Spanish II: Linguistic Variation in the Spanish Speaking World

The course includes the study of basic concepts and terminology in modern linguistics and is intended to convey a better understanding of historical development of the Spanish language, language functions and dialectal variants. Spanish is addressed from its historical development to a standard language, which includes discussions about the importance of language contact and cultural influence. The emphasis of the course is on Spanish dialectology through the study of grammatical, phonetical and semantical differences between the major dialect regions of the Spanish-speaking world. Furthermore, the Spanish dialectal variants are discussed based on the importance they have in different socio-cultural contexts in Spain and Spanish America.