A RAE map for Spanish dialects

I just stumbled across a fun feature on the Real Academia’s website: an interactive map that lets you find country-specific dictionary entries:

As an example, if you mouse-hover over Cuba, you will see that the country has 1892 acepciones, or lexical entries, in the dictionary. Clicking on the country brings you to a list of these entries. Some words on the list are used only in Cuba, such as abakuá, meaning a member of a men-only secret society. Others are general Spanish words with uses specific to Cuba. For example, in Cuba abanico ‘fan’ can refer to a wooden device that signals to a train conductor the correct branch of a track fork to take.

To my disappointment there are no acepciones for the United States, even though we have our own branch of the Academia, and more Spanish speakers than Spain. In contrast, the Philippines have 88 entries even though Spanish is no longer spoken there. Not fair!

 

5 thoughts on “A RAE map for Spanish dialects

  1. Adrián

    Hola, Judy:

    Hacía ya tiempo que no comentaba en sus artículos. Comprendo su malestar: la Academia suele actuar de manera caprichosa. Yo tampoco sé por dónde coger el susodicho mapita de la RAE. No entiendo si se refiere al total de acepciones o solamente a las incluidas en la última edición. En cualquier caso, aunque no aparezca reflejado, tenga por seguro que se hayan añadido palabras provenientes de EE.UU más o menos genéricas. En España imperan los anglicismos en los terrenos tecnológico y científico, llegan hasta tal cota que incluso están afectando a la sintaxis de aquéllos menos versados en su idioma. Un mero ejemplo de ello es “bizarro”, el cual, a pie de calle o en foros, ha adquirido prácticamente el significado de su homólogo inglés; sin embargo, no significa “extravagante”; sino “valiente”.

    Un saludo cordial.

    Reply
  2. Susan R

    Thank you so much for this post. I am currently doing some research into the influences of indigenous languages on Spanish in Latin America today, and this map will help considerably. I did not know it existed on the RAE website. Once again, you have led me to a great resource!

    Reply
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