Peninsular Spanish

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Peninsular Spanish, also known as European Spanish, refers to the varieties of 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

• Andalusian Spanish
• Canarian Spanish
• Castilian Spanish
• Castrapo (Spanish spoken in Galicia as opposed to Galician)
• Murcian Spanish

[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