Cuban Spanish is the variety of the

Spanish language Spanish () or Castilian () is a Romance languages, Romance language of the Indo-European languages, Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin spoken on the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. Today, it is a world language, gl ...

as it is spoken in

Cuba Cuba, officially the Republic of Cuba, is an island country, comprising the island of Cuba (largest island), Isla de la Juventud, and List of islands of Cuba, 4,195 islands, islets and cays surrounding the main island. It is located where the ...

. As a Caribbean variety of Spanish, Cuban Spanish shares a number of features with nearby varieties, including coda weakening and neutralization, non-inversion of Wh-questions, and a lower rate of dropping of subject pronouns compared to other Spanish varieties. As a variety spoken in Latin America, it has

seseo In Spanish dialectology, the realization of coronal fricatives is one of the most prominent features distinguishing various dialect regions. The main three realizations are the phonemic distinction between and ('), the presence of only alve ...

and lacks the pronoun.

Origins

Cuban Spanish is most similar to, and originates largely from, the Spanish that is spoken in the

Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; ) or Canaries are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean and the southernmost Autonomous communities of Spain, Autonomous Community of Spain. They are located in the northwest of Africa, with the closest point to the cont ...

and

Andalusia Andalusia ( , ; , ) is the southernmost autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community in Peninsular Spain, located in the south of the Iberian Peninsula, in southwestern Europe. It is the most populous and the second-largest autonomou ...

. Cuba owes much of its speech patterns to the heavy Canarian migrations of the 19th and early 20th centuries. The accent of

La Palma La Palma (, ), also known as ''La isla bonita'' () and historically San Miguel de La Palma, is the most northwesterly island of the Canary Islands, a Spanish autonomous community and archipelago in Macaronesia in the North Atlantic Ocean. La Pa ...

is the closest of the Canary Island accents to the Cuban accent. Many Cubans and returning Canarians settled in the Canary Islands after the revolution of 1959. Migration of other Spanish settlers (

Asturians Asturians () are a Romance ethnic group native to the autonomous community of Asturias, in the North-West of the Iberian Peninsula. Culture and society Heritage The Asturians have Celtic ( Astures) and Latin cultural origins, most notably f ...

Catalans Catalans ( Catalan, French and Occitan: ''catalans''; ; ; or ) are a Romance ethnic group native to Catalonia, who speak Catalan. The current official category of "Catalans" is that of the citizens of Catalonia, a nationality and autono ...

, Castilians), and especially

Galicians Galicians ( or ''pobo galego''; ) are an ethnic group primarily residing in Galicia, northwest Iberian Peninsula. Historical emigration resulted in populations in other parts of Spain, Europe, and the Americas. Galicians possess distinct cu ...

also occurred, but left less influence on the accent. Much of the typical Cuban vocabulary stems from Canarian

lexicon A lexicon (plural: lexicons, rarely lexica) is the vocabulary of a language or branch of knowledge (such as nautical or medical). In linguistics, a lexicon is a language's inventory of lexemes. The word ''lexicon'' derives from Greek word () ...

. For example, ''guagua'' ('bus') differs from standard Spanish ''autobús''. An example of Canarian usage for a Spanish word is the verb ''fajarse'' ('to fight'). In Spain, the verb would be ''pelearse'', and ''fajar'' exists as a non-reflexive verb related to the hemming of a skirt. Much of the vocabulary that is peculiar to Cuban Spanish comes from the different historic influences on the island. Many words come from the

, but some words are of West African, French, or indigenous Taino origin, as well as peninsular Spanish influence from outside the Canary Islands, such as Andalusian or Galician. The West African influence is due to the large

Afro-Cuban Afro-Cubans () or Black Cubans are Cubans of full or partial sub-Saharan African ancestry. The term ''Afro-Cuban'' can also refer to historical or cultural elements in Cuba associated with this community, and the combining of native African a ...

