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Este artigo presenta un estudo de diversos fraseoloxismos pragmáticos do español e do inglés que, en termos xerais, o falante emprega para expresa-lo seu compromiso respecto da verdade do que enuncia e isto intensifica a forza ilocutiva do seu acto de fala. Perséguese, deste xeito, caracteriza-lo status fraseolóxico destas expresións, o lugar que ocupan na periferia do sistema fraseolóxico e as funcións concretas que desempeñan no discurso, que van dende a expresión do compromiso epistémico ata a manifestación do acordo interactivo intensificado. A análise baséase, de xeito máis específico, na abundante presenza destas unidades nos córpora COLAm (español) e COLT (inglés) da linguaxe xuvenil, no que este tipo de expresións se empregan como fins de especial variedade e expresividade. // This article presents a study of several Spanish and English pragmatic idioms which, in broad terms, are used by speakers to convey their commitment towards what they express and thus serve to intensify the pragmatic/illocutionary value of a given speech act. We aim to define the phraseological status of this set of expressions and the place they occupy within the periphery of phraseology, and analyze their specific discursive functions, which range from the expression of the speaker’s epistemic commitment to the pragmatic intensification of agreement in interaction. Our analysis is based on the abundant presence of these idioms in the COLAm and COLT corpora of Spanish and English teenagers’ language, where they are used with particularly rich and varied expressive purposes.

This paper is part of a wider research project which studies the academic writing of the dental Hispano-American community. It aims to describe and to analyze which hedging strategies are used and for what purpose in 40 dental research papers published in Hispano-American journals (1 Venezuelan, 1 Cuban and 2 Spanish) between 1999 and 2005. The frequency of use of hedges in the different rhetorical sections of the dental papers is analyzed: introduction, method, results, discussion and conclusions. In addition, we compare the use of hedging strategies according to the section, journal and nationality. It was found that impersonal constructions and approximators predominated, followed by shields. However, deictics and the compound hedges reported less frequency. Introduction and discussion were the most heavily hedged sections. Nevertheless, hedges were also registered, mainly impersonal type, in method and results sections. Conclusion was the least hedged section. Shields, deictics and compound hedges were found mainly in the introduction and the discussion sections. On the other hand, approximators, shields and impersonal constructions were used in all the sections. The comparisons of our results show statistically significant differences in the use of hedges according to the rhetorical section, and the nationality; we also found differences between the frequencies of use of the five hedging strategies. Hedging is a very frequent strategy in the dental Hispanic RP; therefore, we propose its formal teaching in the dental academic writing courses.

The aim of this paper is to investigate the use of Spanish and Korean reformulation markers against the backdrop of a contrastive / intercultural rhetoric approach (Kaplan, 1966; Hinds, 1987; Clyne, 1994; Connor, 2008, 2011). In order to carry out the analysis, following a line of previous research papers in Murillo (2007, 2012), an empirical study using Spanish and Korean journalistic corpus was performed. The results obtained demonstrate significant disparity between the use of Spanish and Korean RMs when approached from a linguistic-intercultural rhetoric perspective, more specifically as to the use of double reformulation -the repetition of the Korean markers (jeuk… jeuk… / got… got…)-, some particular rhetorical patterns of the Korean marker got, denoting its cultural idiosyncrasy, and the discourse processes, such as ‘definition’, ‘denomination’, and ‘conclusion’, utilizing the selected markers in the two languages.

Digression is a discourse function that is identifiable and distinct from other similar functional strategies, and varies cross-linguistically. This paper investigates the way speakers of Spanish and English digress from their main discourse topics and how these transitions are marked. Once digression is defined by the proposal of four features considered to be inherent in this concept, the paper focuses on so-called 'digression formulating phrases', recurrent expressions which make explicit reference to the digression and signal that a new direction with respect to topic is proposed. The paper thus adopts a less common than the usual approach to discourse coherence and digression, whose literature has largely focused on discourse markers. The dataset, extracted from a corpus of parliamentary discourse, is analysed in an attempt to address two research questions. I investigate, first, the frequency and distribution of the selected digression formulating phrases in the two languages, and discern which of the two contexts of digression (i.e. beginnings and ends) is more highly marked, and, second, their use in connection to aspects such as syntactic configuration and position, and co-occurring features of semantic and pragmatic meaning. The contrastive perspective adds precision and richness to the treatment of digression.

This paper offers an in-depth analysis of a novel elliptical construction Spanish, dubbed Topic-Remnant Elided Polar Questions (or polar TREQs in short). A detailed examination of polar TREQs will provide evidence for the claim that (a) they are a type of TP-Ellipsis, triggered by the presence of an [E]-feature on C, and (b) the remnant is a topicalized XP that undergoes movement out of the ellipsis site. Furthermore, the analysis of polar TREQs in various contexts (in particular, with respect to so-called connectivity effects) confirms the need of syntactic identity between the linguistic antecedent and the ellipsis site to license ellipsis here. Additionally, this study sheds light on the syntactic structure underlying these constructions, particularly the presence of an intermediate TopP position within the embedded clause. Moreover, an examination of the patterns related to the presence or absence of an overt complementizer in this elliptical construction provides empirical support for Merchant's (2001) Sluicing-COMP Generalization. In summary, this paper not only provides a comprehensive account of the syntactic intricacies of a new elliptical construction in Spanish, but also provides valuable insights into the broader landscape of ellipsis phenomena in this language.

Resumen La morfología léxica es uno de los contenidos curriculares de la materia de Lengua y literatura castellana, ya que el conocimiento de la estructura interna de las palabras y sus procesos de formación son importantes para la mejora de la competencia comunicativa del alumnado. En este artículo se muestra la viabilidad de la incorporación de algunos conceptos y procesos de índole diacrónica en la enseñanza de la morfología léxica en Secundaria y Bachillerato. A pesar de asumir que, en toda la Enseñanza Media, el enfoque principal en el análisis de la estructura morfológica de las palabras complejas, de las relaciones entre sus constituyentes y de los procesos de formación de palabras debe ser el sincrónico, este trabajo pone de manifiesto que el empleo de la diacronía no solo contribuye a aumentar el alcance explicativo y descriptivo del plano sincrónico, sino que proporciona a los docentes argumentos sólidos para hacer reflexionar a los estudiantes sobre los hechos lingüísticos actuales que, al fin y al cabo, no dejan de ser el resultado de una evolución histórica. Abstract Due to its importance in improving students’ communicative competence, Lexical Morphology, i.e., the knowledge of the internal structure of words as well as their formation processes, is taken as part of the curriculum content of the subject “Spanish Language and Literature”. In this paper, we discuss the viability of including certain diachronic concepts and processes in the teaching of Lexical Morphology during Secondary Education. Despite the assumption that the analysis of the morphological structure of complex words, as well as the relationships between their constituents and the word formation processes should have a synchronic major focus for the duration of Secondary Education, in this paper the application of diachrony will be proven not only useful for increasing the explanatory and descriptive power of synchronic means, but also capable of providing teachers with solid arguments enabling students to reflect on current linguistic phenomena, which, after all, are results of historical evolution.

