Tense and mood variation in Spanish nominal subordinates: The case of Peruvian varieties

Crespo del Rio, Claudia

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Description

Title

Tense and mood variation in Spanish nominal subordinates: The case of Peruvian varieties

Author(s)

Crespo del Rio, Claudia

Issue Date

2014-05-30T16:46:12Z

Director of Research (if dissertation) or Advisor (if thesis)

Escobar, Anna Maria

Doctoral Committee Chair(s)

Escobar, Anna Maria

Committee Member(s)

• Fagyal, Zsuzsanna
• Ionin, Tania
• MacDonald, Jonathan

Department of Study

Spanish, Italian & Portuguese

Discipline

Spanish

Degree Granting Institution

University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

Degree Name

Ph.D.

Degree Level

Dissertation

Keyword(s)

• Andean Spanish
• Contact
• Quechua
• Peruvian Spanish
• Second Language Acquisition

Abstract

Peruvian Spanish has been described as a group of different varieties, in particular because of the degree of influence of indigenous languages. In the Andean region, contact between Spanish and Quechua has given rise to both monolingual and bilingual varieties of Andean Spanish, which present distinct characteristics. At the same time, however, Andean and non-Andean varieties share some features of Andean grammar due to intense dialect contact within the country (A.M. Escobar 2000, 2007, 2010; Caravedo and Klee 2005; O'Rourke 2005; Muntendam 2009) and reinforced by constant migrations from the Andes to the coast and to the capital since the first half of the 20th century. Considering this particular sociolinguistic situation, the dissertation aims to study the unique variation phenomena of the region and explore the contact hypothesis regarding its origin. The study focuses on two linguistic features that play an important role in Spanish dialectology and the configuration of Peruvian varieties in particular. First, variation in tense is analyzed in Spanish nominal subordinate clauses with verb types that require subordinate verbs in subjunctive mood (e.g. quiero que vengas “I want you to come”), and both verbs (the main and the subordinate) with the same tense (quería que vinieras “I wanted (PAST) you to come (PAST)”). Although other Latin American dialects allow present tense in the subordinate clause with main verbs in past tense (Sessarego 2010, Suñer and Padilla-Rivera 1987), it is considered to be more frequent in Peruvian Spanish (Sessarego 2008). In Peruvian varieties, this variation is found with different verb types, including verbs that are flexible in regards to this requirement (factive-emotive, such as alegrarse “to be happy” and lamentar “to be sorry”) and verb types that are considered the strictest (desire, such as querer “to want,” and lack of knowledge, such as ignorar “to not know”). Variation in mood, the second variable, is also considered in the study, since this is a feature found in Peruvian Spanish as well. It has been stated that bilingual speakers in Quechua-Spanish regions show a tendency to favor the indicative mood, even in contexts where the subjunctive is expected (quería que viniste “I wanted (IND.) you to come (IND.)”). Four groups of speakers were considered from three Peruvian Spanish varieties: Spanish spoken by Quechua speakers in the Andes and two Spanish varieties spoken in Lima, the capital. The last two varieties differ from each other in the sociolinguistic background of their speakers: one group lives in an area mainly inhabited by Andean migrants and the other lives in an area with no strong migrant background. The fourth group, included as a control group, is made up of speakers of Mexican Spanish living in Mexico City. High school students (N = 93) completed an oral production task that had stories with past contexts. Three linguistic factors were considered: the verb type in the main clause, the time of the event in the subordinate clause, and the degree of knowledge of the speaker. The Quechua-Spanish bilingual group also answered a Spanish proficiency test, which further distinguished them into two subgroups: intermediate and advanced level speakers. A perception task was also given to a subgroup of each group of speakers, to better understand the degree of acceptability of these two types of variation. Results showed that although past subjunctive answers were preferred in all groups, present subjunctive was used in a higher percentage than in the control group, and with events that were only possible in the past, considered ungrammatical in standard Spanish. Moreover, bilinguals did not have the highest percentages of present subjunctive among the Peruvian groups, which could suggest that this type of variation is not reinforced by the contact with Quechua. Nonetheless, the bilingual group from the Andes showed more variation than the other groups with respect to mood. They not only alternated between past and present in the subjunctive form, but also showed higher percentages of use of the indicative and conditional mood. Within this group, the intermediate-level subgroup was the one that produced more nonsubjunctive answers, whereas the advanced group performed similar to the non-Andean groups from Lima. Thus, the results suggest that mood variation among these bilinguals is a result of the process of acquisition of Spanish as a second language.

Graduation Semester

2014-05

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Copyright 2014 Claudia Crespo del Rio

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