population, most of whom are descended from African slaves imported in the 19th century. Some Cuban words of African origin include 'wonderful', 'friend', and 'Yoruba deity'. In addition, different Afro-Cuban religions and secret societies also different African languages in their practices and liturgies. Many Afro-Cubans in the 19th century also spoke Bozal Spanish, derived from the term , which originally referred to muzzles for wild dogs and horses, and came to be used to refer to enslaved Africans who spoke little Spanish. Some elements of Bozal Spanish can still be found in the speech of elderly Afro-Cubans in remote rural areas, in Palo Mayombe chants, and in trance states during possession rituals in

Santería Santería (), also known as Regla de Ocha, Regla Lucumí, or Lucumí, is an African diaspora religions, Afro-Caribbean religion that developed in Cuba during the late 19th century. It arose amid a process of syncretism between the traditional ...

. Due to historical commercial ties between the US and Cuba, American English has lent several words, including some for clothing, such as ''pulóver'' (which is used to mean "T-shirt") and ''chor'' ("shorts", with the typical Spanish change from English ''sh'' to ''ch'', like mentioned above, may be pronounced [], the pronunciation of English "sh"). Anglicisms related to baseball, such as ''strike'' and ''foul,'' are frequently employed, with Spanish pronunciation.

Phonology

Cuban Spanish is marked by a variety of phonological features that make it similar to, and distinct from, many other dialects of Spanish. Like other Latin American Spanish varieties, this dialect is seseante, meaning there is no distinction between ⟨s⟩, ⟨z⟩, and soft ⟨c⟩ sounds, differing from a

Peninsular Spanish Peninsular Spanish (), also known as the Spanish of Spain (), European Spanish (), or Iberian Spanish (), is the set of varieties of the Spanish language spoken in Peninsular Spain. This construct is often framed in opposition to varieties from ...

dialect. Cuban Spanish is also similar to most other Latin American dialects by using

yeísmo (; literally "Y-ism") is a distinctive feature of many dialects of the Spanish language, characterized by the loss of the traditional palatal lateral approximant phoneme (written ) and its merger into the phoneme (written ). It is an examp ...

; the letters ⟨y⟩ and ⟨ll⟩ are both pronounced � Similar to speakers of other Caribbean dialects, Cuban Spanish speakers exhibit the weak pronunciation of consonants, especially at the end of a syllable. A syllable-final may either be aspirated and be pronounced as or may even be deleted, in a process known as

elision In linguistics, an elision or deletion is the omission of one or more sounds (such as a vowel, a consonant, or a whole syllable) in a word or phrase. However, these terms are also used to refer more narrowly to cases where two words are run to ...

. Where some speakers would pronounce a word like ''estar'' ('to be') as sˈtaɾ pronouncing /s/ as alveolar, many Caribbean Spanish speakers aspirate the /s/ and produce hˈtaɾ or elide it altogether, pronouncing ˈtaɾ This trait is shared with most American varieties of Spanish spoken in coastal and low areas (''Lowland Spanish''), as well as with

Canarian Spanish Canarian Spanish or Canary Island Spanish (Spanish terms in descending order of frequency: , , , or ) is a variant of standard Spanish spoken in the Canary Islands by the Canary Islanders. Canarian Spanish heavily influenced the development of ...

and the Spanish spoken in the southern half of the Iberian Peninsula. Take for example, the following sentence:

''Esos perros no tienen dueños'' (Eso' perro' no tienen dueño') �esoh ˈperoh no ˈtjeneŋ ˈdweɲoh ('Those dogs do not have owners')

Also, because this feature has variable realizations, any or all instances of in the above example may be dropped, potentially rendering �eso ˈpero no ˈtjeneŋ ˈdweɲo Other examples: ''disfrutar'' ("to enjoy") is pronounced ihfɾuˈtaɾ and ''fresco'' ("fresh") becomes �fɾehko In

