AT THE DIALECTAL CROSSROADS: THE SPANISH OF ALBUQUERQUE, NEW MEXICO

Abstract

Bills & Vigil (2008) have established two dialects of New Mexican Spanish – Traditional Spanish and Border Spanish. In general, archaisms and Anglicisms predominate in the north of the state (Traditional Spanish) whereas Mexicanisms predominate in the south (Bord er Spanish). The recent incorporation of Mexicanisms in the Spanish of Albuquerque has placed it at a dialectal crossroads where a Traditional variety is being supplanted by Mexican Spanish, thereby making it more similar to Border Spanish. This study addr esses the extent to which the Spanish of Albuquerque has absorbed Mexicanisms and explores how they were introduced into the community. The use of Mexicanisms is compared to that of archaisms and Anglicisms using an original 20 - hour corpus of spoken Albuqu erque Spanish. Contrary to the claims of Bills & Vigil (2008), the Spanish of Albuquerque is much more similar to Border Spanish than Traditional Spanish and should be reclassified to reflect this difference.