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Spanish Phonetics and Phonology in Contact: Studies from Africa, the Americas, and Spain
Edited by Rajiv Rao
[Issues in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 28] 2020
► pp. 325–362

Chapter 12
The Spanish sound system and intonation in contact with Galician

| Instituto da Lingua Galega – Universidade de Santiago de Compostela
| Instituto da Lingua Galega – Universidade de Santiago de Compostela
This exploratory study presents an approach to the phonetic models of Galician Spanish (GS) by means of a small sample of six female speakers with different linguistic profiles. We analyze the production of stressed vowels, final unstressed vowels, and some intonation contours. Unlike earlier descriptions, we do not find direct transfer from Galician to the GS phonetic system. Our results show: (1) The disappearance of the Galician seven vowel system and some examples of hybridization in wh-question intonation, both of which could be seen as signs of change in GS; and (2) The reduction of the final vowels and direct transfer from Galician to GS in yes-no questions, both of which could suggest preservation of the covert prestige of Galician.
Keywords: Galician Spanish, Galician, language contact, phonetics, intonation
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Galician and Spanish in contact
  • 3.Previous work on Galician Spanish
  • 4.Corpus and methodology
  • 5.Results
    • 5.1Stressed vowels
    • 5.2Unstressed final vowels
    • 5.3Intonation
      • 5.3.1Information-seeking yes-no questions
      • 5.3.2Information-seeking wh-questions
  • 6.Discussion
  • 7.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgments
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 6 August 2020
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ihll.28.12reg
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