Seseo in the Spanish-speaking world

Segmental Variation II: Seseo in the Spanish-speaking world:

A historical, geographic, and sociolinguistic profile

Manuel Díaz, Indiana University

Matthew Pollock, Indiana University

Abstract

This article is concerned with a thorough description of the historical and sociolinguistic documentation of seseo, and to a lesser extent ceceo and distinction, in the Spanish-speaking world. First, the historical development of the current sibilant system is described with reference to the geographical distribution of sibilant phenomena in Spain and America. Following that, recent findings in sociolinguistic research are laid out, focusing on factors such as education, formality, age, sex, and immigration. Next, a pilot study is presented that uses empirical evidence to examine how party affiliation affects politicians’ use of local norms, namely seseo and ceceo, in Málaga. Overall, Andalusian Spanish provides fertile ground for future theoretical and statistical work, including on rural/urban differences, individual identity, and longitudinal differences related to a possible demerger of seseo, ceceo, and distinction.

Keywords: seseo, ceceo, distinction, Spain, Spanish America, Andalusia, sibilant history, sociolinguistic variation, identity, political speech

1. Introduction

In this chapter, we provide the reader with a general perspective about seseo in the Spanish-speaking world and its relationship with other phenomena such as ceceo and distinction between /s̊/ and /θ/ (distinción in Spanish). Distinction, seseo, and ceceo can be considered norms of pronunciation that vary according to region. Distinction is a feature predominant in the variety of Spanish spoken in central and northern peninsular Spanish. Speakers of this variety have in their phonological inventory two sibilant phonemes: (1) /s̊/, a voiceless apico-alveolar fricative associated in the orthographic representation with the grapheme and (2) /θ/, an interdental voiceless fricative that is associated in the orthographic representation with the graphemes and (see Table 17.1a). Seseo is the main phenomenon across Latin-American Spanish, certain areas of southern Spain, and the Canary Islands. In these varieties, only one phoneme is found in speakers’ inventories: /s/, a voiceless dorso-alveolar fricative[footnoteRef:2] that represents orthographic , , and (Table 17.1b). Ceceo is a phenomenon found in certain areas of southern Spain that has also been documented in Honduras, El Salvador, and Venezuela (Margarita Island). In these varieties, speakers only have /θ/, an interdental voiceless fricative, to represent orthographic , , and (Table 17.1c). Despite this geographic description, these norms are in variation in certain regions and speakers alternate in speech (Villena and Ávila 2012) [2: In the historical literature as well as in the dialectogical investigations, it is reported that variation exists in the articulation of these dorsal-alveolar sounds.]

Table 17.1: The three Spanish sibilant patterns

Pattern

‘frog’

‘sky’

‘shoe’

a.

Distinction

[s̊apo]

[θjelo]

[θapato]

b.

Seseo

[sapo]

[sjelo]

[sapato]

c.

Ceceo

[θapo]

[θjelo]

[θapato]

With the purpose of offering a general perspective, this chapter first describes a brief history of the development of distinction, seseo, and ceceo, then reviews aspects related to the geographic distribution of these phenomena in Section 2. Section 3 examines recent sociolinguistic research on these phenomena to provide an update on the most recent advances in this area, as well as a pilot study based on data collected in Málaga. The last two sections are dedicated to discussing pending issues and conclusions regarding the Spanish sibilant system.

2. Description of the History & Background

Medieval Spanish had a complex system of sibilants, which can be observed through orthographic representations from historical sources. As explained by Penny (2002: 62), “voiced fricatives emerged in Spanish to match the preexisting series of voiceless fricatives.” These voiced segments were developed through separate processes that, by the 12th century, resulted in a system comprising 6 fricatives (see Table 17.2). Medieval Spanish had seven graphemes that represented different pronunciations and phonological contrasts in old Spanish (i.e., < ç>, , , , , ). The grapheme < ç> in caça ‘hunt’ corresponds to a dental, voiceless affricate [t͡s]. The grapheme in doze ‘twelve’ is associated with the dental, voiced affricate [d͡z]. The orthographic representation in passa ‘happens’ is associated with the apico-alveolar, voiceless fricative [s̊]. The grapheme in casa ‘house’ is associated with an apico-alveolar, voiced fricative [z̊]. In dixe ‘says,’ the grapheme was pronounced as [š], a palatal, voiceless fricative. Finally, the orthographic representation or was pronounced as [ž], a palatal, voiced fricative.

Table 17.2: The development of Spanish sibilants

Grapheme

12th Century

1492

1550

North

South/

Ceceo

Seseo

<ç>

caça hunt

/t͡s/

/s̜/

/s̜/

/θ/

doze twelve

/d͡z/

/z̜/

/θ/

/s/

passa happen

/s̊/

/s̊/

/s̊/

/s̊/

casa house

/z̊/

/z̊/

dixe says

/s̆/

/s̆/

/s̆/

/x/

/h/

/h/

mugier woman

/z̆/

/z̆/

By 1492, the affricate phonemes [t͡s] and [d͡z] lost their affricate characteristics and became fricatives. Specifically, they changed into /s̜/, a voiceless dental fricative, and /z̜/, a voiced dental fricative. These two units, along with the sibilants described above, are part of the system that represents the variety of Spanish spoken by settlers when they arrived in America. Eddington (1987) documents this process of deaffrication, arguing that this phenomenon started in Andalusia, and that its origins can be traced to the fifteenth century.