This paper focuses on loanword phonology in the context of Spanish words that have become part of the English lexicon in the 20th century. The background section shows that attention has been paid to Spanish words used in English from a lexical point of view, but scarcely regarding phonology. Furthermore, the few existing studies of loanword phonology do not deal in depth with Spanish and English as an example of crosslinguistic contact. Therefore, this paper aims at contributing to the explanation of the phonological adaptations occurring in Spanish words when integrated into English, and therefore the conditions of English phonology that operate in the process of perception and production of Spanish loanwords. In doing so, two areas of interest are analysed: vowel phonemes and consonant phonemes, mainly in relation to their distinctive features and the distribution of units and also considering related phenomena such as phonetic and orthographical factors.

This paper focuses on the Basque impersonal construction, i.e. a detransitivized configuration that can convey impersonal, passive and middle readings. Although these are agentive constructions (Fernández and Berro 2021), labile change-of-state predicates in these sentences allow for a causative and an anticausative reading, enhanced by the possibility of inserting a purpose clause or a by-itself PP, respectively (Ortiz de Urbina 2003). We suggest that two distinct underlying representations with identical exponents yield these readings: (i) a defective Voice head that encodes an implicit external argument in the causative variant (Schäfer 2008; Berro et al. 2022), and (ii) an anticausative counterpart, lacking Voice altogether. We support this claim by examining the distribution of noncore dative arguments in these contexts, whose possible interpretations are (i) affected by an intentionally or naturally caused change of state, or (ii) accidental causers of this event; this phenomenon is also attested in Spanish se-passives and se-anticausatives (Cuervo 2003; Suárez-Palma 2020). Assuming that a middle applicative head introduces these arguments (Cuervo 2020), the affected reading arises when the applicative merges below vP, and the accidental causer one when it sits on top of it. Crucially, the latter is only possible in anticausative contexts, where that position is not filled by Voice; these observations from Basque mirror Suárez-Palma’s (2020) findings for Spanish. Finally, if this proposal is on the right track, future typological studies should include Basque in the list of languages showing applicative constructions (Polinsky 2024).

This paper investigates the Czech translation counterparts of the Spanish / Italian causative construction with the causative verb hacer / fare + verb. On the basis of two parallel corpora, a typology of Czech equivalents is proposed. In contrast to the general divide between analytic/synthetic translation constructions, the research uncovers a number of various recurrent patterns. The paper shows the quantitative distribution of the defined types of patterns. It demonstrates that between the two opposite poles of expressiving causativity, i.e. through morphological causativization and syntactic causative construction, there are languages, such as Czech, that display a wider range of structural possibilities. Although some types clearly dominate, the overall range of patterns is much larger.

This paper provides evidence of the impact of the Anglo-American culture on Spanish language and society. Societal phenomena such as globalization, migration and the media are observable in every area of Spanish people’s daily life. This study reveals the extent of the popularity of foreign given names, mostly English, in Spanish society. English given names seem to be currently associated with such values as high fashion and social prestige. Study of variables frequency, gender and age reveal that the choice of English first names is becoming very popular. A comparative analysis of English given names in the 1960s and in the 2010s in Spain is carried out. The dataset was collected from the Spanish Institute of Statistics (INE) and the results report that English first names occur quite frequently among people aged 25 years or younger and therefore represent a new tendency. The paper includes discussion of adaptations of some of the examined English names to Spanish.

The influence that English exerts on different languages has been widely examined. Particularly, many studies that have brought the classification of Anglicisms according to thematic fields into focus have shown that, in relation to various languages and varieties, sports is the area in which Anglicisms seem to appear most frequently (Seidel 2010, Andersen 2011). Considering Spanish, when introducing English names of sports, the two main choices are either to adopt/adapt these foreign names or to calque them into the recipient language. This paper aims to clarify which of these two options has been the most successful one and whether diatopic variation plays a part in this respect. To fulfil this goal, a series of equivalent pairs and their variants are looked up in CORPES XXI, and the statistics provided by this corpus in relation to geographical distribution are analysed. Results show that diatopic variation affects disparity in the frequency of use of the different forms of English ball sports names in Spanish.

This paper presents the characteristics of the intonation of Spanish spoken in Bucaramanga, Colombia, a variety considered as “strong and rude”. Spontaneous, semi-spontaneous and read utterances from four participants were analysed acoustically. After stylisation with MOMEL, the data was tagged according to the Sp_ToBI system, within the Autosegmental-Metrical model. The declarative, interrogative, and exhortative contours were compared with the intonational inventories available for Spanish. The results confirm prior dialectal boundaries based on lexical data and supports the dichotomy between coastal and mountain varieties in the dialects of Spanish spoken in Colombia.

Objective. This paper documents and analyzes how the members of an online community of fansubbers collaborate to subtitle Hispanic series and films in Chinese. In order to understand how this community organizes itself on the Internet to satisfactorily complete such a complex multimodal and multilingual process, the paper focuses on the community members’ roles and chain of production, the virtual spaces in which they work, their self-regulation strategies and the ethical issues they face. -- Methodology. The authors used qualitative content analysis and discourse analysis of a corpus composed with the help of netnographic techniques, including semi-structured interviews, participant observation and field notes. -- Results. The community was found to have a hierarchical structure, where a small group of managing members coordinated the others, who completed different tasks (e.g., transcription, synchronization, translation) in the overall collaborative project. The community took advantage of existing virtual spaces (e.g., official forums, social networks, online chats) to organize and promote its work and to develop a complete system of self-regulation, from recruitment to further training and evaluation with performance management. The authors conclude that fansubbers are cautious volunteers who make their own rules to protect and legitimize their community, which consists of freelance translators and technicians who are amateurs but who take their work seriously. These volunteers collaborate efficiently on the Internet, maintaining strict quality standards in their subtitling, and are supported by active audiences. Empowered in the digital age, this community is revolutionizing traditional modalities of reading and writing, recreating media products in an original way to meet the emerging needs of viewers