Havana Havana (; ) is the capital and largest city of Cuba. The heart of La Habana Province, Havana is the country's main port and commercial center.ard) is typically pronounced ehˈpwe(de'pué'/despué'). Another instance of consonant weakening in Cuban Spanish (as in many other dialects) is the deletion of intervocalic /d/ in the participle ending ''-ado'' (-ao/-a'o), as in ''cansado'' ('o) anˈsao("tired"). More typical of Cuba and the Caribbean is the

of final /r/ in some verb infinitives, or merger with -/l/; e.g. ''parar'', 'to stop', can be realized as aˈɾalor aˈɾa(''paral/pará''). The voiceless velar fricative (spelled ⟨g⟩ before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩ and ⟨j⟩) is usually aspirated or pronounced h">Voiceless_glottal_fricative.html" ;"title="nowiki/>Voiceless glottal fricative">h which is also common in Andalusian and Canarian dialects and some Latin American dialects. Another common characteristic of Caribbean Spanish is the tendency for other processes to affect consonants in the final position such as /n/ velarization and neutralization of liquid consonants. Word-final becomes , such as in the word ''hablan'' (“they talk”), pronounced βlaŋ # Syllable-final may become or , or even become entirely silent. Final more frequently becomes in the eastern and central regions of Cuba. For example, in words such as ''carne'' (“meat”) or ''amor'' (“love”) many speakers of this dialect will produce the words as alneor mol Postvocalic tends to disappear entirely. All of these characteristics occur to one degree or another in other Caribbean varieties, as well as in many dialects in

(in southern Spain)—the place of historical origin of these characteristics. In some areas of Cuba, the voiceless affricate [] (spelled ''ch'') is deaffrication, deaffricated to []. The Spanish of the eastern provinces (the five provinces comprising what was formerly Oriente Province) is closer to Dominican Spanish, that of the Dominican Republic than to the Spanish spoken in Havana. There also exists a phonological feature unique to Cuba called the ''toque'' or ''golpe'' (“tap” or “hit”). This phonological process occurs within a consonant cluster that is composed of a

liquid consonant In linguistics, a liquid consonant or simply liquid is any of a class of consonants that consists of rhotics and voiced lateral approximants, which are also sometimes described as "R-like sounds" and "L-like sounds". The word ''liquid'' seems ...

, i.e., �or and an

occlusive In phonetics, an occlusive, sometimes known as a stop, is a consonant sound produced by occluding (i.e. blocking) airflow in the vocal tract, but not necessarily in the nasal tract. The duration of the block is the ''occlusion'' of the consonan ...

nasal consonant In phonetics, a nasal, also called a nasal occlusive or nasal stop in contrast with an oral stop or nasalized consonant, is an occlusive consonant produced with a lowered velum, allowing air to escape freely through the nose. The vast majo ...

, i.e., t] b] k] m]. Instead of producing the liquid, a Cuban speaker may produce the

glottal stop The glottal stop or glottal plosive is a type of consonantal sound used in many Speech communication, spoken languages, produced by obstructing airflow in the vocal tract or, more precisely, the glottis. The symbol in the International Phonetic ...

consonant � For example, a word like ''algodón'' ('cotton') will have the phoneme substituted for the �sound, producing ʔ-go-ˈðon In western Cuba and in a

syllable coda A syllable is a basic unit of organization within a sequence of speech sounds, such as within a word, typically defined by linguists as a ''nucleus'' (most often a vowel) with optional sounds before or after that nucleus (''margins'', which are ...

can be

merged Mergers and acquisitions (M&A) are business transactions in which the ownership of a company, business organization, or one of their operating units is transferred to or consolidated with another entity. They may happen through direct absorpt ...

with each other and assimilated to the following consonant, resulting in geminates. At the same time, the non-assimilated and unmerged pronunciations are more common. Example pronunciations, according to the analysis of which transcribes the merged, underlying

phoneme A phoneme () is any set of similar Phone (phonetics), speech sounds that are perceptually regarded by the speakers of a language as a single basic sound—a smallest possible Phonetics, phonetic unit—that helps distinguish one word fr ...

as :

