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To Kill a Mockingbird (film)
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To Kill a Mockingbird
film poster
Directed by
Robert Mulligan
Produced by
Alan J. Pakula
Screenplay by
Horton Foote
Based on
To Kill a Mockingbird
by Harper Lee
Starring
Gregory Peck
Mary Badham
Phillip Alford
John Megna
Ruth White
Paul Fix
Brock Peters
Frank Overton
Narrated by
Kim Stanley
Music by
Elmer Bernstein
Cinematography
Russell Harlan, A.S.C.
Edited by
Aaron Stell, A.C.E.
Production
companies
Brentwood Productions
Pakula-Mulligan
Distributed by
Universal Pictures
Release date
December 25, 1962 (1962-12-25)
Running time
129 minutes[1]
Country
United States
Language
English
Budget
$2 million[2]
Box office
$13.1 million[2]
To Kill a Mockingbird is a 1962 American drama film directed by Robert Mulligan. The screenplay by Horton Foote is based on Harper Lee's 1960 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel of the same name. It stars Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch and Mary Badham as Scout.
The film received overwhelmingly positive reviews from critics and was a box-office success, earning more than 10 times its budget. The film won three Academy Awards, including Best Actor for Peck, and was nominated for eight, including Best Picture.
In 1995, the film was listed in the National Film Registry. In 2003, the American Film Institute named Atticus Finch the greatest movie hero of the 20th century. In 2007 the film ranked twenty-fifth on the AFI's 10th anniversary list of the greatest American movies of all time. In 2005, the British Film Institute included it in their list of the 50 films you should see by the age of 14.
To Kill a Mockingbird marked the film debuts of Robert Duvall, William Windom, and Alice Ghostley.
Contents
[hide]
1 Plot
2 Cast
3 Music
4 Critical response
4.1 Gregory Peck
5 Awards and honors
5.1 Academy Awards
5.2 Golden Globe Awards
5.3 Cannes Film Festival
6 Restoration
7 See also
8 References
9 External links
Plot[edit]
The film's young protagonists, Jean Louise "Scout" Finch (Mary Badham) and her brother Jeremy Atticus "Jem" Finch (Phillip Alford), live in the fictional town of Maycomb, Alabama, during the early 1930s. The story covers three years, during which Scout and Jem undergo changes in their lives. They are innocent children, spending their days happily playing games with each other and spying on Arthur "Boo" Radley (Robert Duvall) who has not left his home for many years and about whom many rumors circulate. Their widowed father, Atticus (Gregory Peck), is a town lawyer and has strong beliefs that all people are to be treated fairly, to turn the other cheek, and to stand for what you believe. He also allows his children to call him by his first name. Early in the film, the children see their father accept hickory nuts, and other produce, from Mr. Cunningham (Crahan Denton) for legal work because the client has no money.[3] Through their father's work as a lawyer, Scout and Jem begin to learn of the racism and evil in their town, aggravated by poverty; they mature quickly as they are exposed to it.
The local judge (Paul Fix) appoints Atticus to defend a black man, Tom Robinson (Brock Peters), against an accusation of rape of a white girl, Mayella Ewell (Collin Wilcox). Atticus accepts the case. Jem and Scout experience schoolyard taunts for their father's decision. Later, as Atticus is sitting in front of the local jail to safeguard Robinson, a lynch mob arrives, which includes Mr. Cunningham. Scout, Jem and their friend, Dill (John Megna), interrupt the confrontation. Scout, unaware of the mob's purpose, recognizes Cunningham as the man who paid her father in hickory nuts and tells him to say hello to his son, who is her schoolmate. Cunningham becomes embarrassed and the mob disperses.
At the trial, it is undisputed that Tom came to Mayella's home at her request to help with the chopping up of a chifforobe, and that Mayella showed signs of having been beaten around that time. Among Atticus' chief arguments is that Tom has a crippled left arm, yet the supposed rapist would have had to make extensive use of his left hand in assaulting Mayella before raping her. Atticus then points out that Mayella's father, Bob Ewell (James Anderson), is left handed, implying that he – rather than Tom – was the one who beat Mayella. Atticus also states that the girl had not been examined by a doctor to check for signs of rape after the supposed assault. In his closing argument Atticus asks the all-white male jury to cast aside their prejudices and instead focus on Tom's obvious innocence. In taking the stand in his own defense, Tom denies he attacked Mayella, but states she kissed him. He testifies he voluntarily assisted Mayella because "I felt sorry for her because…". Although Tom does not finish his sentence, the prosecutor (William Windom) hammers home the point that he was a black man feeling sorry for a white woman. In a town where whites are viewed as superior to blacks, Tom's sympathy for Mayella dooms his case, and he is found guilty.
As Atticus leaves the courtroom, the black spectators in the balcony rise to their feet as a sign of respect and appreciation. Reverend Sykes says to Scout, "Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father's passing." When Atticus arrives home, Sheriff Heck Tate (Frank Overton) tells him that Tom has been killed by a deputy during his transfer to prison. According to this deputy, Tom was trying to escape, "running like a crazy man" before he was shot. Atticus and Jem go to the Robinson family home to inform them of Tom's death. Bob Ewell, Mayella's father, appears and spits in Atticus' face while Jem waits in the car. Atticus wipes his face and leaves.
Autumn arrives, and Scout and Jem attend a nighttime Halloween pageant at their school. Scout wears a large hard-shelled ham costume, portraying one of Maycomb county's products. At some point during the pageant, Scout's dress and shoes are misplaced. She is forced to walk home without shoes, wearing her ham costume. While cutting through the woods, Scout and Jem are attacked by an unidentified man who has been following them. Scout's costume, like an awkward suit of armor, protects her from the attack but restricts her movement and severely restricts her vision. Jem is knocked unconscious and Scout escapes unharmed in a brief but violent struggle. Their attacker is thwarted and overcome by another unidentified man. Scout escapes her costume in time to see the second man carrying Jem to their home. Scout follows the stranger inside and runs into the arms of a concerned Atticus. Doc Reynolds comes over and treats the broken arm of an unconscious Jem.
When Sheriff Tate asks Scout what happened, she sees a man standing quietly in the corner behind the door of Jem's room. Atticus formally introduces Scout to Arthur Radley, whom she has known as Boo, the man who came to the aid of Jem and Scout in the woods. It is revealed that Boo had overpowered Bob Ewell before carrying Jem home. The sheriff reports that Ewell was discovered dead at the scene of the attack with a knife in his ribs. Atticus assumes that Jem killed Ewell in self-defense. Sheriff Tate, however, believes that Boo killed Ewell in defense of the children, and he tells Atticus that to drag the shy and reserved Boo into the spotlight for his heroism would be "a sin". To protect Boo, Sheriff Tate suggests that Ewell "fell on his knife". Scout draws a startlingly precocious analogy, to likening unwelcome public attention to Boo to the killing of a mockingbird.
Cast[edit]
See also: List of To Kill a Mockingbird characters
In the order of the film's opening credits:
Gregory Peck as Atticus Finch
John Megna as Charles Baker "Dill" Harris
Frank Overton as Sheriff Heck Tate
Rosemary Murphy as Miss Maudie Atkinson
Ruth White as Mrs Dubose
Brock Peters as Tom Robinson
Estelle Evans as Calpurnia
Paul Fix as Judge John Taylor
Collin Wilcox as Mayella Violet Ewell
James Anderson as Robert E. Lee "Bob" Ewell
Alice Ghostley as Miss Stephanie Crawford
Robert Duvall as Arthur "Boo" Radley
William Windom as Horace Gilmer, District Attorney
Crahan Denton as Walter Cunningham
Richard Hale as Nathan Radley
Mary Badham as Scout
Phillip Alford as Jem
Uncredited roles (in order of appearance)
Kim Stanley.........Unseen narrator—the voice of adult Scout—"Maycomb was a tired old town – even in 1932 when I first knew it – that summer I was six years old."
Paulene Myers.........Mrs. Dubose's servant, sitting close to her on the Dubose porch (she has no speaking lines).
Jamie Forster.........Mr. Townsend, sitting on a bench, with three men, near the courthouse: "If you're lookin' for your daddy, he's inside the courthouse."
Steve Condit.........Mr. Cunningham's son Walter, at dinner with the Finch family: "Yes, sir. I don't know when I had roast. We been havin' squirrels and rabbits lately."
David Crawford.........David, Tom Robinson's son, sitting on the steps to the Robinsons' shack: "Good evening."
Kim Hamilton.........Helen, Tom Robinson's wife, inside the Robinsons' shack: "Good evening, Mr. Finch."
Dan White.........Mob leader approaching as Atticus Finch sits in front of the jailhouse: "He in there, Mr. Finch?"
Kelly Thordsen.........Heavyset member of the mob who grabs and picks up Jem: "Well, I'll send you home."