Objectiu: documentar i analitzar la cooperació en línia d'una comunitat digital que subtitula sèries i pel·lícules hispanes al xinès; estudiar-ne els rols i les funcions, la cadena de treball, els espais virtuals, les estratègies d'autoregulació i les qüestions ètiques, i conèixer com s'organitzen a la xarxa per complir satisfactòriament una tasca multimodal i plurilingüe tan complexa. -- Metodologia: anàlisi qualitativa de contingut i anàlisi del discurs sobre un corpus extret mitjançant tècniques de la netnografia, que inclou entrevistes semiestructurades, observació participant i notes de camp. -- Resultats: la comunitat té una estructura jeràrquica. Una direcció reduïda coordina els altres membres, que exerceixen diferents funcions (transcripció, sincronització, traducció) en el treball col·laboratiu sobre el producte subtitulat; aprofita diferents espais virtuals (el fòrum oficial, les xarxes socials, els xats) per organitzar-se i promocionar-se, i desenvolupa un sistema complet d'autoregulació, des del reclutament fins a la formació i l’avaluació del rendiment de cada membre. Considerem que els fansubbers són voluntaris prudents (elaboren la seva pròpia normativa per tal de legitimar-se), traductors i tècnics aficionats però autònoms i seriosos (cooperen de manera eficient a la xarxa i exerceixen un control de qualitat estricte sobre els subtítols), que s'adrecen a audiències actives i apoderades en l'era digital. Aquesta pràctica revoluciona les modalitats tradicionals de lectura i escriptura, i recrea de manera original els productes mediàtics per satisfer les necessitats emergents dels espectadors. Objective. This paper documents and analyzes how the members of an online community of fansubbers collaborate to subtitle Hispanic series and films in Chinese. In order to understand how this community organizes itself on the Internet to satisfactorily complete such a complex multimodal and multilingual process, the paper focuses on the community members’ roles and chain of production, the virtual spaces in which they work, their self-regulation strategies and the ethical issues they face. -- Methodology. The authors used qualitative content analysis and discourse analysis of a corpus composed with the help of netnographic techniques, including semi-structured interviews, participant observation and field notes. -- Results. The community was found to have a hierarchical structure, where a small group of managing members coordinated the others, who completed different tasks (e.g., transcription, synchronization, translation) in the overall collaborative project. The community took advantage of existing virtual spaces (e.g., official forums, social networks, online chats) to organize and promote its work and to develop a complete system of self-regulation, from recruitment to further training and evaluation with performance management. The authors conclude that fansubbers are cautious volunteers who make their own rules to protect and legitimize their community, which consists of freelance translators and technicians who are amateurs but who take their work seriously. These volunteers collaborate efficiently on the Internet, maintaining strict quality standards in their subtitling, and are supported by active audiences. Empowered in the digital age, this community is revolutionizing traditional modalities of reading and writing, recreating media products in an original way to meet the emerging needs of viewers.

Objetivo: documentar y analizar la cooperación en línea de una comunidad digital que subtitula series y películas hispanas al chino, estudiando los roles y las funciones, la cadena de trabajo, los espacios virtuales, las estrategias de autorregulación y las cuestiones éticas, para conocer cómo se organizan en la red para cumplir satisfactoriamente una tarea multimodal y plurilingüe tan compleja. -- Metodología: análisis cualitativo de contenido y análisis del discurso sobre un corpus compuesto mediante técnicas de la netnografía, que incluyen entrevistas semiestructuradas, observación participante y notas de campo. -- Resultados: la comunidad tiene una estructura jerárquica. Una dirección reducida coordina a los demás miembros, que desempeñan distintas funciones (transcripción, sincronización, traducción) en el trabajo colaborativo sobre el producto subtitulado; aprovecha diferentes espacios virtuales (foro oficial, redes sociales, chats) para organizarse y promocionarse, y desarrolla un sistema completo de autorregulación, desde el reclutamiento hasta la formación y evaluación del rendimiento de cada miembro. Consideramos que los fansubbers son voluntarios cautos (elaboran su propia normativa para legitimarse), traductores y técnicos aficionados pero autónomos y serios (cooperan de manera eficiente en la red y ejercen un estricto control de calidad sobre los subtítulos), que se dirigen a audiencias activas y empoderadas en la era digital. Esa práctica revoluciona las modalidades tradicionales de lectura y escritura, recreando de manera original los productos mediáticos para satisfacer las necesidades emergentes de los espectadores. Objective. This paper documents and analyzes how the members of an online community of fansubbers collaborate to subtitle Hispanic series and films in Chinese. In order to understand how this community organizes itself on the Internet to satisfactorily complete such a complex multimodal and multilingual process, the paper focuses on the community members’ roles and chain of production, the virtual spaces in which they work, their self-regulation strategies and the ethical issues they face. -- Methodology. The authors used qualitative content analysis and discourse analysis of a corpus composed with the help of netnographic techniques, including semi-structured interviews, participant observation and field notes. -- Results. The community was found to have a hierarchical structure, where a small group of managing members coordinated the others, who completed different tasks (e.g., transcription, synchronization, translation) in the overall collaborative project. The community took advantage of existing virtual spaces (e.g., official forums, social networks, online chats) to organize and promote its work and to develop a complete system of self-regulation, from recruitment to further training and evaluation with performance management. The authors conclude that fansubbers are cautious volunteers who make their own rules to protect and legitimize their community, which consists of freelance translators and technicians who are amateurs but who take their work seriously. These volunteers collaborate efficiently on the Internet, maintaining strict quality standards in their subtitling, and are supported by active audiences. Empowered in the digital age, this community is revolutionizing traditional modalities of reading and writing, recreating media products in an original way to meet the emerging needs of viewers.

This paper presents the characteristics of the intonation of Spanish spoken in Bucaramanga, Colombia, a variety considered as “strong and rude”. Spontaneous, semi-spontaneous and read utterances from four participants were analysed acoustically. After stylisation with MOMEL, the data was tagged according to the Sp_ToBI system, within the Autosegmental-Metrical model. The declarative, interrogative, and exhortative contours were compared with the intonational inventories available for Spanish. The results confirm prior dialectal boundaries based on lexical data and supports the dichotomy between coastal and mountain varieties in the dialects of Spanish spoken in Colombia.