Morphology and syntax

Cuban Spanish typically uses the diminutive endings ''-ico'' and ''-ica'' (instead of the standard ''-ito'' and ''-ita'') with stems that end in . For example, ''plato'' ("plate") > ''platico'' (instead of ''platito''), and ''momentico'' instead of ''momentito''; but ''cara'' ("face") becomes ''carita''. This form is common to the Venezuelan, Cuban, Costa Rican, Dominican, and Colombian dialects. The suffix ''-ero'' is often used with a place name to refer to a person from that place; thus ''habanero'', ''guantanamera'', etc. A person from

Santiago de Cuba Santiago de Cuba is the second-largest city in Cuba and the capital city of Santiago de Cuba Province. It lies in the southeastern area of the island, some southeast of the Cuban capital of Havana. The municipality extends over , and contains t ...

is ''santiaguero'' (compare ''santiagués'' "from

Santiago de Compostela Santiago de Compostela, simply Santiago, or Compostela, in the province of Province of A Coruña, A Coruña, is the capital of the autonomous communities of Spain, autonomous community of Galicia (Spain), Galicia, in northwestern Spain. The city ...

( Galicia,

Spain Spain, or the Kingdom of Spain, is a country in Southern Europe, Southern and Western Europe with territories in North Africa. Featuring the Punta de Tarifa, southernmost point of continental Europe, it is the largest country in Southern Eur ...

)", ''santiaguino'' "from

Santiago de Chile Santiago (, ; ), also known as Santiago de Chile (), is the capital city, capital and largest city of Chile and one of the largest cities in the Americas. It is located in the country's Chilean Central Valley, central valley and is the center ...

"). ''Wh''-questions, when the subject is a pronoun, are usually not inverted. Where speakers of most other varieties of Spanish would ask "¿Qué quieres?" or "¿Qué quieres tú?", Cuban speakers would more often ask "¿Qué tú quieres?" (This form is also characteristic of Dominican, Isleño, and Puerto Rican Spanish.) Cuban Spanish also frequently uses expressions with personal

infinitive Infinitive ( abbreviated ) is a linguistics term for certain verb forms existing in many languages, most often used as non-finite verbs that do not show a tense. As with many linguistic concepts, there is not a single definition applicable to all ...

s, a combined preposition, noun or pronoun, and verbal infinitive where speakers in other dialects would typically use a conjugated subjunctive form. For example, , instead of 'that happened before I arrived here'. This type of construction is found elsewhere in the Caribbean and occurs in all speech styles. Cuban Spanish uses the familiar second-person pronoun in many contexts where other varieties of Spanish would use the formal . While Cuban Spanish has always preferred to , the use of has become increasingly rare after the Revolution.

Voseo In Spanish grammar, () is the use of as a grammatical person, second-person grammatical number, singular pronoun, along with its associated verbal forms, in certain regions where the language is spoken. In those regions it replaces , i.e. th ...

is practically non-existent in Cuba. It was historically present in the countryside of eastern Cuba. Pedro Henríquez Ureña alleged that it often used the object and possessive pronouns and instead of and . Its present-tense conjugations ending in , , and , and future-tense conjugations in . In keeping with the socialist polity of the country, the term ("comrade" or "friend") is often used instead of the traditional ''señor/señora''. However, states that the term has failed to enter the popular language, and is rejected by some Cubans who are critical of their government, citing a misunderstanding with a Cuban who refused to be addressed as .

Influence of the Canary Islands

Many words in traditional Cuban Spanish can be traced to those of the Spanish spoken in the

. Many Canary Islanders emigrated to Cuba and had one of the largest parts in the formation of the Cuban dialect and accent. There are also many elements from other areas of Spain such as Andalusian, Galician, Asturian, Catalan, as well as some African influence. Cuban Spanish is very close to Canarian Spanish. Canarian emigration has been going on for centuries to Cuba, and were also very numerous in emigration of the 19th, and 20th centuries. Through cross emigration of Canarians and Cubans, many of the customs of Canarians have become Cuban traditions and vice versa. The music of Cuba has become part of the Canarian culture as well, such as

mambo Mambo most often refers to: *Mambo (music), a Cuban musical form *Mambo (dance), a dance corresponding to mambo music Mambo may also refer to: Music * Mambo section, a section in arrangements of some types of Afro-Caribbean music, particul ...