William "Bill" Walker.........Reverend Sykes, at the courthouse for Tom Robinson's trial: "Miss Jean Louise? Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father's passin'."
Charles Fredericks.........Court clerk at Tom Robinson's trial: "Place your hand on the bible, please. Do you solemnly swear to tell the truth...?"
Guy Wilkerson.........Jury foreman at Tom Robinson's trial: We find the defendant guilty as charged."
Jay Sullivan.........Court reporter at Tom Robinson's trial: "Yes."
Jester Hairston.........Tom Robinson's father in front of the Robinsons' shack: "Hello Mr. Finch. I'm Spence, Tom's father."
Hugh Sanders.........Doctor who examines Jem: "He's got a bad break, so far as I can tell. Somebody tried to wring his arm off."
Music[edit]
To Kill a Mockingbird
Soundtrack album by Elmer Bernstein
Released
Early April 1963[4]
Recorded
August 1–2, 1996, City Halls, Glasgow
Label
Varèse Sarabande
Elmer Bernstein's score for To Kill a Mockingbird is regarded as one of the greatest film scores[5] and has been recorded three times. It was first released in April 1963 on Ava; then Bernstein re-recorded it in the 1970s for his Film Music Collection series; and finally, he recorded the complete score (below) in 1996 with the Royal Scottish National Orchestra for the Varese Sarabande Film Classics series.
"Main Title" – 3:21
"Remember Mama" – 1:08
"Atticus Accepts The Case – Roll in the Tire" – 2:06
"Creepy Caper – Peek-A-Boo" – 4:10
"Ewell's Hatred" – 3:33
"Jem's Discovery" – 3:47
"Tree Treasure" – 4:23
"Lynch Mob" – 3:04
"Guilty Verdict" – 3:10
"Ewell Regret It" – 2:11
"Footsteps in the Dark" – 2:07
"Assault in the Shadows" – 2:28
"Boo Who" – 3:00
"End Title" – 3:25
Critical response[edit]
The film received widespread critical acclaim. As of March 2017, it maintains a 91% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, based on 56 reviews.[6] According to Bosley Crowther:[7]
"Horton Foote's script and the direction of Mr. Mulligan may not penetrate that deeply, but they do allow Mr. Peck and little Miss Badham and Master Alford to portray delightful characters. Their charming enactments of a father and his children in that close relationship, which can occur at only one brief period, are worth all the footage of the film. Rosemary Murphy as a neighbor, Brock Peters as the Negro on trial, and Frank Overton as a troubled sheriff are good as locality characters, too. James Anderson and Collin Wilcox as Southern bigots are almost caricatures. But those are minor shortcomings in a rewarding film."
Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times criticized the film for focusing less on the blacks, denouncing the cliché of the honest, white man standing for a helpless black:[8]
"It expresses the liberal pieties of a more innocent time, the early 1960s, and it goes very easy on the realities of small-town Alabama in the 1930s. One of the most dramatic scenes shows a lynch mob facing Atticus, who is all by himself on the jailhouse steps the night before Tom Robinson's trial. The mob is armed and prepared to break in and hang Robinson, but Scout bursts onto the scene, recognizes a poor farmer who has been befriended by her father, and shames him (and all the other men) into leaving. Her speech is a calculated strategic exercise, masked as the innocent words of a child; one shot of her eyes shows she realizes exactly what she's doing. Could a child turn away a lynch mob at that time, in that place? Isn't it nice to think so."
Gregory Peck's performance became synonymous with the role and character of Atticus Finch. Producer Alan J. Pakula remembered hearing from Peck when he was first approached with the role: "He called back immediately. No maybes. […] I must say the man and the character he played were not unalike".[9] Peck later said in an interview that he was drawn to the role because the book reminded him of growing up in La Jolla, California.[10] "Hardly a day passes that I don't think how lucky I was to be cast in that film", Peck said in a 1997 interview. "I recently sat at a dinner next to a woman who saw it when she was 14 years old, and she said it changed her life. I hear things like that all the time".[11]
Gregory Peck[edit]
The 1962 softcover edition of the novel opens with the following: The Southern town of Maycomb, Alabama, reminds me of the California town I grew up in. The characters of the novel are like people I knew as a boy. I think perhaps the great appeal of the novel is that it reminds readers everywhere of a person or a town they have known. It is to me a universal story – moving, passionate and told with great humor and tenderness. Gregory Peck.
Harper Lee, in liner notes written for the film's DVD re-release by Universal, wrote: "When I learned that Gregory Peck would play Atticus Finch in the film production of To Kill a Mockingbird, I was of course delighted: here was a fine actor who had made great films – what more could a writer ask for? ...The years told me his secret. When he played Atticus Finch, he had played himself, and time has told all of us something more: when he played himself, he touched the world".[12] Upon Peck's death in 2003, Brock Peters, who played Tom Robinson in the film version, quoted Harper Lee at Peck's eulogy, saying, "Atticus Finch gave him an opportunity to play himself". Peters concluded his eulogy stating, "To my friend Gregory Peck, to my friend Atticus Finch, vaya con Dios".[13] Peters remembered the role of Tom Robinson when he recalled, "It certainly is one of my proudest achievements in life, one of the happiest participations in film or theater I have experienced".[14] Peters remained friends not only with Peck but with Mary Badham throughout his life.
Peck himself admitted that many people have reminded him of this film more than any other film he has ever done.[15]
Awards and honors[edit]
In 1995 To Kill a Mockingbird was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant".[16] It is also Robert Duvall's big-screen debut, as the misunderstood recluse Boo Radley. Duvall was cast on the recommendation of screenwriter Horton Foote, who met him at Neighborhood Playhouse in New York City where Duvall starred in a 1957 production of Foote's play, The Midnight Caller.[17]
The American Film Institute named Atticus Finch the greatest movie hero of the 20th century.[18] Additionally, the AFI ranked the movie second on their 100 Years... 100 Cheers list, behind It's a Wonderful Life.[19] The film was ranked number 34 on AFI's list of the 100 greatest movies of all time, but moved up to number 25 on the 10th Anniversary list.[20] In June 2008, the AFI revealed its "Ten top Ten"—the best ten films in ten "classic" American film genres—after polling over 1,500 people from the creative community. To Kill a Mockingbird was acknowledged as the best film in the courtroom drama genre.[21]
In 2007 Hamilton was honored by the Harlem community for her part in the movie. She was the last surviving African-American adult who had a speaking part in the movie. When told of the award, she said, "I think it is terrific. I'm very pleased and very surprised".[22]
American Film Institute Lists
AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies – #34
AFI's 100 Years...100 Heroes & Villains:
Atticus Finch – #1 Hero
AFI's 100 Years...100 Movie Quotes:
"Miss Jean Louise, stand up. Your father's passing." – Nominated[23]
"You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view, until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it." – Nominated[23]
AFI's 100 Years of Film Scores – #17
AFI's 100 Years...100 Cheers – #2
AFI's 100 Years...100 Movies: 10th Anniversary Edition– #25
AFI's 10 Top 10 – #1 Courtroom Drama
Academy Awards[edit]
The film won three Academy Awards out of the eight for which it was nominated.[24]
Academy Award for Best Actor — Gregory Peck (The award was presented to Peck by Sophia Loren)
Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay – Horton Foote
Academy Award for Best Art Direction – Set Decoration, Black-and-White — (Henry Bumstead, Alexander Golitzen, and Oliver Emert)
Other nominations were for
Best Picture (Producer, Alan J. Pakula)
Best Director (Robert Mulligan)
Best Cinematography, Black-and-White (Russell Harlan),
Best Actress in a Supporting Role (Mary Badham)
Best Music, Score — Substantially Original (Elmer Bernstein)
Its main competition was Lawrence of Arabia, which won the Oscar for Best Picture, Best Director and Best Original Score. Peter O'Toole had been nominated for Best Actor for his performance as T. E. Lawrence, but Peck won for Mockingbird. The Longest Day claimed the award for Best Cinematography, while Patty Duke was awarded Best Supporting Actress for her work in The Miracle Worker.
Golden Globe Awards[edit]
Golden Globe Award for Best Actor – Motion Picture Drama — Gregory Peck
Golden Globe Award for Best Original Score — Motion Picture — Elmer Bernstein
Golden Globe Award for Best Film Promoting International Understanding — To Kill a Mockingbird
Cannes Film Festival[edit]
The film was selected for the 1963 Cannes Film Festival in feature film category, winning the Gary Cooper Award.[25][26]
Restoration[edit]
The film was restored and released on Blu-ray and DVD in 2012 as part of the 100th anniversary of Universal Pictures.[27]
See also[edit]
List of American films of 1962
La Joven (The Young One), the 1960 film
Trial film
White savior narrative in film
References[edit]
Jump up ^ "TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD (A)". British Board of Film Classification. December 20, 1962. Retrieved December 25, 2015.