This paper presents a critical stance in the face of the technology-enhanced language learning (TELL) hype in higher education (HE). This hype, largely driven by institutional – instrumental and financial – imperatives has come under increasing scrutiny in recent times. Indeed, emerging discourses surrounding the broader context of technology-enhanced learning question the focus on technology-led innovation rather than pedagogy-led innovation as well as a number of scholarly aspects that remain largely undertheorised (cf. Bayne, 2014; Kirkwood & Price, 2013, 2014). In this paper we thus set out to articulate the challenges we face as language educators in the HE context and, in so doing, bring to light the glaring methodological gap that emerges from these. This discussion is complemented by practical examples from ongoing curricular innovation in intermediate Spanish language courses. These practical examples illustrate the pedagogical strategies we have implemented to respond to these challenges critically, but also, creatively. These strategies integrate theoretical principles from cognitive grammar (cf. Llopis-García, 2011) and an affective engagement approach to address specific pedagogical concerns that have emerged in these courses.

This paper discusses the corpus of Gran Canarian Spanish gathered in 2016 in order to provide an in-depth sociolinguistic account of the lenition processes identified in the dialect. After a detailed description of the methodology and database preparation, I present two case studies showcasing the utility of such corpora. First, I show the phonetic and social factors governing the distribution of different surface variants of the underlying coda /s/, pointing to generalised variation and hence incompleteness of any of the weakening options. Second, I provide a comparison of the spontaneous speech produced by the 6 informants of the corpus with their productions from a laboratory study, which leads to the conclusion that variation is subject to yet another important factor: social setting and that the options chosen on each occasion are reflections of competing stages on the same lenition trajectory systematically applied by language users.

The paper discusses the effects of mood on the availability of an existential interpretation of negative words such as nadie "nobody" in the complement of emotive factive predicates in Spanish. In these contexts, the subjunctive mood allows nadie to be interpreted as a non-negated existential quantified expression, ∃x, equivalent to alguien. On the other hand, the indicative mood allows only for a negative universal interpretation of the expression, ∀x¬, or a negated existential interpretation, ¬∃x. An account of this phenomenon is proposed in terms of the notion of settledness. A proposition expressed by an indicative complement is asserted, which indicates the speaker's intention that it be settled in the context set. The proposition is grammatically settled. A proposition in the subjunctive mood is not asserted, the speaker is not indicating an intention that it be settled, it is in a grammatically unsettled state (p/¬p: a state in which p and ¬p are left undetermined). The word nadie is analyzed as denoting a quantity scale . Within an asserted complement, the interpretation of nadie is fixed at the highest, most informative, point in the scale, ∀. On the other hand, within the grammatically unsettled complement of an affective predicate, the interpretation of nadie is not fixed at the highest point in the scale. This indeterminacy allows it to assume a value at the lowest point, ∃. It is noted that this possibility provides an expressive tool which may be used to add an emphatic hue to an utterance.

This paper contains a sample of the speech corpus from Miraflores (Boyacá). The segment presented is taken from a 50-minute interview. It was collected in 2019 and belongs to a second-generation average educated male speaker. The sociolinguistic analysis is based on a descriptive approach and examines the uses of Spanish in the speaking community of Miraflores (Boyacá) at socio-phonic, socio-syntactic, socio-lexical and socio-discursive levels. Rich and creative discursive constructions in real speech were observed in the sample analysed, as the variables attest the unity of Spanish, thanks to metaphorical expressions and cognitive processes that promote the linguistic, social and contextual interaction of the Spanish speaking community from Miraflores (Boyacá).

Abstract. The primary goal of this paper is to establish a comparison between the two most important forms that express futurity in Spanish and in European Portuguese, viz. the Futuro Simple / Futuro Simples (Simple Future) and the structure ir (‘go’) a / ir (‘go’) + Infinitive. Whereas the Simple Future behaves quite similarly in both languages, conveying temporal information of posteriority that may be strongly constrained by modal and aspectual factors, the periphrastic construction differs considerably in Spanish and in European Portuguese. In effect, contrary to its Spanish counterpart, which is considered, in the literature, ambiguous between an aspectual (prospective) and a temporal (future) operator, the data from European Portuguese point towards a consistent temporal meaning for the structure ir (‘go’) + Infinitive. So, we investigate the conditions under which these forms are licenced, in order to describe their semantic similarities and differences; moreover, since they both mainly bear temporal information, we compare the behaviour of the European Portuguese Simple Future and the structure ir (‘go’) + Infinitive, proposing that the former is less restricted than the latter: besides the location of a given situation in a future interval, ir (‘go’) + Infinitive seems to require an additional temporal boundary preventing the relevant eventuality to overlap the speech time.

In this paper, we proposed a reading of paratexts (Genette, 2009) in two translations of Memórias póstumas de Brás Cubas into Spanish, in order to analyze the way Machado de Assis’ image is constructed. As a critical approach of working with the translated texts, paratranslation allows us to understand not only the wider aspects regarding the text itself, but also those related to the translation process within the editorial practices (Yuste Frías, 2011, 2015). We have recognized an emphasis on the biographical aspects of Machado de Assis, mainly about his childhood as a poor black boy in 1800’s Brazil as well as his adulthood as a literary genius and an epileptic person. We have also compared this construction of Machado as an author, the more well-known and repeated image along the years, with another Machadopresented by Massa (2009a).

This article presents the main tenets of the Parallel Structures Model, a recently new autosegmental model, and applies it, for the first time, to the analysis of some phonological phenomena in Spanish. In particular, the paper illustrates the explanatory advantages of adopting the Parallel Structures Model in the analysis of the realizations of /s/ in coda followed by a voiceless stop within a word, because the wide range of realizations reported for such contexts in aspirant varieties of Spanish poses an interesting challenge to representational theories concerned with the internal structure of segments.

This paper reviews previous studies about dialectal variation of rhythm in Spanish and aims to analyse possible differences among Spanish spoken in Andalusia, Madrid, and Galicia. Four of the rhythm metrics present in the literature were used in the analysis. Spontaneous speech, by contrast with reading tasks, did allow us to discriminate among varieties, albeit only in the case of vowel duration measures. Drawing on the different effect of task on the results, two possible conceptions of rhythm are discussed: language rhythm (as a phonological property) and speech rhythm (as a phonetic property). It is argued that so-called rhythm metrics may be more related to the latter or may even reflect phonotactic rather than rhythmic properties.

