/ following [s] and [r], are contradicted by other researchers, including SamperPadilla (1990: 67). My own fieldwork, carried out on LPS in 1983and involving extensive recorded materials, confirms occlusive pronunciation ofvoiced obstruents following elided /s/, but reveal a dearth of conclusive casesinvolving [h] followed by a voiced obstruent. Regardless of discrepancies among different observers, and ofdifferences in research technique (Alvar 1972 and Trujillo 1981 relied onreal-time transcription, Felix 1979 employed tape recordings, while Almeida1982 not only taped examples, but subjected them to spectrographic analysis), acommon core of observations remains, which challenges currently availablemodels of Spanish phonology.
(9) There is some voicing ofintervocalic/word-initial postvocalic /p/, /t/, and /k/ throughout the CanaryIslands (Torres Stinga 1995:62-4; Trujillo 1980a; Morera 1994:55).
(10) Intervocalic /s/ is occasionally aspiratedor lost, although not to the extent found, e.g., in Honduras, El Salvador, andNew Mexico (Torres Stinga 1995:73-5). Morera (1994:65) reports on the scarcity of this variant inFuerteventura.
Canary Islanders abroad.
Thefrequent emigration of Canary Islanders over the past four centuries resultedin numerous transplanted Canarian communities throughout North and SouthAmerica. Linguistic traces of CanaryIsland Spanish continue to persist in the Caribbean, particuarly in theDominican Republic, Cuba, Puerto Rico, and Venezuela. During the course of the 18th century, Spain sent large numbersof settlers from the Canary Islands to hold the line against French incursionsat the western edge of the Spanish colony of Santo Domingo. The significant proportion of CanaryIslanders in rural western regions and also in the capital city may account forsome of the features of Dominican Spanish, particularly the use of non-invertedquestions. Golibart (1976) believesthat vocalization of syllable-final /s/ and /r/ (e.g.mujer >mujei,carta >caita,algo >aigo) in the northern Cibao region ofthe Dominican Republic is of Canary Island origin, although this pronunciationis very rare in contemporary Canary Spanish. Megenney (1990a: 80f.) hints atan African origin for the same pronunciation. Few other areas of Latin America have ever manifestated thisphenomenon. Puerto Ricanjíbarospeech of the 19th century apparently had this trait, now absent in all PuertoRican dialects (Alvarez Nazario 1990: 80f.). Vocalization of liquidswas also prevalent among thenegros curros of 19th century Cuba, freeblacks living in Havana who adopted a distinctive manner of speaking (Bachillery Morales 1883, Ortiz 1986), more related to Andalusian than to Afro-Hispanicpatterns. It is thus possible thatvocalization of liquids was once more common in many Spanish-speaking regions,being now reduced to a few small areas. Granda (1991) believes that liquid vocalization is due primarily tosociolinguistic marginality, rather than to substrate influences.
InCuba, immigration from Spain was especially heavy in the second half of the19th century, particularly from Galicia/Asturias and the Canary Islands. Canarian immigration peaked in the firstdecades of the 20th century, and was responsible for a not inconsiderableamount of linguistic transfer between the two territories. So concentrated was Spanish immigration thatCubans began to refer to all Spaniards from the Peninsula asgallegos`Galicians,'and to the Canary Islanders asisleños `islanders.' Alvarez Nazario (1972) gives an overview ofthe Canary Island influence on Puerto Rican Spanish.
Table1: Behavior of /s/ in Canary Island andother Spanish dialects
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/sC/ /s#C/ /s##/ /s#V/ /s/#v
[s] [h] [Ø] [s][h] [Ø] [s] [h] [Ø] [s] [h] [Ø] [s] [h] [Ø]
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Isleño
11 76 13 3 62 35 4 11 85 49 30 21 10 57 33
Fuerteventura (rural)
3 82 15 0 88 12 0 17 83 53 46 1 1 92 7
La Gomera (rural)
5 93 2 2 94 4 11 12 77 84 11 5 4 93 3
Gran Canaria (rural)
0 88 12 0 87 13 0 11 88 73 21 6 0 94 6
El Hierro (rural)
46 54 0 15 84 1 70 16 14 89 9 2 13 87 0
Lanzarote (rural)
7 82 11 0 83 17 0 20 80 74 24 2 3 80 17
La Palma (rural)
3 89 8 1 93 6 2 18 80 48 52 0 3 94 3
Tenerife (rural)
2 66 32 0 90 10 3 19 78 84 16 0 3 87 10
Sevilla
0 95 5 0 91 9 5 2 93 69 10 21 1 46 54
Granada
0 82 18 0 85 15 1 2 97 0 15 85 2 50 48
Cuba
3 97 0 2 75 23 61 13 26 48 28 25 10 53 27
Dominican Republic
8 17 75 5 25 70 36 10 54 50 5 45 17 22 61
Panama
2 89 9 1 82 17 25 6 69 69 17 14 2 39 59
Puerto Rico
3 92 5 4 69 27 46 22 32 45 32 23 16 53 31
Venezuela
7 40 53 3 47 50 38 16 46 57 26 17 15 52 33
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Legend: C = consonant; # = word boundary; ## =phrase boundary;
V = stressed vowel; v = unstressedvowel
Table2: Behavior of word‑final /n/ inCanary Island and other dialects
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Dialect /n/## /n/#V
[n] [ŋ] [Ø] [n] [ŋ] [Ø]
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Isleño 82 2 16 94 0 6
Fuerteventura 30 54 16 50 37 13
(Pto. Rosario)
Fuerteventura 17 26 57 56 21 23
(rural)
La Gomera 27 51 22 55 34 11
(S. Sebastián)
La Gomera (rural) 49 18 33 80 11 9
Las Palmas de G. C. 18 49 33 54 34 12
G. Canaria (rural) 29 29 42 73 10 17
El Hierro 71 5 24 96 0 4
(Valverde)
Lanzarote 39 32 29 57 17 26
(Arrecife)
Lanzarote (rural) 31 8 61 76 4 20
La Palma (S. Cruz) 3 63 34 55 23 22
La Palma (rural) 34 32 32 61 18 21
S. Cruz de Tenerife 13 51 36 63 19 18
Tenerife (rural) 36 35 29 63 26 11
Sevilla 2 42 36 40 38 22
Granada 0 77 23 48 35 17
Cuba 8 54 38 3 59 38
Panama 1 88 11 5 80 15
Puerto Rico 22 69 9 8 79 13
Venezuela 1 86 13 13 72 15
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Legend: /n/ ## = phrase-final (muy bien); /n/ #V = word‑final prevocalic (bienhecho)