^ Jump up to: a b "To Kill A Mockingbird – Box Office Data, DVD and Blu-ray Sales, Movie News, Cast and Crew Information". The Numbers. Retrieved December 13, 2014.
Jump up ^ Harper Lee. "To Kill a Mockingbird: Chapters 2–3". SparkNotes. Retrieved 2014-03-17.
Jump up ^ Billboard Apr 13, 1963
Jump up ^ Erikson, Matthew. "Elmer Bernstein: 'One of the Greatest Film Composers Ever'". Hartford Courant. Retrieved September 24, 2016.
Jump up ^ "To Kill A Mockingbird". www.rottentomatoes.com. 1962-12-25. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
Jump up ^ Crowther, Bosley (February 15, 1963). "One Adult Omission in a Fine Film: 2 Superb Discoveries Add to Delight". The New York Times. Retrieved 2013-06-13.
Jump up ^ Ebert, Roger. "To Kill a Mockingbird". Retrieved 13 July 2014.
Jump up ^ Nichols, Peter. "Time Can't Kill 'Mockingbird'; [Review]." New York Times: February 27, 1998. pg. E.1
Jump up ^ King, Susan. "How the Finch Stole Christmas; Q & A WITH GREGORY PECK." Los Angeles Times: December 22, 1997. pg. 1
Jump up ^ Bobbin, Jay. "Gregory Peck is Atticus Finch in Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird." Birmingham News (Alabama): December 21, 1997 Pg. 1F.
Jump up ^ Universal Pictures Legacy Series DVD 2005
Jump up ^ Hoffman, Allison, Rubin, H. "Peck Memorial Honors Beloved Actor and Man; The longtime star is remembered for his integrity and constancy". Los Angeles Times: June 17, 2003. pg. B.1.
Jump up ^ Oliver, Myrna. "Obituaries; Brock Peters, 78; Stage, Screen, TV Actor Noted for Role in 'To Kill a Mockingbird'; " Los Angeles Times. Los Angeles, Calif.: August 24, 2005. pg. B.8.
Jump up ^ Gregory Peck Interview with Jimmy Carter at YouTube
Jump up ^ To Kill a Mockingbird – Awards – IMDb
Jump up ^ Robert Duvall (actor), Gary Hertz (director) (2002-04-16). Miracles & Mercies (Documentary). West Hollywood, California: Blue Underground. Retrieved 2008-01-28.
Jump up ^ http://connect.afi.com/site/DocServer/handv100.pdf?docID=246
Jump up ^ http://connect.afi.com/site/DocServer/cheers100.pdf?docID=202
Jump up ^ http://connect.afi.com/site/DocServer/100Movies.pdf?docID=301
Jump up ^ "AFI's 10 Top 10". American Film Institute. 2008-06-17. Retrieved 2008-06-18.
Jump up ^ "Harlem community honors 'Mockingbird' actress" from the USA Today.
^ Jump up to: a b "AFI's 100 Years...100 Movie Quotes Nominees" (PDF). Retrieved 2013-06-13.
Jump up ^ "NY Times: To Kill a Mockingbird". NY Times. Retrieved 2008-12-24.
Jump up ^ "Festival de Cannes: To Kill a Mockingbird". festival-cannes.com. Retrieved 2009-02-27.
Jump up ^ "1963 Cannes Film Festival". Internet Movie Database. Retrieved 2 October 2012.
Jump up ^ Appelo, Tim (2012-01-10). "Universal Celebrates 100th Birthday With New Logo and 13 Film Restorations". The Hollywood Reporter. Retrieved 2012-12-10.
External links[edit]
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To Kill a Mockingbird study notes
Atticus Finch's closing argument in text and audio from AmericanRhetoric.com
To Kill A Mockingbird location and production notes
[show]
v
t
e
Films directed by Robert Mulligan
Fear Strikes Out (1957)
The Rat Race (1960)
The Great Impostor (1961)
Come September (1961)
The Spiral Road (1962)
To Kill a Mockingbird (1962)
Love with the Proper Stranger (1963)
Baby the Rain Must Fall (1965)
Inside Daisy Clover (1965)
Up the Down Staircase (1967)
The Stalking Moon (1968)
The Pursuit of Happiness (1971)
Summer of '42 (1971)
The Other (1972)
The Nickel Ride (1974)
Bloodbrothers (1978)
Same Time, Next Year (1978)
Kiss Me Goodbye (1982)
Clara's Heart (1988)
The Man in the Moon (1991)
[show]
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Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird (1960)
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Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=To_Kill_a_Mockingbird_(film)&oldid=826619069"
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Spanish orthography
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This article's lead section does not adequately summarize key points of its contents. Please consider expanding the lead to provide an accessible overview of all important aspects of the article. Please discuss this issue on the article's talk page. (September 2014)
Spanish language
Overview
Pronunciation
History
Orthography
Names
Grammar
Determiners
Nouns
Pronouns
Adjectives
Prepositions
Verbs
conjugation
irregular verbs
Varieties
Peninsular
American
Standard
Spanglish
Dialectology
seseo
yeísmo
voseo
leísmo
loísmo
v
t
e
This article contains IPA phonetic symbols. Without proper rendering support, you may see question marks, boxes, or other symbols instead of Unicode characters. For an introductory guide on IPA symbols, see Help:IPA.
Spanish orthography is the orthography used in the Spanish language. The alphabet uses the Latin script. The spelling is fairly phonemic, especially in comparison to more opaque orthographies like English and Irish, having a relatively consistent mapping of graphemes to phonemes; in other words, the pronunciation of a given Spanish-language word can largely be predicted from its spelling and to a slightly lesser extent vice versa. The punctuation is similar to that used in other Romance languages and in English.[dubious – discuss]
Contents
[hide]
1 Alphabet in Spanish
1.1 Alternative names
2 Orthography
2.1 Consonants
2.2 Vowels
2.3 The letter Y
2.4 Special and modified letters
2.5 Keyboard requirements
2.6 Stress and accentuation
2.6.1 Accentuation of capital letters
2.7 Differential accents
2.8 Foreign words
2.9 Capitalization
2.10 Older conventions
2.11 Reform proposals
3 Arabic alphabet
4 See also
5 References
6 Bibliography
7 External links
Alphabet in Spanish[edit]
The Spanish language is written using the Spanish alphabet, which is the Latin script with one additional letter: eñe "ñ", for a total of 27 letters.[1] Although the letters "k" and "w" are part of the alphabet, they appear only in loanwords such as karate, kilo, waterpolo and wolframio (tungsten). Each letter has a single official name according to the Real Academia Española's new 2010 Common Orthography,[2] but in some regions alternative traditional names coexist as explained below. The digraphs "ch" and "ll" were considered letters of the alphabet from 1754 to 2010 (and sorted separately from "c" and "l" from 1803 to 1994).[citation needed] The digraph "rr" is occasionally considered a letter, but officially it was never so.[citation needed]
Spanish alphabet
Letter
A
B
C1
D
E
F
G
H
I
Name
a be, be larga, be alta ce de e efe ge hache i
Phoneme(s)
/a/ /b/ /k/, /θ/2 /d/ /e/ /f/ /ɡ/ /x/ silent3 /i/
^1 The sequence ⟨ch⟩ represents the affricate /tʃ/. The digraph was formerly treated as a single letter, called che.
^2 The phonemes /θ/ and /s/ have merged in many dialects; see seseo.
^3 With the exception of some loanwords: hámster, hachís, hawaiano, which have /x/.
Letter
J
K
L
M
N
Ñ
O
P
Q
Name
jota ka ele eme ene eñe o pe cu
Phoneme(s)
/x/ /k/ /l/4 /m/ /n/ /ɲ/ /o/ /p/ /k/5
^4 When ⟨l⟩ is written double (e.g. calle), it represents the palatal lateral /ʎ/ in a few dialects; but in most dialects—because of the historical merger called yeísmo—it, like the letter ⟨y⟩, represents the phoneme /ʝ/.
^5 Used only in the digraph ⟨qu⟩.
Letter
R6
S
T
U
V
W
X
Y
Z
Name
erre ese te u uve, ve, ve corta, ve baja uve doble, ve doble, doble ve, doble u[3] equis ye, i griega zeta
Phoneme(s)
/ɾ/, /r/ /s/ /t/ /u/ /b/ /w/, /b/ /ks/, /x/, /s/ /ʝ/, /i/ /θ/2
^6 The digraph ⟨rr⟩, which only appears between vowels, represents the trill [r].
For details on Spanish pronunciation, see Spanish phonology and Help:IPA/Spanish.
When acute accent and diaeresis marks are used on vowels (⟨á⟩, ⟨é⟩, ⟨í⟩, ⟨ó⟩, ⟨ú⟩ and ⟨ü⟩) they are considered variants of the plain vowel letters, but ⟨ñ⟩ is considered a separate letter from ⟨n⟩. This makes a difference when sorting alphabetically: ⟨ñ⟩ appears in dictionaries after ⟨n⟩. For example, in a Spanish dictionary piñata comes after pinza.