In the nineteenth century, the political, economic and social circumstances that marked Europe determined the publication of various teaching materials of commercial Spanish appeared in the form of correspondence arts or manuals. This paper deals with L'espagnol commercial by Emmanuel Contamine de Latour (Paris, Larousse, from 1890 to 1923, 11th edition), with the aim of contributing to the history of some little-known materials but very profitable, to their origin, to the context in which they appeared, to the needs they satisfied, to the language they reflected or to the methodology used.

Many deem James Joyce’s Finnegans Wake an untranslatable novel. Despite this, the characteristics that appear to obscure its meaning, such as semantic multiplicity and experimental syntax, also make it particularly open to interpretation and resignification—thus, to translation. The present paper proposes a flexible, creative, playful, and free approach to its translation. I discuss the possibilities derived from such an approach through the analysis and translation of fragments of Finnegans Wake into Spanish, and I support this approach to the translation process with some of the most prominent research on the translations of Joyce’s works, up to date scholarship from Translation Studies, and relevant testimonies from Joyce himself and from translators and writers who have studied his literary production. I argue that Finnegans Wake is a text that tries to capture language itself, transcends linguistic barriers by resisting rigidity of meaning, and achieves an “openness” and freedom that, paradoxically, have somewhat limited the efforts to translate it. Therefore, I propose that if Joyce did not limit himself in his creative process, it is necessary that we, as readers and translators, accept without fear the challenges presented to us by Finnegans Wake and dare to create new art from it.

El presente artículo versa sobre el uso de metodologías basadas en las TIC; más concretamente, sobre la gamificación como elemento generador de motivación en el proceso de enseñanza-aprendizaje en un contexto universitario japonés para la enseñanza del español como lengua extranjera. Método: se realizó un estudio de carácter mixto (cuasiexperimental y transversal) aplicado a dos grupos de estudiantes (grupo control y experimental). Se partió de la hipótesis de que la aplicación de técnicas gamificadas provocaría un aumento de la motivación entre el alumnado y, por consiguiente, una mejora del rendimiento académico. Conclusiones: uno de los principales objetivos de la investigación era el de delimitar las mecánicas y plasmarlas en un curso gamificado y replicarlas en nuestra práctica docente, ya que según los resultados obtenidos queda demostrado que de esta forma se genera un mayor compromiso e implicación en los alumnos. GAMIFICATION PROJECT IN JAPANESE HIGHER EDUCATION FOR SPANISH AS A FOREIGN LANGUAGE This paper discusses and highlights the use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT); more precisely showing gamification as a motivational generator element, in a Japanese university context, for teaching Spanish as a foreign language. The method: the investigative approach is a mixed method (quantitative and qualitative) This quasi-experimental and cross-cutting design study was applied to two student groups (experimental and control groups). The working hypothesis is that as a result of the implementation of gamification strategies and techniques to a course through LMS (Blended Learning) for teaching Spanish, motivation and academic performance will increase among students. In conclusion: one of the main goals of this article is to frame and enclose the main mechanics of gamification, and apply them into our daily teaching. According to the data obtained, it is therefore apparent that we achieve a higher commitment and better involvement from our students.

This paper examines the lexical repertoires in Spanish and Portuguese that are included in two conversation manuals: O espanhol tal qual se fala. Novissima guía de conversação com a pronúncia figura, work elaborated for the Portuguese who want to learn Spanish; and the Manual de la conversación y del estilo epistolar, for the acquisition of Portuguese by Spaniards. The vocabularies inserted in both works are thematically grouped: they constitute nomenclatures, repertoires that are very common within the tradition of teaching and learning foreign languages. In addition, these vocabularies are complemented with a column dedicated to the pronunciation of the target language, in a similar way to other contemporaneous texts. Therefore, the analysed works are not original, but they are a good sample of the materials used throughout the history of foreign language teaching.

This paper documents English teachers’ and advanced English students’ perspectives on the use of Spanish in the English classroom in Puerto Rico. Using qualitative data collection methods such as interviews and focus group data, the researchers document the ways that many English teachers on the island justify their use of Spanish in the English classroom as they work to make their teaching more comprehensible. Nevertheless, the advanced students from both public and private schools who participated in this study offer a note of caution regarding the use of too much Spanish in the English classroom. Ultimately, findings suggest that many English teachers consciously or unconsciously adopt a translanguaging approach that needs to be assessed critically depending on the language proficiency and confidence of the students in their classrooms. To reference this article (APA) / Para citar este artículo (APA) / Para citar este artigo (APA) Mari, V., & Carroll, K. S. (2020). Puerto Rican teachers’ and students’ beliefs toward Spanish use in the English classroom as a way to motivate students. Latin American Journal of Content & Language Integrated Learning, 13(2), 289-311. https://doi.org/10.5294/laclil.2020.13.2.6 Recibido: 21/05/2020 Aceptado: 09/09/2020

The purpose of this paper is to introduce a developed software program called the “Spanish Collocation Tool (SCT)” and its application in related corpus-based studies. The Spanish Collocation Tool (SCT) was designed to assist with the research and analysis of Spanish collocation. The SCT allows searches of collocated elements not limited to words, but also parts of speech and lemmas. Furthermore, it can compare two collocation lists to detect any significant differences between them. In this study, this collocation tool, SCT, and a constructed L3 Taiwanese learners’ written corpus of Spanish called CEATE were combined to create efficient access to results in a systematic approach. Furthermore, by using the SCT, the pedagogical implications of the search results for the development of on-line multimedia material for learning Spanish collocations are discussed in the end.

Romera and Elordieta (2019) and Elordieta and Romera (2020) reported that most information-seeking absolute interrogatives in the variety of Spanish spoken in the Basque Country have a rising-falling circumflex final contour. Basque has falling final contours in absolute interrogatives. Applying the same methodology, this paper shows that most information-seeking absolute interrogatives in Madrid Spanish end in a high rising configuration. The results of this research strengthen the hypothesis proposed by Romera and Elordieta (2019) and Elordieta and Romera (2020) that the variety of Spanish spoken in the Basque Country shows influence from Basque.

ABSTRACT In Spanish, combining an indefinite plural article and a cardinal number leads to an approximative interpretation similar to that provided by approximators like ‘approximately’. In this paper, we advance a syntactic and semantic analysis of these structures. We show that the construction shares a number of properties with structures containing explicit approximative elements, so it justified to assume that a particular constituent contributes the approximative meaning. We propose that an approximative morpheme Approx is combined with the cardinal number; the morphological realization of this morpheme is as the plural affix on the indefinite article. We advance a denotation for Approx, and elaborate the necessary assumptions on the functioning of numerals for our analysis to work at a general level.

