Peninsular Spanish

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Peninsular Spanish refers to the Spanish spoken in the Iberian Peninsula as opposed to the Spanish spoken in the Americas also known as Latin American Spanish.

In general the main characteristic that distinguishes both variants of Spanish is the use of a different phoneme /θ/, that is, the initial sound of the English word think - (in Peninsular Spanish) for the soft 'c' (c+e, c+i) and the 'z'; also known as 'distinción'.

However, this characteristic is far from uniform in all dialectical variations of the Spanish of the Iberian Peninsula. The Andalusian dialect and the Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands do not use 'distincion' as a general rule, but could use either seseo or ceceo.


[edit] Variants


[edit] Sources of Additional Material

http://www.mtsu.edu/~rmorris/morris2000.pdf = Constraint Interaction in Spanish /s/-Aspiration: Three Peninsular Varieties
http://www.mtsu.edu/~rmorris/morris2002.pdf = CODA OBSTRUENTS AND LOCAL CONSTRAINT CONJUNCTION IN NORTH-CENTRAL PENINSULAR SPANISH