There are five digraphs: ⟨ch⟩ ("che" or "ce hache"), ⟨ll⟩ ("elle" or "doble ele"), ⟨rr⟩ ("doble erre"), ⟨gu⟩ ("ge u") and ⟨qu⟩ ("cu u").[4] While che and elle were formerly treated each as a single letter,[1] in 1994 the tenth congress of the Association of Spanish Language Academies, by request of UNESCO and other international organizations, agreed to alphabetize ⟨ch⟩ and ⟨ll⟩ as ordinary sequences of letters. Thus, for example, in dictionaries, chico is alphabetized after centro and before ciudad, instead of being alphabetized after all words beginning with cu- as was formerly done.[5] Despite their former status as unitary letters of the alphabet, ⟨ch⟩ and ⟨ll⟩ have always been treated as sequences with regard to the rules of capitalization. Thus the word chillón in a text written in all caps is CHILLÓN, not *ChILlÓN, and if it is the first word of a sentence, it is written Chillón, not *CHillón. Sometimes, one finds lifts with buttons marked LLamar, but this double capitalization has always been incorrect according to RAE rules.
In Spanish text, the letters are ranked from most to least common: ⟨E A O S R N I D L C T U M P B G V Y Q H F Z J Ñ X W K⟩,[6] and the vowels take around 45% of the text.
Alternative names[edit]
B and V[1]
The letters ⟨b⟩ and ⟨v⟩ were originally simply known as be and ve, which in modern Spanish are pronounced identically. In Old Spanish, they likely represented different sounds but the sounds merged later. Their usual names are be and uve;[7][8] in some regions, speakers may instead add something to the names to distinguish them. Some Mexicans and most Peruvians generally say be grande / chica ('big B' / 'little V'); Argentines, Uruguayans and Chileans, be larga / corta ('long B' / 'short V'). Some people give examples of words spelt with the letter; e.g., b de burro / v de vaca ('b as in burro' / 'v as in vaca'); Colombians tend to say be grande for B and ve pequeña for V. In Venezuela, they called B as b de Bolívar, and V as v de Venezuela; but also, as be alta y ve baja ('tall B' / 'short V'). Regardless of these regional differences, all Spanish-speaking people recognize be as the official name of B.
R[1]
The digraph ⟨rr⟩ is sometimes called doble erre or erre doble. It is sometimes suggested that the name of the letter ⟨r⟩ be ere when it is single, and erre when it is double, but the dictionary of the Real Academia Española defines the name of ⟨r⟩ as erre. Ere is considered obsolete.[9] The name ere was used when referring specifically to the alveolar tap /ɾ/ and erre referring to the alveolar trill /r/. The two contrast between vowels, with the latter being represented with ⟨rr⟩, but the sounds are otherwise in complementary distribution so that a single ⟨r⟩ may represent either. As a referent to the trill sound rather than the phoneme, erre can refer to a single or double ⟨r⟩.
W[1]
In Latin American Spanish, ⟨w⟩ is sometimes called doble ve, ve doble, or doble uve. In Colombia and Mexico, because of English acculturation, the letter is usually called doble u (like English "double u"). In Spain it is usually called uve doble.
I
Because of its origin, ⟨i⟩ is occasionally known as i latina ("Latin i") to distinguish it from ⟨y⟩, which is known as i griega ("Greek i").
Y[1]
The most common name for ⟨y⟩ in Spain is i griega, but in Latin American Spanish it has been commonly superseded by ye, in an effort to standardize on a one-word name, as opposed to a name consisting of two words. Using ye as the only name for the letter is one of the newest proposed changes specified by the 2010 new common orthography.[citation needed] Its aim is to standardize on a one-word name for this letter.[1]
Z[1]
The name for ⟨z⟩ is zeta (formerly ceta, pronounced the same).[10] In older Spanish, it was called zeda or ceda, and the diminutive form of this word, cedilla, is now used in both Spanish and English to refer to the diacritic mark exhibited in the letter ⟨ç⟩.
Orthography[edit]
Spanish orthography is such that the pronunciation of most words is unambiguous given their written form; the main exception is the letter ⟨x⟩, which usually represents /ks/ or /s/, but can also represent /x/ or /ʃ/, especially in proper nouns from times of Old Spanish, as in México or Pedro Ximénez (both /x/). These orthographic rules are similar to, but not the same as, those of other Romance languages of the Iberian Peninsula, such as Portuguese, Catalan and Galician.
The converse does not always hold, i.e. for a given pronunciation there may be multiple possible spellings. The main issues are:
the use of both ⟨b⟩ and ⟨v⟩ for /b/;
the use of both ⟨j⟩ and ⟨g⟩ for /x/ before ⟨e⟩ and ⟨i⟩;
the silent ⟨h⟩;
for the speakers who have merged /ʝ/ and /ʎ/, the various use of ⟨y⟩, ⟨ll⟩ or ⟨hi⟩ in different words;
the use of ⟨hu⟩, ⟨gu⟩ or ⟨bu⟩ before a vowel for /w/ (although many speakers distinguish some or all of these combinations);
for speakers not in central and northern Spain, the use of ⟨c/z⟩ and ⟨s⟩ for /s/;
the occasional use of accents to distinguish two words that sound the same, such as tú and tu, sí and si, más and mas.
Use of different letters for the same sound
sound
before ⟨e/i⟩
elsewhere
/θ/ or /s/ ⟨c⟩ (or ⟨z⟩ in some loanwords) or ⟨s⟩ ⟨z⟩ or ⟨s⟩
/k/ ⟨qu⟩ (or ⟨k⟩ in some loanwords) ⟨c⟩ (or ⟨k⟩ in some loanwords)
/kw/ ⟨cu⟩
/x/ ⟨g⟩ or ⟨j⟩ (or ⟨x⟩ in Mexico) ⟨j⟩ (or ⟨x⟩ in Mexico)
/ɡ/ ⟨gu⟩ ⟨g⟩
/ɡw/ ⟨gü⟩ ⟨gu⟩
Consonants[edit]
Consonants
Letter
Context
IPA
Examples
English approximation
b or v word-initial after a pause, or after ⟨m⟩ or ⟨n⟩ [b] bestia; embuste; vaca; envidia practically the same as the typical English ⟨b⟩, except that it is fully voiced; e.g. about
elsewhere (i.e. after a vowel, even across a word boundary, or after any consonant other than ⟨m⟩ or ⟨n⟩) [β] bebé; obtuso; vivir; curva; mi bebé; mi vaca[11] between baby and bevy (like the typical English ⟨v⟩, but with the upper lip in place of the upper teeth)
c before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩ [θ] (central and northern Spain) or
[s] (most other regions)[12] cereal; encima same as the English voiceless ⟨th⟩ (as in thing) in central and northern Spain,
or the typical English ⟨s⟩ (as in sass) in all other regions
elsewhere [k] casa; claro; vaca; escudo same as certain instances of English ⟨k⟩ or ⟨c⟩; e.g. skull, scan, or picking (unaspirated, i.e. without the puff of air that accompanies English /k/ at the beginning of a word, e.g. in can)
before voiced consonants [ɣ] anécdota a sound between a light English ⟨g⟩ and the typical English ⟨h⟩ (between gold and ahold)
ch everywhere[13] [tʃ] or [ʃ] (depending upon the dialect) ocho; chícharo same as the typical English ⟨ch⟩; church
d word-initial after a pause, or after ⟨l⟩ or ⟨n⟩ [d] dedo; cuando; aldaba practically the same as the typical English ⟨d⟩, except that it is fully voiced and the tip of the tongue touches the upper teeth; e.g. adore
elsewhere [ð] dádiva; arder; admirar; mi dedo; verdad[11] same as the typical English voiced ⟨th⟩; e.g. this
f everywhere [f] fase; café same as the typical English ⟨f⟩; e.g. face
g before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩ [x] or [h] general similar to a "strong" English ⟨h⟩-sound (e.g. the ⟨ch⟩ in Scottish loch or in German Bach) or aspirated ⟨h⟩ (as in heaven)
not before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩, and either word-initial after a pause, or after ⟨n⟩ [ɡ] gato; grande; vengo practically the same as the typical English ⟨g⟩ sound, except that it is fully voiced; e.g. ago
not before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩, and not in the above contexts [ɣ] trigo; amargo; signo; mi gato[11] a sound between a light English ⟨g⟩ and the typical English ⟨h⟩ (between gold and ahold)
gu before ⟨a⟩ or ⟨o⟩, and either word-initial after a pause, or after ⟨n⟩; but only in some dialects [ɡw] guante; lengua a sound like the ⟨gu⟩ in English penguin
before ⟨a⟩ or ⟨o⟩, and not in the above contexts [ɣw] agua; averiguar[11] similar to the typical English ⟨w⟩, but preceded by a soft guttural sound
before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩, and either word-initial after a pause, or after ⟨n⟩ [ɡ] guerra practically the same as the typical English ⟨g⟩ sound, except that it is fully voiced; e.g. ago
before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩, and not in the above contexts [ɣ] sigue[11] a sound between a light English ⟨g⟩ and the typical English ⟨h⟩ (between gold and ahold)
