A description of the acoustic properties of rhotics in Costa Rican Spanish

Abstract

Studies into the rhotic variation in Costa Rican Spanish have previously utilized perceptive methodologies and focused primarily on phonetic/phonological descriptions of the phenomenon. More recent studies such as Dearstyne (2021) have utilized modern acoustic methodology and have found a system that includes trills, taps, assibilated fricatives and approximants. This study focuses on the latter, seeking to acoustically describe the variant rhotics in this dialect. The methodology is centered on audio-recordings of native speakers from Costa Rica performing a sentence-reading task. The sentences were created to contain rhotics in the contexts in which rhotic variation has been previously documented by Vásquez Carranza (2006). Dependent variables are predicated on the manner of articulation; formants are recorded for approximants while spectral peaks and the center of gravity is taken for assibilated fricatives. Preliminary results for three participants show acoustic values for both qualities that are consistent with the alveolar place of articulation, yet different to other languages and dialects (Quilis 1981, Edwards 1992). (Spectral peak [ř] = 1,408 Hz, center of gravity [ř] = 240 Hz, F2 [ɹ] = 1,755 Hz). It is expected that these data will contribute to a better understanding of the rhotic system in this dialect of Spanish.