Spaniard living in the US here to clarify how our language works. Spaniards are the best at speaking their own language by definition. We make the language, and we decide how it evolves. When you say many Spaniards suck at speaking their own language, I think you are getting confused with the many dialects that exist within the Spain. Some dialects, while being perfectly and dramatically correct, are very hard for non-native speakers to understand. Pronunciation of letters may change from dialect to dialect, but the grammar is basically the same.
The authority that sets the Spanish language grammar rules (Real Academia Española - RAE) is in Spain, and it’s rules only apply to the “standard” Spanish dialect spoken in Spain, which is also known as Castillian. However, there are multiple other dialects of Spanish within Spain (and multiple other languages that are not Spanish - Galego, Catalan, Euskera, etc). Other countries that speak other Spanish dialects choose if they want to follow or not the rules set by the RAE, and many Spanish dialects do not follow those rules. Some Spanish speaking countries have their own organizations to define their Spanish dialects. There are dialects of Spanish that are very different from the original Castillian Spanish. For example, listen to Argentinian Spanish, and compare it to Castillian Spanish. The difference is noticeable even for non-Spanish speakers. They also use a slightly different grammar.
ArtemisimetrA@lemmy.duck.cafe 1 day ago
And then when to actually spend any time in a place where Spanish is the first language, you start to understand that, like any language, there’s the academic form (commonly taught to non-native speakers as a second or third etc. language), and then there’s the local version, complete with an the colloquialisms and slang and unique pronunciations. In Argentina, the double-L (which school taught me makes a “y” sound, “ella” being pronounced basically “ey-ya”) is commonly produced as more of a soft “J” sound (“ella” becomes “ey-jha”). As far as my (admittedly limited) knowledge goes, that’s really not common outside of Argentina. And then in Bolivia, especially among native descendants (Quechua and Aymara predominantly), the double-r (which school taught me is one of two conditions when you roll the R with a tongue trill) is more commonly pronounced almost like a “zh” (“herramienta” becomes “hezhamienta”). Again, not common outside of Bolivia. Spain has that classic “Barthelona” lisp, and uses the “vosotros” pronoun where most South American Spanish speakers would probably use “ustedes” (basically “y’all” vs. “esteemed plural second persons”). And that’s not even getting into which verb tenses are used most widely in different regions. There’s like 14 or 15 specific verb tenses in Spanish to English’s 7, and in school I was taught to use specific ones to communicate effectively; then I went and spent two months in Bolivia pretty much never using past perfect or predicate, instead using past imperfect for 95% of interactions, only using past perfect with other folks que hablan español como segunda lengua, or in a few very specific interactions where more specifically was required than would be so in common, everyday interactions.
fushuan@lemm.ee 5 hours ago
An addendum to the ll, Elle. It’s not like ey-ya, that’s wrong pronounciation, it’s like a literal bibrating L.
You might be referring to the same phoneme since y sounds like the soft J you are referencing, but yeah.
ArtemisimetrA@lemmy.duck.cafe 4 hours ago
Oh yeah totally! That’s a much better explanation of that specific phoneme. I went for the over-simplified version that was being taught to me in middle school, where I think the assumption was mostly “we need to teach them grammatical and structural rules and not worry about natural sounding pronunciation” which probably contributes strongly to the gringo accent where vowels aren’t pronounced consistently, but shift more like they do in English, and creates mispronunciations that are so grating and confusing (especially between certain a, i, & e sounds)
JandroDelSol@lemmy.world 1 day ago
Colombians, at least Paisas, also have the double ll = j sound and use vosotros! Spanish dialects can get wild lol
ArtemisimetrA@lemmy.duck.cafe 1 day ago
Neat! I probably never would have known that if you hadn’t told me!