gü before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩, and either word-initial after a pause, or after ⟨n⟩; but only in some dialects [ɡw] güero, pingüino a sound like the ⟨gu⟩ in English penguin
before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩, and not in the above contexts [ɣw] averigüe[11] similar to the typical English ⟨w⟩, but preceded by a soft guttural sound
h everywhere (silent)[14] hoy; hacer; prohibir; huevo; hielo silent (like the English ⟨h⟩ in English honor or hour)
everywhere; occurs in loanwords and foreign proper names [x] or [h] hámster, hawaiano, hachís, yihad, harakiri, Yokohama similar to a "strong" English ⟨h⟩-sound (e.g. the ⟨ch⟩ in Scottish loch or in German Bach) or aspirated ⟨h⟩ (as in heaven)
hi before a vowel [j] or [ʝ] hierba; hielo similar to or the same as the typical English ⟨y⟩; e.g. you (but often more strongly pronounced, sometimes resembling the English ⟨j⟩, as in jam)
hu before a vowel [w] hueso; huevo[15] same as the typical English ⟨w⟩; we (sometimes sounds closer to the English ⟨gw⟩, like in Gwen, or ⟨bw⟩, like in cobweb)
j everywhere [x] or [h] jamón; eje; reloj;[16] similar to a "strong" English ⟨h⟩-sound (e.g. the ⟨ch⟩ in Scottish loch or in German Bach) or aspirated ⟨h⟩ (as in heaven)
k rare; only occurs in a few loanwords [k] kilo, karate same as certain instances of English ⟨k⟩ or ⟨c⟩; e.g. skull, scan, or picking (unaspirated, i.e. without the puff of air that accompanies English /k/ at the beginning of a word, e.g. in can)
l everywhere [l] lino; alhaja; principal same as the typical English ⟨l⟩ (especially like the clear ⟨l⟩ of British English, rather than the dark ⟨l⟩ of American English);e.g. lull
ll everywhere [ʎ], [ʝ] or [dʒ](depending upon the dialect) llave; pollo similar to the ⟨lli⟩ in English million (in some dialects simplified to a sound between the typical English ⟨y⟩ and ⟨j⟩, e.g. between yes and Jess)
m everywhere except word-finally [m] madre; comer; campo[17] same as the typical English ⟨m⟩; madam
word-final [n] or [ŋ] (depending upon the dialect) álbum varying between the typical English ⟨n⟩ and ⟨ng⟩, e.g. the ⟨ng⟩ in English sing
n sin
everywhere but before other consonants [n] nido; anillo; anhelo same as the typical English ⟨n⟩; e.g. nun
before other consonants[17] [m]
[ɱ]
[n]
[ɲ]
[ŋ]
invierno
confite
mundo
enyesar
cinco same as the typical English ⟨m⟩; madam
same as the English ⟨m⟩ in symphony
same as the typical English ⟨n⟩ (as in nun)
same as the English ⟨ny⟩ in canyon
same as the typical English ⟨ng⟩ (as in sink or sing)
ñ everywhere [ɲ] ñandú; cabaña[17] roughly like canyon
p everywhere [p] pozo; topo; esposa same as certain instances of English ⟨p⟩; e.g. span or typing (unaspirated, i.e. without the puff of air that accompanies English /p/ at the beginning of a word, e.g. in pan)
qu only occurs before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩ [k] quise same as certain instances of English ⟨k⟩ or ⟨c⟩; e.g. skull, scan, or picking (unaspirated, i.e. without the puff of air that accompanies English /k/ at the beginning of a word, e.g. in can)
r word-initial, morpheme-initial,[18]
or after ⟨l⟩, ⟨n⟩, or ⟨s⟩, or syllable-final (especially before ⟨l⟩, ⟨m⟩, ⟨n⟩, or ⟨s⟩) and word-final positions (before pause or consonant-initial words only) [r] rumbo; honra; Israel; subrayar; invierno; persona; verde; carta; amor puro trilled or rolled ⟨r⟩
elsewhere (sometimes word-initial (after a pause or consonant-ending words only), morpheme-initial, or after ⟨l⟩, ⟨m⟩, ⟨n⟩, or ⟨s⟩, or syllable-final positions, and word-final positions before vowel-initial words only) [ɾ] caro; cabra; bravo; rumbo; honra; Israel; invierno; persona; verde; carta; amor puro; amor eterno flapped ⟨r⟩; e.g. the same sound as the ⟨dd⟩ of ladder or ⟨tt⟩ of latter in American English
rr only occurs between vowels [r] carro trilled or rolled ⟨r⟩
s before a voiced consonant (e.g. ⟨l⟩, ⟨m⟩, ⟨d⟩) [z] isla; mismo; desde; deshuesar[19] same as the typical English ⟨z⟩; e.g. the ⟨s⟩ in is or busy; in central and northern Spain, Paisa region of Colombia, and Andes, this sound is made with the tip of the tongue rather than the blade, with a sound quality intermediate between the alveolar [z] of English busy and the palato-alveolar [ʒ] of pleasure
everywhere else [s] saco; casa; deshora; espita[19] same as the typical English ⟨s⟩; sass; in central and northern Spain, Paisa region of Colombia, and Andes, this sound is made with the tip of the tongue rather than the blade, with a sound quality intermediate between the alveolar [s] of English sea and the palato-alveolar [ʃ] of she
sh Not considered to be a Spanish digraph (hence words like sherpa, show, flash are considered extranjerismos crudos), but used in proper names from other languages, some of them being accentuated in the Spanish manner (names from Native American languages or from languages using non-Latin writing systems) [ʃ] or [tʃ] (sometimes [s]) Áncash; Shanghái; shiitake, shah, Washington same as the typical English ⟨sh⟩;e.g. sheesh; when this digraph is equated with the phoneme /s/ (typically in northern and central Spain, Paisa region of Colombia, and Andes), the sound is made with the tip of the tongue rather than the blade, with a sound quality intermediate between the alveolar [s] of English sea and the palato-alveolar [ʃ] of she
t everywhere [t] tamiz; átomo same as certain instances of English ⟨t⟩; e.g. stand (unaspirated, i.e. without the puff of air that accompanies English /t/ at the beginning of a word, e.g. in tan). Also, the tip of the tongue touches the upper teeth, rather than the alveolar ridge
before voiced consonants [ð] atmósfera same as the typical English voiced ⟨th⟩; e.g. this
tl rare; mostly in loanwords from Nahuatl [tl] or [tɬ] tlapalería; cenzontle; Popocatépetl similar to the combined ⟨tl⟩ sound in English cat-like
tx rare; from loanwords [tʃ] pintxo same as "ch".
tz rare; from loanwords [ts] quetzal; Pátzcuaro same as the "ts" in English cats
w rare; in loanwords from English [w] waterpolo when (sometimes turn to /gw/ or /bw/)[15]
rare; in loanwords from German and in Visigothic names [b]1 wolframio; Wamba same as the typical English ⟨b⟩; e.g. bib
x between vowels and word-finally [ks] exacto; taxi; relax same as the typical English ⟨x⟩; e.g. taxi
word-initially [s] xenofobia same as the typical English ⟨s⟩; sass; in central and northern Spain, Paisa region of Colombia, and Andes, this sound is made with the tip of the tongue rather than the blade, with a sound quality intermediate between the alveolar [s] of English sea and the palato-alveolar [ʃ] of she
before a consonant [ks] or [s] extremo[19][20] same as the typical English ⟨x⟩ or ⟨s⟩; e.g. max or mass
in some words borrowed from Nahuatl, mostly place names, and in some Spanish proper names conserving archaic spelling [x] or [h] México; Oaxaca; xiote; Texas; La Axarquía; Ximena; Ximénez; Mexía similar to a "strong" English ⟨h⟩-sound (e.g. the ⟨ch⟩ in Scottish loch or in German Bach) or aspirated ⟨h⟩ (as in heaven)
in some words from indigenous American languages, mostly place names [ʃ] or [tʃ] (sometimes [s]) Xela; xocoyote same as the typical English ⟨sh⟩; e.g. sheesh; when this is equated with the phoneme /s/ (typically in northern and central Spain, Paisa region of Colombia, and Andes), the sound is made with the tip of the tongue rather than the blade, with a sound quality intermediate between the alveolar [s] of English sea and the palato-alveolar [ʃ] of she
y as a semivowel (almost always in a diphthong) [i] or [j] hay, soy same as the typical English ⟨y⟩ (but joined in a single syllable with another vowel sound); aye, boy
as a consonant [j], [ʝ], or [dʒ] ya; yelmo; ayuno[11] similar to the typical English ⟨y⟩, or ⟨j⟩ but softer; e.g. similar to yes or Jess
z usually does not occur before ⟨e⟩ or ⟨i⟩ [θ] (central and northern Spain) or
[s] (most other regions)[12] zorro; paz; caza same as the English voiceless ⟨th⟩ (as in thing) in central and northern Spain,
or the typical English ⟨s⟩ (as in sass) in all other regions
before voiced consonants [ð] (central and northern Spain) or [z](most other regions)[12] jazmín, juzgado, Aznar same as the typical English voiced ⟨th⟩; e.g. this in central and northern Spain,
or the typical English ⟨z⟩; e.g. the ⟨s⟩ in is or busy;
^ Orthographic <w> in names of Visigothic origin is thought to have been pronounced [β] in Old Spanish (in which /b/ and /β/ are separate phonemes); /β/ is also spelled <v> in Old Spanish. See History of Spanish#Merger of /b/ and /v/.
