The Spaniards and Their Language--Bless Their Pea-Pickin' Hearts

Do let us know if you figure out what to do with the letter "s" in Spain. In the Castellano region they will make it a light "th" sound. Other places they might say "s" like we do. And some avoid the issue by dropping the s entirely. We heard a lot of " bueno dia" greetings when we were there 2 weeks ago.

The letter "s" is NOT pronounced like a "th" in Castillian. The letters "c" and "z" before a vowel are (as you say, in some regions only). So, gazpacho in some areas will be pronounced "gath-PACH-o," but in others it will be "gass-PACH-o."

You are quite correct that in some local accents, "s" sounds at the middles or ends of words are partly or completely dropped in speech, while in other regions, the letter is given full weight. There's an example that native speakers pointed out to me, in the film Women On The Verge Of A Nervous Breakdown. The word for "feminist" is pronounced differently by the actress from Madrid (fem-ee-NEES-ta) compared with the actress from Andalucia (fem-ee-NEE-ta, swallowing the "s").

The trick with French is that if you only know English, and just look at French and try to say it, it will come out VERY wrong. Remember how Bugs Bunny said "mon-SEWER" and "mad-uh-MOY-sl"? He's not the only one I've heard make those kinds of mistakes. So, start by just listening without looking (Pimsleur is great for this). Then, once you've started to learn the sounds, you can learn how they're spelled.

Willy,

Although both languages are part of the same family, the pronunciation especially is quite different and of course there are also regional variations. I don't know how accurate THIS video is, but it's interesting to watch. It's about 20 minutes in length and goes into some detail on the structure of both languages.

I should have said the s "sound", not the letter. So ce and ci words.

I'm with you , Willy. I made some progress on Spanish, but boy the French is not coming along all that well. A friend gave me a list of "tricks" for French. I'm not sure if it makes it easier. One is if the word has an s at the end, you don't pronouce it, as in Tours (silent S). But if its se, then you say the s, as in Amboise. Goodness, its a lot of rules! Interestingly, I'm now trying to learn Italian for an October trip, and having some practice with Spanish makes things easier. I may not be able to pronounce a word correctly but I can look at it and have a pretty good idea what it means.

I think it is helpful that I live in a place in which I come across Latino English Language learners so I've always heard a fair amount of Spanish spoken.

My high school French teacher said: Be CaReFuL - those consonants are the only ones pronounced if the last letter of a word. Of course, if the following word begins with a vowel, then the last letter is pronounced . . . . for example, c'est la vie (that's life) the st in c'est is silent, but c'est a moi (it's mine), the t is pronounced (set-a-mwah)

And don't assume you know more than basic British English. They have different meanings for words (lift, bonnet, fag, lorry, chips . . . ) and some of the accents will make you think they're speaking a foreign language.

Silly one of the hardest languages to learn is in fact ENGLISH!

My friend had an international student live with her family for a year and he nailed us on this , for instance :

Book - it is a noun and a verb - it is written and pronounced the same and you just have to “ know” when translated it by context of whole sentence which one it is - not fun .

Fair / Fare - two different words completely and pronounced the same

She had a run in her stocking from the run to the bus stop .

I’m a fan of Rock music but I am so hot at concerts I carry a fan .

I landed that job I wanted when we landed in Spain .

Fire - fire someone or set someone on fire ?

Would you build a house with wood or wood you build a house with would ? Sounds the Same .

Fine - it’s fine to be confused about the fine you were given by the officer because you cut the line too fine when passing that car . Think about it .

Our language is awful to learn . We have just as many rules and tons of exceptions .

I speak [Latin American] Spanish fluently, and have been thrown off by the Spanish spoken in Spain! In Spain, the differences between distincion, seseo, and ceceo can seem strange for people who learned Spanish in Latin America or even in the US - not just gazpacho as gath-PA-cho but zapatos as tha-PA-tosh, and more (the tendency to pronounce the "s" at the end of a word more as a "sh").

In Spain you tend to come across three approaches -
Distincion - "c" and "z" pronounced as "th", with "s" pronounced "s" (most common).
Seseo - "c", "z", and "s" all pronounced "s" (fairly standard through all of Latin America).
Ceceo - "c", "z", and "s" all pronounced "th" (least common).

I suppose distincion makes a whole lot of sense, when ya think about it. In Spanish, "casar" means to marry, while "cazar" means to hunt. With seseo, both "casar" to marry and "cazar" to hunt would sound the same. With the distincion pronunciation turning that "z" in to a "th" sound, you'd know someone was planning on hunting a deer and not marrying it assuming context didn't already clue you in! 😀 I suppose the oft-heard "sh" for when a word ends in "s" might just be more a pronunciation thing, rather than a defining characteristic of the dialects. Really, distincion vs. seseo. vs. ceceo is more about not just the letters "z", "c", and "s" but the syllables za, ce, ci, zo, zu, sa, se, si, so, su. I have gone way off on a tangent, though!

Ultimately, you're more likely to learn seseo if you study Spanish in the United States, but you'll be understood throughout Spain. You may have a bit of a tough time understanding people as they speak with distincion, but they'll have an easy enough time understanding you.