Framed within a Sociocultural Theory of Mind approach to Second Language Learning and Development (Lantolf & Poehner, 2014), this article presents a pedagogical proposal for implementing concept-based instruction (C-BI) in the Spanish heritage language (HL) classroom in order to promote the development and internalization of the grammatical concept of aspect. Although aspect has been found to be particularly troublesome for heritage language learners (Montrul, 2009; Silva-Corvalán, 1994), few studies have focused on teaching conceptual development of verbal aspect in the HL classroom. This paper contributes to filling this gap by proposing an innovative pedagogical design aimed at providing HL students with the opportunity to generate and transform a conceptual understanding of aspect through conscious interaction in significant, coherent, and systematic ways.

In this paper we review the „Corpus Oral de Referencia de la Lengua Española Contempóranea“. This corpus is a carefully compiled text collection of orthographically transcribed recordings of oral conversations. As it was compiled as a reference corpus, it provides texts of different styles and registers and has a considerable size of about 1,100,000 words. CORLEC therefore is an important resource for researchers interested in the field of spoken language. The Corpus is freely available as SGML-based-files or plain-text-files. As both variants are similar in their structure and content, the review addresses the two formats. The review first provides some background information and an overview of the structure of the corpus. Then, the transcription files are described in their structure and content. Eventually, a short overview of the integration of the corpus into other projects and a résumé are given.

This paper creates a novel link between research on linguistics and education by discussing what we know about the sound system of heritage language users of Spanish and how these findings can inform practices implemented in heritage Spanish courses in the USA. First, we provide an overview of terminology associated with heritage language research, situating heritage Spanish programs within the educational context of the USA, and explaining why heritage Spanish phonetics and phonology remain relatively unexplored. Next, we delve into previous linguistic research on the heritage Spanish sound system in terms of individual vowels and consonants, as well as at the level of intonation, rhythm, and stress, while highlighting any observed differences between the system of heritage Spanish and those of Spanish speakers of other backgrounds. Finally, motivated by the phonetic/phonological insight of previous work, in addition to existing pedagogical and curricular research on heritage Spanish, we consider how and why the inclusion of specific types of sound-system-based commentary and practice in the educational experience of heritage users of Spanish could be beneficial.

Abstract – In this paper I focus on the polylinguistic and polycultural landscape of Milan on the theoretical basis of daily life studies, the sociolinguistics of globalization, and intercultural pragmatics. The relevance of this field is determined by the need for urban anthropology to semiotize the urban spaces as an interpretative bridge between the microsystem (the individual level) and the macrosystem (the social level). More concretely, I investigate the presence of the Spanish language in the superdiversity of Milan and, methodologically, I collect ethnographically and interpret qualitatively a corpus of 700 daily life texts of various types of street writing. The results show the significant presence of Spanish in the urban landscape and a high level of hybridism which is, nevertheless, totally functional in communication. I also detect the emergence of linguistic, pragmatic and intercultural awareness in the writers. Finally, with some precautions, I confirm the scientific potential of the daily life documents to investigate complex urban dynamics.Resumen – El tema de este estudio es el panorama polilingüe y policultural de Milán y se plantea a partir de las bases teóricas de los everyday life studies, de la sociolingüistica de la globalización y de la pragmática intercultural. La relevancia del estudio descansa en la necesidad de la antropología urbana de elaborar una interpretación semiótica de los espacios urbanos, puesto que pueden constituir un puente interpretativo entre el microsistema (individuo) y el macrosistema (sociedad). Concretamente, el objetivo es investigar el papel del idioma español en la supediversidad milanesa; la metodología es de etnografía urbana con la formación e interpretación cualitativa de un corpus fotográfico de setecientos textos cotidianos de escritura callejera (pintadas, avisos, grafiti, ecc.). Los datos relevan una presencia significativa del español en el landscape milanés, con un alto nivel de hibridismo que, de todas formas, es funcionalmente adecuado y denota el emerger de la conciencia lingüística, pragmática e intercultural de los hablantes-escritores. Además, se confirma, con alguna precaución, el aporte científico de los documentos de la cotidianidad para interpretar la complejidad urbana.

In this paper, the properties of Spanish evaluative prenominal possessives (i.e. the affective possessive preceding a proper name, the so-called “emphatic possessive”, and the possessive in the Old and American Spanish doubled possessive construction) are thoroughly described, and compared with those of canonical prenominal possessives. It is mainly proposed that evaluative possessives, in contrast to canonical prenominal possessives, are not base-generated as nominal modifiers and then raise to D0, but are directly merged (mostly) within the DP domain, thus capturing the fact that affective, emphatic and doubling possessives just evaluate the relation between the possessum and the possessor, and are not interpreted as complements of the noun. In order to account for their different distribution, it is further argued that the three types of Spanish evaluative prenominal possessives are inserted (basically) in different structural positions in an split-DP.

In this paper it is argued that objects of subject experiencer psychological verbs do not have kind reference, but rather refer to individual object entities: specific individuals, generic plurals, and even entity correlates of a property. We argue that objects of transitive subject experiencer psychological verbs must refer to atoms or sums of atoms, because they presuppose the existence of the Target-of-Emotion. Focusing mainly on data from various Romance languages and Russian, we also argue that the Target-of-emotion of psychological verbs such as odiar ‘hate’ cannot refer to a kind entity, conceived as an abstract individual or an abstract sortal concept, but instead can refer to a maximal sum of individual entities, instantiated through a generic plural.

This paper describes two perceptual experiments carried out to determine the contribution of pitch range to the identification of emotions in speech. Synthetic manipulated speech was used to observe the effect on emotion perception of two specific acoustic cues: global pitch range along utterances and local excursions at final rising-falling pitch movements. The obtained results suggest that increasing F0 (the main acoustic parameter related to pitch perception) in both cues, global and local pitch range, is associated by subjects to the expression of particular emotions, especially surprise (ESCP hypothesis), rather to a general expression of arousal (ACP hypothesis) or as a general cue for emotional content (EGP hypothesis), at least in Spanish.