The only consonant letters that can be doubled in the Spanish orthography are "l", "r" (as the digraphs "ll" and "rr"), "c" (only when the two "c"s have different sounds: acción, diccionario), "n" (e.g. innato, perenne, connotar, dígannos), and "b" (in a few words with the prefix sub-: subbase, subbético). Exceptions are gamma (and its derivatives gammaglobulina, gammagrafía), digamma, kappa, atto-, as well as unadapted foreign words (including proper names) and their derivations (see below).
Vowels[edit]
Vowels
Letter
IPA
Examples
English approximation
a [a] azahar spa
e [e] vehemente bet
i [i] dimitir; mío see
y y
o [o] boscoso between coat (American more than British) and caught
u [u] cucurucho; dúo food
Semivowels[21]
IPA
Spelling
Examples
English approximation
[j] i before a vowel aliada; cielo; amplio; ciudad you
[w] u before a vowel
(but silent in qu, also gu before an e or i) cuadro; fuego; Huila;[15] arduo wine
The letter Y[edit]
The letter "y" is consistently used in the consonantal value. The use of the letter "y" for a vowel or a semivowel is very restricted. The diphthongs ai, ei, oi, ui are usually written ay, ey, oy, uy at the end of words (e. g. hay, ley, voy, muy), though exceptions may occur in loanwords (e.g. bonsái, agnusdéi). The letter y is conserved in rarely used encliticized verbal forms like doyte, haylas (it is more normal to say te doy, las hay). The letter "y" is used for the vowel /i/ in the conjunction y and in some acronyms, like pyme (from pequeña y mediana empresa). Otherwise, "y" for a vowel or semivowel occurs only in some archaically-spelled proper names and their derivations: Guaymas, guaymeño, and also fraybentino (from Fray Bentos with regular usage of "y" in a word-final diphthong). Derivatives of foreign proper names also conserve "y": taylorismo, from Taylor.
Special and modified letters[edit]
The vowels can be marked with an acute accent—á, é, í, ó, ú, ý—for two purposes: to mark stress if it does not follow the most common pattern, or to differentiate words that are otherwise spelled identically (called the tilde diacrítica in Spanish). The accented "y" is found only in some proper names: Aýna, Laýna, Ýñiguez.
A silent "u" is used between "g" and "e" or "i" to indicate a hard "g" pronunciation, so that "gue" represents /ɡe/ and "gui" represents /ɡi/. The letter "ü" ("u" with diaeresis,) is used in this context to indicate that the "u" is not silent, e.g. pingüino /pinˈgwino/. The diaeresis may occur also in Spanish poetry, occasionally, over either vowel of a diphthong, to indicate an irregular disyllabic pronunciation required by the meter (vïuda, to be pronounced as three syllables). This is analogous to the use of "ï" in naïve in English.
Also a silent "u" always follows a "q" when followed by "e" or "i", as in queso, química, but there is no case for the combination "qü", with "cu" fulfilling this role (as in cuestión). There are no native words in Spanish with the combination "qua" nor "quo"; again, "cu" is used instead (cuando). When they appear, usually from Latin idioms such as statu quo, the "u" is always pronounced, so "ü" is never needed after "q". Prior to the introduction of the 2010 Common Orthography words such as cuórum ('quorum'), cuásar ('quasar') or Catar ('Qatar') were spelled with "q"; this is no longer so.
Keyboard requirements[edit]
See also: QWERTY § Spanish
To write Spanish on a typewriter or to set type, the special characters required are á, é, í, ó, ú, ñ, Ñ, ü, Ü, ¿, and ¡. Á, É, Í, Ó, and Ú are also prescribed by the RAE, although occasionally dispensed with in practice.
As implemented on the mechanical typewriter, the keyboard contained a single dead key, with the acute accent ( ´ ) in the lower-case position, and the dieresis ( ¨ ) in the upper-case position. With these, one could write á, é, í, ó, ú, and ü. A separate key provided ñ/Ñ. (A dead key ~ was not used on the Spanish keyboard, but was on the Portuguese.) ¿ and ¡ completed the required minimum. When an additional key was added to electro-mechanical typewriters, this was used for ª and º, though these are not required. (They are somewhat archaic ordinal abbreviations: 1º for primero, 2ª for segunda, etc.)
As implemented in the MS-DOS operating system and its successor Microsoft Windows, a ç/Ç pair, not required in Spanish but needed for Catalan, Portuguese, and French, is typically added, and the use of the acute accent and dieresis with capital letters (Á, É, Í, Ó, Ú, Ü) is supported. Although not needed for Spanish, another dead key with ` (the grave accent) in lower-case position and ^ (the circumflex accent) in upper-case position was included. · (the mid-line period, required in Catalan) is also found. To make room for these characters not on the standard English keyboard, characters used primarily in programming, science, and mathematics—[, ], {, }, /, \, |, <, and >—are removed, requiring special keystroke sequences to access.
Stress and accentuation[edit]
Written Spanish unequivocally marks stress through a series of orthographic rules. The default stress is on the penultimate (next-to-last) syllable on words that end in a vowel, ⟨n⟩ or ⟨s⟩ and on the final syllable when the word ends in any consonant other than ⟨n⟩ or ⟨s⟩. Words that do not follow the default stress have an acute accent over the stressed vowel. The written accent will thus appear only in certain forms of a word and not others, for example andén, plural andenes. In many cases the accent is essential to understanding what a word means, for example hablo (I speak) as opposed to habló (he/she/Ud. spoke).
For purposes of counting syllables and assigning stress in Spanish, where an unmarked high vowel is followed by another vowel the sequence is treated as a rising diphthong, counted as a single syllable—unlike Portuguese and Catalan, which tend to treat such a sequence as two syllables.[22] A syllable is of the form XAXX, where X represents a consonant, permissible consonant cluster, or no sound at all, and A represents a vowel, diphthong, or triphthong. A diphthong is any sequence of an unstressed high vowel (⟨i⟩ or ⟨u⟩) with another vowel (as in gracias or náutico). And a triphthong is any combination of three vowels beginning and ending with unstressed high vowels (as in cambiáis or buey). Hence Spanish writes familia (no accent), while Portuguese and Catalan both put an accent mark on família (all three languages stress the first ⟨i⟩). The letter ⟨h⟩ is not considered an interruption between vowels (so that ahumar is considered to have two syllables: ahu-mar; this may vary in some regions, where ⟨h⟩ is used as a hiatus or diphthong-broking mark for unstressed vowels, so the pronunciation would be then a-hu-mar, though that trait is gradually disappearing).
An accent over the high vowel (⟨i⟩ or ⟨u⟩) of a vowel sequence prevents it from being a diphthong (i.e., it signals a hiatus): for example, tía and país have two syllables each.
A word with final stress is called oxytone (or aguda in traditional Spanish grammar texts); a word with penultimate stress is called paroxytone (llana or grave); a word with antepenultimate stress (stress on the third-to-last syllable) is called proparoxytone (esdrújula). A word with preantepenultimate stress (on the fourth last syllable) or earlier does not have a common linguistic term in English, but in Spanish receives the name sobresdrújula. (Spanish words can be stressed only on one of the last three syllables, except in the case of a verb form with enclitic pronouns, such as poniéndoselo.) All proparoxytones and sobresdrújulas have a written accent mark.
Adjectives spelled with a written accent (such as fácil, geográfico, cortés) keep the written accent when they are made into adverbs with the -mente ending (thus fácilmente, geográficamente, cortésmente), and do not gain any if they do not have one (thus libremente from libre). In the pronunciation of these adverbs—as with all adverbs in -mente—primary stress is on the ending, on the penultimate syllable. The original stress of the adjective—whether marked, as in fácilmente, or not marked, as in libremente—may be manifested as a secondary stress in the adverb.
