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Forms of Address in the Spanish of the Americas
Edited by María Irene Moyna and Susana Rivera-Mills
[Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 10] 2016
► pp. 305–324

“Fijáte…sabes que le digo yo”

Salvadoran voseo and tuteo in Oregon*

| University of New Mexico
ORCID logo | University of New Mexico

This study investigates voseo and tuteo among Salvadorans residing in Oregon and examines whether tuteo increases as a result of contact with Hispanics of Mexican descent. Analyses of 404 tokens of 2sg verbs taken from natural conversations indicated clear preferences depending on social networks. Salvadoran-oriented Salvadorans mostly relied on voseo, while Mexican-oriented Salvadorans almost exclusively employed tuteo. While we found little intra-speaker variation, voseantes’ tokens of tuteo primarily occurred in contexts of reported speech, indicating that, for voseantes, tuteo signals ‘otherness’. We predicted that, among the tuteantes, voseo would linger in set phrases, such as fijáte. This prediction was not borne out, suggesting that fixed expressions index speakers’ identification with the community of their choice rather than national origin.

Published online: 25 August 2016
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ihll.10.15woo
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