This paper investigates three main strategies used by Spanish teenagers to intensify their language, namely by suffixation and affixation of the base, and by recurring to the lexical intensifier mazo. For this purpose, all occurrences of these intensifiers in the Corpus Oral de Lenguaje Adolescente de Madrid (COLAm) are analyzed. Rather than describing the behavior of each individual category, this article aims at providing a better understanding of both the internal (morphosyntactic and semantic-pragmatic) and external (sociolinguistic) factors that determine the alternating use of the three strategies within the paradigm of intensifiers. The analysis also looks into the grammaticalization process that has given rise to the use of mazo as a highly frequent and versatile intensifier in teenage talk.

O obxectivo do traballo é afondar no estudo diacrónico das perífrases verbais máis comúns do castelán con valor deóntico (haber de + infinitivo, haber que + infinitivo, tener que + infinitivo, deber [de] + infinitivo e poder + infinitivo), empregando como base textual diversas recadádivas paremiolóxicas (Los refranes que dizen las viejas tras el fuego, atribuído ao Marqués de Santillana; o Vokabulario de Refranes i Frases Proverbiales i otras Formulas komunes de la lengua castellana de Correas e o Refranero Multilingüe do Instituto Cervantes). Para iso, nunha primeira fase ofrecemos as premisas metodolóxicas baseadas en tres pilares teóricos: a paremia como texto (corpus lingüístico), as perífrases deónticas como obxecto de estudo e a filosofía moral como ferramenta de análise taxonómica. Na segunda parte do artigo faise un estudo lingüístico das perífrases segundo o método da gramática histórica: primeiramente, ofrécense os datos pertinentes sobre cada unha das obras, dende unha perspectiva sincrónica; e, a continuación, estúdanse as relacións entre as paremias con perífrases dende unha perspectiva diacrónica. As principais conclusións resaltan a relevancia das paremias para coñecer en maior profundidade a historia da nosa lingua, entre outros motivos, porque estas constitúen un xénero textual que permite unha comparación diacrónica nos diversos estadios do idioma. // The aim of this paper is to broaden the diachronic study of the most common Spanish verbal periphrases with a deontic meaning (haber de + infinitivo, haber que + infinitivo, tener que + infinitivo, deber [de] + infinitivo e poder + infinitivo), with a textual basis of various paroemiologic compilations (Los refranes que dizen las viejas tras el fuego, attributed to Marqués de Santillana; Vokabulario de Refranes i Frases Proverbiales i otras Formulas komunes de la lengua castellana by Correas; and Refranero Multilingüe by the Instituto Cervantes). To carry on this study, we offer in the first part the methodological assumptions based on three theoretical pillars: paroemia as a text (linguistic corpus), deontic periphrases as the object of study, and moral philosophy as a tool for taxonomic analysis. In the second part of the article, we carry on a linguistic study of the periphrases according to the method of historical grammar. Here, we first provide relevant data about each text from a synchronic perspective, and then explore the relationships among paroemias with periphrases from a diachronic point of view. The main conclusions highlight the relevance of paroemias in order to know more about the history of the Spanish language, among other reasons, because these conclusions form a genre that allows a textual comparison through several stages of the language.

In this paper a TEI corpus with sonnets from the Spanish Golden-Age is reviewed. Some of the 52 authors represented in the collection are Cervantes, Lope, Quevedo, Tirso, Calderón or Góngora. In total, the corpus contains more than 5000 sonnets. The project is currently under development at the University of Alicante, Spain. One of the strongest aspects of this corpus is the metrical annotation of each verse. The researchers have already analysed the corpus using topic modelling, a suitable technique for the structure of the collection and the size of the texts. The weakest aspect of this collection is the metadata of the files: the majority of them are redundant and some important aspects (e.g. identifiers of texts, author, collection, source) are missing. The corpus is available as a GitHub repository, a good practice that facilitates cloning all the data, the track of changes and the preservation of the corpus.

Durante la Asamblea Extraordinaria de la Sociedad Española de Educación Comparada, celebrada el 8 de septiembre de 2006 en la ciudad de San Sebastián se aprobó la candidatura encabezada por el profesor Vicente Llorent Bedmar. Con una vocación de claro carácter continuista y con una renovación parcial de los miembros que componían la anterior Junta Directiva, se dio inicio a un periodo presidencial que duraría cuatro años. Durante esta etapa se siguieron manteniendo importantes pilares de la Sociedad, tales como la Revista de la Sociedad Española de Educación Comparada, el Boletín de la misma, la celebración de los congresos nacionales bienales, las jornadas para profesores de Educación Comparada, el premio Pedro Rosselló y la página Web de la Sociedad. Además, se produjo la creación del Grupo de investigadores en formación y se instituyó un premio destinado a la mejor comunicación presentada por los jóvenes investigadores en cada congreso nacional, y tanto la REEC como el Boletín, cambiaron su tradicional publicación en papel a su edición electrónica.During the Special Assembly of the Spanish Comparative Education Society, on the 8th of September in 2006 in San Sebastian, the candidacy headed by Professor Vicente Llorent Bedmar was approved. With a clear intention of continuate the labour of the last Executive Committee and a partial replacement of the previous Comittee members, it was initiated a presidential period during four years. During this period, some important aspects of the Society continued, such Spanish Journal of Comparative Education, the Bulletin, the biennial national congresses, Comparative Education teachers´s seminars, Pedro Rosselló award and the website. In addition it was established an award for the best paper presented by young researchers in each national congress, and both of them, REEC and Bulletin changed to the electronic edition.

This is the firstquantitative research on reading compliance in FL courses. It investigated theeffect of clickers on learning gains for regularly assigned readings, determinedby 16 quiz grades during a semester. 38 intermediate L2 Spanish studentsassigned to two group conditions also completed a questionnaire at the end ofthe semester about their preparedness for the quizzes and their opinions aboutthe use of clickers. Results indicated that participants in the Clickercondition obtained significantly lower grades in the quizzes than those in thePaper and Pencil one, despite clickers receiving positive feedback andcomments, and even though students in the Clicker condition reported preparingfor class more often than those in the Paper and Pencil condition.

This paper examines non-normative uses of Spanish in chat language. Using a corpus of real online conversations, we analyzed their linguistic features from a normative perspective and classified them into phonetic, lexical, and morphosyntactic deviations from the standard. Our results suggest that chat language is closer to spoken language than to prototypical written language. This analysis can be seen as a new contribution to the very-well-studied phenomenon of cyberlanguage.