Accentuation of capital letters[edit]
Further information: es:Acentuación de las mayúsculas
The Real Academia Española indicates that accents should still be written on capitals.[23]
Differential accents[edit]
Blackboard used in a university classroom shows students' efforts at placing "ü" and acute accent diacritic used in Spanish orthography.
In a number of cases, homonyms are distinguished with written accents on the stressed (or only) syllable: for example, te (informal object case of 'you') vs. té ('tea'); se (third person reflexive) vs. sé ('I know' or imperative 'be'); tu (informal 'your') vs. tú (informal subject case of 'you'). When relative and interrogative pronouns have the same letters (as is often the case), the interrogative pronoun is accented and the relative pronoun is not:
¿A dónde vas? 'Where are you going?'
A donde no puedas encontrarme. 'Where you cannot find me.'
The use of ó is poetic for the vocative: ¡Ó señor! The use of ⟨ó⟩ for the word o (meaning 'or') is a hypercorrection. Up until 2010, ⟨ó⟩ was used when applied to numbers: 7 ó 9 ('7 or 9'), to avoid possible confusion with the digit 0. The tenth congress of the Association of Spanish Language Academies deemed the use of an accent unnecessary, as typewriting eliminates possible confusion due to the different shapes of ⟨0⟩ (zero) and ⟨o⟩ (the letter).[1]
These diacritics are often called acentos diacríticos or tildes diacríticas in traditional Spanish grammar.
Foreign words[edit]
Loanwords in Spanish are usually written according to Spanish spelling conventions (extranjerismos adaptados): e.g., pádel, fútbol, chófer, máster, cederrón. However, some foreign words (extranjerismos crudos) are used in Spanish texts in their original forms, not conform to Spanish orthographic conventions: e.g., ballet, blues, jazz, jeep, lady, pizza, sheriff, software. RAE prescribes extranjerismos crudos to be written in italics in a text printed in roman type and vice versa, and in quotation marks in a manuscript text or when italics are not available:
Quiero escuchar jazz y comer pizza. Quiero escuchar jazz y comer pizza. Quiero escuchar "jazz" y comer "pizza".
In practice, this RAE prescription is not always followed.
This typographical emphasis is not used for foreign proper names and their derivations; nor is it used for some Spanish derivations of extranjerismos crudos, such as pizzería.
Capitalization[edit]
Capitalization in Spanish is sparse compared to English. In general, only personal and place names, some abbreviations (e.g. Sr. López, but señor López); the first word (only) in the title of a book, movie, song, etc. (except when the title contains only two words, then the second word is also sometimes capitalized); and the first word in a sentence are capitalized, as are names of companies, government bodies, etc. Names of nationalities or languages are not capitalized, nor (in standard style) are days of the week and months of the year.[24][25]
Older conventions[edit]
The Spanish Royal Academy has reformed the orthographic rules of Spanish many times.
In Old Spanish, ⟨x⟩ was used to represent the voiceless palatal sound /ʃ/ (as in dixo 'he/she said'), while ⟨j⟩ represented the voiced palatal /ʒ/ (as in fijo 'son'). With the changes of sibilants in the 16th century, the two sounds merged as /ʃ/ (later to become velar /x/), and the letter ⟨j⟩ was chosen for the single resulting phoneme in 1815. When Cervantes wrote Don Quixote he spelled the name in the old way (and English preserves the ⟨x⟩), but modern editions in Spanish spell it with ⟨j⟩. For the use of ⟨x⟩ in Mexico—and in the name México itself—see below.
The letter ⟨ç⟩ (c-cedilla)—which was first used in Old Spanish—is now obsolete in Spanish, having merged with ⟨z⟩ in a process similar to that of ⟨x⟩ and ⟨j⟩. Old Spanish coraçon, cabeça, fuerça became modern corazón, cabeza, fuerza.
Words formerly spelled with ⟨ze⟩ or ⟨zi⟩ (such as catorze, dezir, and vezino) are now written with ⟨ce⟩ and ⟨ci⟩ (catorce, decir, vecino, respectively). The sequences ⟨ze⟩ and ⟨zi⟩ do not occur in modern Spanish except some loanwords: zeugma, zigurat, zipizape; some borrowed words have double spellings: zinc/cinc.[26]
The old spellings with ⟨ç⟩, ⟨ze⟩, and ⟨zi⟩ remained in use until the eighteenth century. They were replaced by ⟨z⟩, ⟨ce⟩, and ⟨ci⟩, respectively in 1726.[27] ⟨Ze⟩ and ⟨zi⟩ continued to be used in some words due to their etymology (e.g. zelo, zizaña), but this usage was largely reduced during the 1860—1880s, so these words became celo and cizaña. The letter ⟨x⟩ was replaced by ⟨j⟩ in 1815,[28] although word-final ⟨x⟩ remained until 1832 (e.g. relox, now reloj).[29] The combinations ⟨je⟩ and ⟨ji⟩ were originally used only in a few etymological cases (e.g. Jesús, Jeremías) and also in diminutives (pajita); after the reform of 1815, ⟨xe⟩ and ⟨xi⟩ were replaced by ⟨ge⟩ and ⟨gi⟩ in the Ortografía but by ⟨je⟩ and ⟨ji⟩ in the Diccionario; since 1832, the spelling was firmly established to be ⟨je⟩ and ⟨ji⟩. Also, unetymological spellings with ⟨ge⟩, ⟨gi⟩ (that is, words that did not have g in Latin) were changed to ⟨je⟩, ⟨ji⟩ (e.g. muger, from Latin mulier, became mujer).
Old Spanish used to distinguish /s/ and /z/ between vowels, and it distinguished them by using ⟨ss⟩ for the former and ⟨s⟩ for the latter, e.g. osso ('bear') and oso ('I dare to'). In orthography, the distinction was suppressed in 1763.[30]
Words spelled in modern Spanish with ⟨cua⟩, ⟨cuo⟩ (e.g. cuando, cuatro, cuota) were written with ⟨qua⟩, ⟨quo⟩ up until 1815.[28]
In 1726, most double consonants were simplified (e.g. grammatica → gramática, addicion → adición)[27]—but the ⟨m⟩ of a prefix before the ⟨m⟩ of a root was differentiated to ⟨n⟩ in 1763 (e.g. "commover → conmover").[30] And the Graeco-Latin digraphs ⟨ch⟩, ⟨ph⟩, ⟨(r)rh⟩ and ⟨th⟩ were reduced to ⟨c⟩, ⟨f⟩, ⟨(r)r⟩ and ⟨t⟩, respectively (e.g. christiano → cristiano, triumpho → triunfo, myrrha → mirra, theatro → teatro).
From 1741[31] to 1815, the circumflex was used over vowels to indicate that preceding ⟨ch⟩ and ⟨x⟩ should be pronounced /k/ and /ks/ respectively and not /tʃ/ and /x/, e.g. exâctitud, patriarchâ.
The use of accent marks in publishing varies with different historical periods, due mainly to reforms promulgated by the Spanish Royal Academy. For example, many of the words that are today standardly written with an accent mark appeared more often without it up until around 1880. These include words with final stress ending in -n (e.g. capitán, también, jardín, acción, común—but not future-tense verb forms like serán, tendrán);[32][33] verbs in the imperfect tense (e.g. tenía, vivían);[34] the possessives mío and mía;[35] and the word día.[36] Meanwhile, one-letter words other than the conjunction y—namely the preposition a and the conjunctions e (the form of y before an [i] sound), o, and u (form of o before [o])—are generally written with accent marks from the mid-1700s to 1911.[37][38][39] The accent-marked infinitive oír begins to outnumber the unaccented form around 1920.[40] Monosyllabic preterit verb forms such as dio and fue were usually written with accent marks before the 1950s.[41]
The names of numbers in the upper teens and the twenties were originally written as three words (e.g. diez y seis, veinte y nueve), but nowadays they have come to be spelled predominantly as a single word (e.g. dieciséis, veintinueve). For the numbers from 21 to 29, the "fused" forms emerged over the second half of the 19th century.[42] For those from 16 to 19, the one-word forms took the lead in the 1940s.[43] Fusing of number-names above 30 (e.g. treintaicinco, cuarentaiocho)[44] is rare.
Reform proposals[edit]
See also: Bello orthography
In spite of the relatively regular orthography of Spanish, there have been several initiatives to simplify it further. Andrés Bello succeeded in making his proposal official in several South American countries, but they later returned to the standard set by the Real Academia Española.[45] Another initiative, the Ortografia Fonetika Rasional Ispanoamerikana, remained a curiosity. Juan Ramón Jiménez proposed changing ⟨ge⟩ and ⟨gi⟩ to ⟨je⟩ and ⟨ji⟩, but this is only applied in editions of his works or those of his wife, Zenobia Camprubí. Gabriel García Márquez raised the issue of reform during a congress at Zacatecas, most notoriously advocating for the suppression of ⟨h⟩, which is mute in Spanish, but, despite his prestige, no serious changes were adopted. The Academies, however, from time to time have made minor changes, such as allowing este instead of éste ('this one'), when there is no possible confusion.
