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One of the things that most interests and fascinates me about the Spanish language are the different dialects that Spanish has. For example the way Spanish is spoken in different Spanish speaking countries such as México, Cuba, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru, Argentina, Spain, New Mexico(New Mexico has a tradition of speaking Spanish that goes back to the Spanish colonial days before the U.S. took over in 1912) and so on and so forth. Actually there are 21 different Spanish speaking countries so right there that would be 21 different dialects. I started out learning Spanish in California from my Spanish speaking neighbors. I had Spanish speaking neighbors from several states of Mexico, two different regions of Cuba, El Salvador, Colombia(different parts of Colombia a proposito), Guatemala, Argentina Bolivia and even a neighbor from southern Spain. I noticed from the beginning that they all spoke with different accents and with some vocabulary differences. Different expressions etc. etc.

First though what is the definition of a dialect? I had a very good and interesting Spanish teacher from Mexico that explained it this way. (A dialect is a change in a language that still permits understanding. Actually that is my definition. Different accent and some vocabulary differences.) Any way my Mexican teacher explained that basically there are two types of dialects for Spanish or any other language. So dialects can be divided into geographical(regional) and social dialects. A geographical (regional dialect) would be for example different geographical locations. For example: Spain, Cuba, Mexico, Argentina etc. etc. Also another way to look at dialects which my teacher explained is that dialects can be divided into horizontal and vertical dialects. A horizontal dialect runs horizontal and is about a geographical location such as different Spanish countries and different locations within a Spanish speaking country. Your vertical dialects are composed of the amount of education a person has, social position, rural or city living etc. etc. So somebody from Cuba can speak a Cuban dialect but there can be still a different dialect spoken by a Cuban because of being a lawyer, teacher, doctor or based on education and for being from a rural setting such as a farmer. Think of how a person from a small rural town or a farmer in Arkansas or Oklahoma might speak compared to highly educated person from the same state.


Does anybody else have the same interest in dialects as I have?