, salsa, son, and

punto Cubano Punto guajiro or ''punto cubano'' – or simply ''punto'' – is a sung genre of Music of Cuba, Cuban music, a poetic art with music. It became popular in the western and central regions of Cuba in the 17th century, and consolidated as a g ...

. Because of Cuban emigration to the Canary Islands, the dish " moros y cristianos" (black beans and rice mixed together with traditional spices, different from "frijoles negros", which is a thick black bean soup served over white rice), also known as simply "moros", can be found as one of the foods of the Canary Islands; especially the island of

. Canary Islanders were the driving force in the

cigar A cigar is a rolled bundle of dried and Fermentation, fermented tobacco leaves made to be Tobacco smoking, smoked. Cigars are produced in a variety of sizes and shapes. Since the 20th century, almost all cigars are made of three distinct comp ...

industry in Cuba, and were called "Vegueros". Many of the big cigar factories in Cuba were owned by Canary Islanders. After the Castro revolution, many Cubans and returning Canarians settled in the Canary islands, among whom were many cigar factory owners such as the Garcia family. The cigar business made its way to the Canary Islands from Cuba, and now the Canary Islands are one of the places that are known for cigars alongside Cuba,

Dominican Republic The Dominican Republic is a country located on the island of Hispaniola in the Greater Antilles of the Caribbean Sea in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean. It shares a Maritime boundary, maritime border with Puerto Rico to the east and ...

Nicaragua Nicaragua, officially the Republic of Nicaragua, is the geographically largest Sovereign state, country in Central America, comprising . With a population of 7,142,529 as of 2024, it is the third-most populous country in Central America aft ...

, and

Honduras Honduras, officially the Republic of Honduras, is a country in Central America. It is bordered to the west by Guatemala, to the southwest by El Salvador, to the southeast by Nicaragua, to the south by the Pacific Ocean at the Gulf of Fonseca, ...

. The island of

has the greatest Cuban influence out of all seven islands. Also, La Palma has the closest Canarian accent to the Cuban accent, due to the most Cuban emigration to that island. Many of the typical Cuban replacements for standard Spanish vocabulary stem from Canarian

. For example, ''guagua'' (bus) differs from standard Spanish ''autobús'' the former originated in the Canaries and is an

onomatopoeia Onomatopoeia (or rarely echoism) is a type of word, or the process of creating a word, that phonetics, phonetically imitates, resembles, or suggests the sound that it describes. Common onomatopoeias in English include animal noises such as Oin ...

stemming from the sound of a Klaxon horn (wah-wah!). The term of endearment "socio" is from the Canary Islands. An example of Canarian usage for a Spanish word is the verb fajarse''fajar''
at ''Diccionario de la

Real Academia Española The Royal Spanish Academy (, ; ) is Spain's official royal institution with a mission to ensure the stability of the Spanish language. It is based in Madrid, Spain, and is affiliated with national language academies in 22 other Hispanopho ...

''. ("to fight"). In standard Spanish the

verb A verb is a word that generally conveys an action (''bring'', ''read'', ''walk'', ''run'', ''learn''), an occurrence (''happen'', ''become''), or a state of being (''be'', ''exist'', ''stand''). In the usual description of English, the basic f ...

would be ''pelearse'', while ''fajar'' exists as a non-reflexive verb related to the hemming of a skirt. Cuban Spanish shows strong heritage to the Spanish of the Canary Islands. Many names for food items come from the Canary Islands as well. The Cuban sauce mojo, is based on the mojos of the Canary Islands where the mojo was invented. Also, Canarian ropa vieja is the father to Cuban ropa vieja through Canarian emigration. Gofio is a Canarian food also known by Cubans, along with many other kinds.

References

Bibliography

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External links

Cuba language

Learn Cuban Spanish

Cuban Spanish 101

Cuban Spanish Guide

Learn Spanish and Cuban Slang
{{Cuba topics Caribbean Spanish Culture of Cuba Spanish Languages of Cuba Spanish-Cuban culture