A Mexican Spanish convention is to spell certain indigenous words with ⟨x⟩ rather than the ⟨j⟩ that would be the standard spelling in Spanish. This is generally due to the origin of the word (or the present pronunciation) containing the voiceless postalveolar fricative /ʃ/ sound or another sibilant that is not used in modern standard Spanish. The most noticeable word with this feature is México (see Toponymy of Mexico). The Real Academia Española recommends this spelling.[46] The American Spanish colloquial term chicano is shortened from mechicano, which uses /tʃ/ in place of the /ʃ/ of rural Mexican Spanish /meʃiˈkano/.
Arabic alphabet[edit]
In the 15th and 16th centuries, Spanish (as well as Portuguese and Ladino) was sometimes written in the Arabic alphabet by moriscos. This form of Spanish is called aljamiado.
See also[edit]
Inverted question and exclamation marks
Spanish manual alphabet
Chilean manual alphabet
References[edit]
^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g h i "La "i griega" se llamará "ye"". l. Cuba Debate. 2010-11-05. Retrieved 5 November 2010. [dead link]
Jump up ^ "Un solo nombre para cada letra". Retrieved 20 September 2014.
Jump up ^ "Diccionario de la lengua española : W". Buscon.rae.es. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "CH", "LL" and "R" in DPD, 2005
Jump up ^ "No obstante, en el X Congreso de la Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española, celebrado en 1994, se acordó adoptar para los diccionarios académicos, a petición de varios organismos internacionales, el orden alfabético latino universal, en el que la ch y la ll no se consideran letras independientes. En consecuencia, estas dos letras pasan a alfabetizarse en los lugares que les corresponden dentro de la C (entre -cg- y -ci-) y dentro de la L (entre -lk- y -lm-), respectivamente." Real Academia Española. Explanation Archived September 6, 2007, at the Wayback Machine. at spanishpronto.com Archived September 14, 2007, at the Wayback Machine. (in Spanish and English)
Jump up ^ Fletcher Pratt, Secret and Urgent: the Story of Codes and Ciphers Blue Ribbon Books, 1939, pp. 254-255. The eñe is added in the fourth to last position according to the Quixote gutenberg.org
Jump up ^ Penny (2002:38)
Jump up ^ "Diccionario de la lengua española : V". Buscon.rae.es. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ [1] Archived December 13, 2012, at the Wayback Machine.
Jump up ^ "Diccionario de la lengua española : Z". Buscon.rae.es. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
^ Jump up to: a b c d e f g /b/, /d/, /ʝ/ and /ɡ/ are approximants ([β̞], [ð̞], [ʝ˕] [ɣ˕]; represented here without the undertacks) in all places except after a pause, after an /n/ or /m/, or—in the case of /d/ and /ʝ/—after an /l/, in which contexts they are stops [b, d, ɟʝ, ɡ], not dissimilar from English b, d, j, g.(Martínez-Celdrán, Fernández-Planas & Carrera-Sabaté 2003:257–8)
^ Jump up to: a b c In Andalusia, Canary Islands, and Spanish America /θ/ has merged into /s/; see seseo and Martínez-Celdrán, Fernández-Planas & Carrera-Sabaté (2003:258) for more information.
Jump up ^ In a small number of borrowed words, such as Kirchner, this is [ʃ].
Jump up ^ Modern words in which h is derived from Latin f (e.g. hacer, hablar) were spelled with f, pronounced [f], in Old Spanish (e.g. fazer, fablar), and there was a transitional stage pronounced [h] before the sound was entirely lost; hence the modern spelling with h. But in words derived from Latin words with h (e.g. hoy, prohibir), the letter was always silent in Spanish. And words beginning with either of the diphthongs [je] or [we] (e.g. hielo, huevo) were given an initial h in spelling (always silent) to insure that their initial glide was not read as a consonant (in Old Spanish, the letters i and j were often interchanged, as were u and v).
^ Jump up to: a b c Some speakers may pronounce word-initial [w] with an epenthetic /ɡ/, e.g. Huila [ˈɡwila]~[ˈwila], hueso [ˈgweso]~[ˈweso], waterpolo [ˈgwaterˈpolo] ~ [ˈwaterˈpolo].
Jump up ^ For most speakers, the ⟨j⟩ is silent at the end of a word, in which case reloj is pronounced [reˈlo].
^ Jump up to: a b c The nasal consonants /n, m, ɲ/ only contrast before vowels. Before consonants, they assimilate to the consonant's place of articulation. This is partially reflected in the orthography: only ⟨m⟩ is written before ⟨b⟩ and ⟨p⟩; but only ⟨n⟩ is written before ⟨v⟩ (although the combination nv represents the same sounds as mb) and ⟨f⟩. Word-finally, only /n/ occurs, normally spelled ⟨n⟩; but ⟨m⟩ is used in some loanwords.
Jump up ^ In the verb subrayar the trilled initial [r] of the root raya is maintained, even with the prefix sub-. The same goes for ciudadrealeño (from Ciudad Real). However, after vowels, the initial ⟨r⟩ of the root becomes ⟨rr⟩ in prefixed or compound words: prorrogar, infrarrojo, autorretrato.
^ Jump up to: a b c For many speakers, /s/ may debuccalize or be deleted in the syllable coda (at the end of words and before consonants).
Jump up ^ In words with the combination -xs- (e.g., exsenador), the pronunciation is [ks], and the two [s] sounds are merged into one. The same goes for -xc- before e, i (e.g., excelente) in varieties with seseo.
Jump up ^ In Spanish, the letters i and u can combine with other vowels to form diphthongs (e.g. cielo, cuadro).
Jump up ^ Butt, Benjamin & 2011, §39.2.2
Jump up ^ 7. Acentuación de letras mayúsculas – Las letras mayúsculas, tanto si se trata de iniciales como si se integran en una palabra escrita enteramente en mayúsculas, deben llevar tilde si así les corresponde según las reglas de acentuación: Ángel, PROHIBIDO PISAR EL CÉSPED. No se acentúan, sin embargo, las mayúsculas que forman parte de las siglas (→ sigla, 5b).
Jump up ^ "Capitalization in Spanish". Spanish.about.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ Foster, David William; Altamiranda, Daniel; de Urioste, Carmen (1999). "Capitalization". The Writer's Reference Guide to Spanish. Austin: University of Texas Press. pp. 75–77. ISBN 978-0-292-72511-9. Retrieved September 18, 2014.
Jump up ^ "Diccionario de la lengua española : C". Buscon.rae.es. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
^ Jump up to: a b Diccionario de autoridades
^ Jump up to: a b Ortografía de la lengua castellana - Real Academia Española - Google йМХЦХ. Books.google.ru. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ Diccionario de la lengua española, novena edición
^ Jump up to: a b Ortografía de la lengua castellana - Google йМХЦХ. Books.google.ru. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Biblioteca Virtual Miguel de Cervantes". Cervantesvirtual.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ Juan Martinez Marin. "La Ortografia Espanola : Perspectiva Historiografica" (PDF). Cvc.cervantes.es. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Google Ngram Viewer". Ngrams.googlelabs.com. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ "Diccionario de la lengua española : Cardinales". Buscon.rae.es. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Jump up ^ Urdaneta, I. P. (1982). "The history of Spanish orthography, Andrea Bello's proposal and the Chilean attempt: Implications for a theory on spelling reform". The Simplified Spelling Society. Archived from the original on 2006-09-27.
Jump up ^ "Diccionario de la lengua española". Buscon.rae.es. Retrieved 2015-05-22.
Bibliography[edit]
Penny, Ralph (2002). A History of the Spanish Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-01184-1.
Butt, John; Benjamin, Carmen (2011). A New Reference Grammar of Modern Spanish (5th ed.). Oxford: Routledge. ISBN 978 1 444 13769 9.
External links[edit]
Find more aboutSpanish orthographyat Wikipedia's sister projects
Definitions from Wiktionary
Textbooks from Wikibooks
Learning resources from Wikiversity
Data from Wikidata
A la nación española: Sobre reformas ortográficas[permanent dead link], Mariano Cubí i Soler, Imprenta de Miguel i Jaime Gaspar, Barcelona, 1852 (Biblioteca Digital Hispánica).
Collation in Spanish
Ortografía de la lengua española published by the Real Academia Española (RAE).
Spanish Alphabet Pronunciation – simplified for beginners to Spanish letter pronunciation.
Retrieved from "https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Spanish_orthography&oldid=807644490"
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