With English as my first language, then learning Spanish as a child, I had a tough time when learning French in my teens. My first inclination was to try and apply Spanish pronunciation to French words, and it was a difficult habit to kick. I had to force myself to read Notre Dame as "notruh dahm" instead of "no-tray dah-may", for instance. Interestingly enough, it wasn't getting away from Americanized pronunciation that was difficult ("no-turr dayme"), but the Spanish. I suspect my brain was just like "Hey, we're learning a new language so let's apply the lessons from the last time we had to do this". Once you get the hang of French, though, it's incredibly easy and its rules make total sense. You just get used to not saying those particular last consonants when they don't have a vowel after them and, as counterintuitive as it might seem at times, some of those French pronunciation rules make complete sense in practice. Take the "c'est la vie" and "c'est a moi" example - "c'est la" without the "st" being pronounced smoothly rolls off the tongue. It's fluid, with no hard, forced transition from "c'est" to "la" to have to worry about. Going from one firm vowel sound to another can be a weird transition ("say-ah" would force you to abruptly end the first syllable, then start up the next in a distinguishable way). So actually pronouncing the "t" in "c'est a" provides that easy break and transition for you. It's like you're conveniently able to pronounce the consonants to pivot off them in to the next vowel, or conveniently able to skip them when allowed. Think of how we do the same in English - we'll say "An apple" instead of "A apple" because the latter is just awkward. Spanish will sometimes do the same - when "de" is followed by the definitive article "el", you'd just say "del" instead of "de el".

Languages do evolve, after all, so I'd suspect a lot of those pronunciation rules that seem strange to us are actually the outcome of centuries of spoken language determining they're the most effective way to get those word and syllable sequences out.

Spanish is a beautiful language. French is a beautiful language. You're doing a great thing by learning what you can of them!

True...English is one of the hardest languages to learn. My native language is English. It is difficult because linguistically there are so many exceptions to the rules that the exceptions are the rules. Yes, I am exaggerating to a make a point.

The one easy part in English that the subjunctive is pretty much gone when compared to its usage in German and even more so with French, ie in situations when you have to use the subjunctive mood. .

Regardless, one must keep plugging away to tackle learning the languages...the more the better.

A couple more French tips:
As stated, don't pronounce the last letter in a word unless it links with a following vowel.

Each syllable is pronounced, unlike American English where each word has only one primary stressed vowel and perhaps a secondary, while all other vowels in a word are indistinguishable (making pronunciation hellish to learn).

Intonation in any language is too often overlooked. French rises slightly at the end of a sentence. It doesn't sound like a question, but it signals the end of the sentence and makes what you are saying sound French, rather than French syllables inserted into an English sentence structure.

Finally, American English is partially at the back of the throat and through the nose, while French is at the front of the mouth, fatiguing lips and tongues not used to the amount of work necessary to round those vowels.
Bonne chance.

Interesting topic! I don't know much about "Pea-Pickin", but if one wants a good resource for studying the variety of Spanish accents I would recommend watching a few episodes of MasterChef España. It's a cooking competition t.v. show but is currently the number one rated show in Spain. The competitors come from all over Spain and the Hispanophone world, so there is a good diversity of accents to compare and contrast at the same time, from Cuban to Asturian and everything in between.

They conveniently have a lower third with where the person is from when they speak to the camera. This one guy in the current season (Carlos) has a very strong Sevilla accent, so it is sometimes hard to understand what he says, even for me lol, they have to occasionally put subtitles for him. One can currently watch entire episodes on the Televisión Española website: http://www.rtve.es/television/masterchef/

Another interesting but subtle accent in Spanish is the Catalan accent, I think this one is a lot harder to detect for non Spaniards, as opposed to Andalucian accent.

If at first you don't succeed just speak more slowly and loudly.

"Intonation in any language is too often overlooked." How true! A key factor. I don't believe in the so-called "butchering a language" , eg language learner butchering French or German...not an option.

Like English, (Castilian) Spanish words can also have two meanings, hence -¿Qué hace el pez? Nada.

And also like the difference between proper English and American English, some words have different meanings in Spain compared to, for example, Argentina.

Waidaminute Nick! What’s this « proper English and American English »? Sorry, that’s so funny.

The Castillian Spanish I learned in school is remarkably consistent. Unfortunately, when you get to Spain, you don't hear much Castillian (even in Castilla y Leon and Castilla La Mancha). In the north, they speak primarily, from west to east, Gallego, Vasco (Euskadi) and Catalon. In Andalucia, they have their own version of Spanish. I heard words, both north and south, I'd never heard before. The good thing is they'll understand you and everyone speaks some local form of Spanish (even if it's a second language).

French can be difficult. I've been trying for a few years and am nowhere close to knowing the language. Spelling vs. pronunciation can be bizarre. I'm still trying to figure out how you get "Hrance" from Reims?

And then there are those travelers who wonder why learn any language besides English....A dear friend, an American high school French teacher, was at a lunch buffet in Paris several years ago, when he noticed that the two American women just ahead of him were speaking English louder and louder at the server, seeming to think he could understand them if they just yelled slower and louder. The server was clearly flustered and didn't know what they wanted. My friend stepped in and translated so that the "ladies" could make their selections. As the two began to check out, one of them turned to my friend and muttered: "I don't know what's wrong with these people, why they don't speak English! If it was good enough for Jesus Christ, it ought to be good enough for them!" True story. Really. True story.