This paper has a twofold aim: to present a unified analysis of ditransitive constructions and transitivity alternations (dative/accusative alternations) in Spanish. As for the first phenomenon, and more concretely the purported existence in Spanish of something comparable to the English dative alternation, we will show the weaknesses of what we consider an analysis fruit of the tendency consisting of finding in the Romance area an exact reflex of English facts. Therefore, we will refute the hypothesis defended by several authors (Masullo 1992, Demonte 1995, Romero 1997, Cuervo 2003a,b) according to which Spanish ditransitive constructions with dative clitic doubling correspond to double object constructions (DOC), whereas non-doubled constructions correspond to the so-called prepositional constructions (PC), or to-dative, in English. After a careful and exhaustive examination of the data, we will argue that Spanish (and Catalan) ditransitive constructions instantiate DOC, whether they bear clitic doubling or not. Pronominalization facts in Catalan, a language which preserves prepositional clitics, will support this analysis, based on the postulation of an affectedness/possession restriction with gradual implementation. As for the second phenomenon of study, the existence of true case alternations in Spanish, we will argue that we are dealing with a kind of variation constrained by the same restriction (or a version of it) which acts in the realm of ditransitive predicates. Here, also, Catalan data will reveal crucial for our analysis. Crucially, we will show that what lies behind Spanish and Catalan dative/accusative alternation is an instance of Differential Indirect Object Marking (DIOM

This paper analyses the use of English in Spanish television commercials, since no scientific studies have been carried out so far in this field. Although there are a few similar studies of print media, our review of the literature has shown some gaps in the research on Anglicisms used in advertising. English seems to be widely present in television commercials in Spain for different reasons. Marketing and cost-saving strategies of multinational companies together with the prestige of the English language and Anglo-American culture in Spain are some of the primary causes. In our study, we have focused on a corpus of pure Anglicisms (English words which have not been adapted to Spanish) and pseudo-Anglicisms (terms that do not exist in English, though they are similar to English words), found in commercials related to cosmetics, hygiene and personal care products, as part of the research project “Globalisation and Impact of the Anglo-American Culture on Spain”. Five hundred and thirty one commercials of the three main private national television channels in Spain (Tele5, Antena3, LaSexta) and children’s Disney Channel (Spain) were compiled in 2013. The results confirm a considerable presence of pure Anglicisms, English-Spanish code switching, pseudo-Anglicisms and Anglo-American imagery and music in the advertising of products related to cosmetics, hygiene and personal care on Spanish television. Consequently, the link of these products to the prestige of the English-speaking world is reinforced.

O presente artigo tem como objetivo apresentar e discutir os resultados de parte de uma pesquisa empírica levada a cabo em 2008 com alunos de espanhol de um dos Centros de Estudos de Línguas mantido pelo governo estadual de São Paulo. Tínhamos como meta conhecer e mensurar, até onde fosse possível, o nível de motivação dos alunos em sala de aula, assim como as suas principais causas. Uma vez que tais Centros são, no momento, os responsáveis em São Paulo pela aplicação da lei que torna obrigatória a oferta de língua espanhola nas escolas de nível médio do país (no que se refere à escola pública estadual), consideramos pertinente divulgar tais resultados, de forma que as discussões suscitadas por eles possam contribuir para um ensino de línguas mais motivador e, portanto, mais eficiente. A pesquisa, de cunho quantitativo e qualitativo, contou com 161 alunos informantes. Os principais resultados apontaram que i) os estudantes em geral encontram-se motivados durante as aulas de espanhol; ii) a figura do professor, o esforço depreendido, o conteúdo, a autonomia de escolha do idioma estudado e o prazer que têm em aprender a LE foram as principais causas de motivação apresentadas; iii) a falta de conhecimento sobre aspectos culturais da língua alvo foi apontada como uma das principais causas de desmotivação; iv) as atividades descritas como mais motivadoras foram, pela ordem, jogos e brincadeiras, vídeos/filmes e músicas; v) as atividades consideradas menos motivadoras foram seminário, prova oral/chamada oral e redação.The objective of this paper is to present and discuss the results of an empirical survey that took place in 2008 involving students of Spanish from a Center of Foreign Languages Studies (Centros de Estudos de Línguas) sponsored by the State of São Paulo. The goal of the survey was to understand and measure, as far as possible, the degree of student´s motivation in the classroom as well as its underlying causes. Taking into account that until now these Centers are responsible to enforce the law that made mandatory the teaching of Spanish for high school students (as far as public schools in the State are concerned), we considered appropriate to publish these results so that the debate engendered by it could contribute to a motivating, and therefore more efficient, foreign language education. The survey, that included quantitative and qualitative information, was based on a sample of 161 students. The results suggested that i) the students were motivated during Spanish classes; ii) the main causes of motivation reported by students were the professor´s personality, the effort put in practice, the content , the autonomy in the choice of the language and the pleasure related to learning a foreign language; iii) one of the main causes of demotivation appointed by the survey was the absence of knowledge about cultural aspects related to the language being studied; iv) the activities described as the most motivating were, in this sequence, games and amusing activities, videos/films and songs; v) the activities considered the least motivating were seminars, oral exams/tests and composition.

This paper outlines the participatory roles of narrators and interviewers in the process of unfolding personal stories. Fifteen secondary school students of Hispanic-Australian background enrolled in intermediate Spanish classes in Melbourne (Australia) were asked to talk about a series of topics allowing them to explore and develop personal stories. For the purpose of providing a comprehensive corpus this manuscript focuses on the 11 personal stories that emerged in Spanish and English around the topic of ‘the worst holiday’. The results show that narratives are not initially volunteered by students, being prefaced by an initial denial of negative experience. Nevertheless, the interviewer’s participation dissipates the narrator’s initial attitude allowing students to construct narratives guided by the interviewer’s expectations. Interviewer strategies include requests for clarification, prompts for story development and co-authorship. Also crucial to the interaction is the use of laughter as a form of personal affiliation.

No presente artigo baseámonos na linguaxe musical como medio para escudriñar na psicoloxía humana a través da linguaxe fraseolóxica. Noutras palabras, examinamos determinados aspectos coma o carácter, as relacións e as emocións humanas tomando a música como base metafórica. Neste artigo confróntanse, dende esta perspectiva, as linguas alemá e española e desentráñanse as diferenzas e as similitudes entrámbolos dous sistemas lingüísticos. // In this paper we will focus on musical language as a means for scrutinizing human psychology through phraseology. In other words, we will examine certain aspects such as human character, relations and emotions taking music as a metaphorical basis. We will compare the German and Spanish languages from this viewpoint in order to unravel the differences and similarities between both language systems.