There are two hypotheses, Eddington (1987: 56-57) explains, that concern the origin of the apico-alveolar fricative and that are fundamental to understanding seseo and ceceo. The first theory, proposed by Amado Alonso (1967), places the roots of the apico-alveolar fricative’s origins in an Iberian substratum; the second one, proposed by Otero (1971), instead argues that it stems from an influence of Basque emerging during the process of “castellanization,” or the development of modern castellano. In either case, Eddington (1987) explains that these hypotheses are problematic because the apico-alveolar fricative is documented not only in Romance, but in various other Indo-European languages. If Spanish settlers in America had used the apico-alveolar segment, Eddington contends, this usage would have been documented in America – and just such evidence has been found in Colombia, Puerto Rico, and Peru. For this reason, Eddington sees the next step in sibilant evolution as deapicalization, which has already taken place in southern Spain, while northern varieties maintain the apico-alveolar production place.

Whatever the root of the apico-alveolar fricative, distinction based on voicing had been lost from the Spanish sibilant system by the mid-16 century, leaving only three phonemes: /s̜/, a voiceless dental fricative; /ž/, a voiced dental fricative; and /s̊/, an apico-alveolar voiceless fricative. The articulatory similarity of these three segments opened the door to variation and diachronic change. Three solutions existed to remove the similarity: phoneme merging, phoneme differentiation, and maintaining the system intact. The chosen solutions varied by geographical region.

Eddington argues that what we now know as seseo is a process of neutralization of the four medieval sibilants into one phoneme, which had a variety of dental and interdental productions. As a result of the processes of deaffrication, deapicalization and devoicing, two norms developed: namely, seseo and ceceo. Seseo represents a merger of the dental and apico-alveolar segments into the pre-dorso-alveolar voiceless fricative /s/. This is the predominant norm in America, while the palatal segment is produced as velar /x/ or glottal /h/ depending on the region. It is important to keep in mind that the sibilant system, which served as the norm in 1492, evolved independently in America under separate social pressures than on the peninsula.

In central-northern Spain, the distinction between the dental sibilants /s̜/ and /z̜/ and the apico-alveolar sibilants /s̊/ and /z̊/ has been maintained since early Spanish (Eddington 1987). A process of variation emerged in the dental segments: variants had qualities described as both “ciceante” and “siseante,” with the final result being an interdental variant. This process of change finally evolved as follows: the voiceless dental fricative /s̜/ became the voiceless interdental fricative /θ/ and the voiceless palatal fricative /š/ became the voiceless uvular fricative /χ/, while the voiceless apico-alveolar fricative /s̊/ remained intact. A possible interpretation of this pattern of variation is that a process of differentiation has occurred.

In summary, the four medieval sibilants evolved in three different systems. In the particular case of seseo, the historical processes of deaffrication, deapicalization and devoicing resulted in a system with just one phoneme, the voiceless pre-dorso-alveolar fricative /s/.

2.1 Spain

This section offers a general perspective of previous descriptive work as well as dialectological descriptions of seseo in Spain, focusing on idealized descriptions based on the assumptions of dialectal literature and the goal of determining isoglosses. As we will see in section 3, the assumption of categorical usage does not reflect current norms in southern Spain, where variation is driven by social factors.

One of the first descriptions of seseo in the Spanish speaking world can be found in the seminal work of Navarro, Espinosa and Rodríguez-Castellano (1933), which is vital to understanding sibilant pronunciation norms in Spain at the beginning of the 20th century. The authors explain that seseo is typically found in Andalusia, the province of Badajoz, certain regions in Murcia, and Hispano-America; however, it can also be found in some bilingual areas of Catalonia, Valencia, Galicia, and the Basque country. In addition to these regions, Frago (2009) documents the use of seseo in the Canary Islands and Ruiz (1999) presents empirical evidence to show that although both seseo and distinction can be found in Melilla, seseo is common in this city.

Navarro et al. (1933) not only points out variability in production of /θ/ and /s/ as seseo and ceceo in Andalusia, but also that the type of /s/ produced by speakers in the region can vary. Andalusian /s/ is typically described as pre-dorsal, convex, and acute in nature. These features create a clear contrast with [s̊] found in varieties of Spanish spoken in northern-central Spain. Furthermore, Navarro et al. report on the geographical extension of the use of seseo and ceceo in southern Spain beyond the political boundaries of Andalusia. According to the authors, these patterns can be found in the province of Badajoz, most particularly in the western region on the border with Portugal. For example, in the towns of Alburquerque and La Codosera, seseo is widely used by speakers from all socioeconomic levels. However, in Villar del Rey, seseo is typically only produced by males, as well as middle-aged, elderly, and uneducated speakers. In the area of Olivenza, the authors attribute the use of seseo to the influence of Portuguese. In the case of Huelva, Navarro et al. (1933) divide the province between the south, where seseo and ceceo are common, and the north, where distinction exists. The seseante southern portion of Huelva also includes the western border areas near Portugal. Seseo in these areas is commonly used by speakers from all socioeconomic level groups. Ceceo, on the other hand, is predominantly used in the southern towns of the province.

In the northern mountainous regions of the province of Seville, including towns such as El Pedroso, Guadacanal, and Alanis, as well as in the city of Seville itself, Navarro et al. (1933) document seseo. Ceceo is meanwhile found in the western and northern towns of the province, including Aznalcollar, Castilblaco, Villanueva, and Lora del Río. The authors also note that ceceo is predominant in the vernacular styles of the southern part of the province, whereas seseo is used in more formal situations. In the province of Cadiz, Navarro et al. (1933) report that ceceo is the overwhelming norm; no seseo or distinction is reported in this region. In Cordoba, the authors report that seseo is predominant in most of the province, while distinction is found in the north, and ceceo is limited to some towns near the border with the province of Seville, such as Montemayor and Jauja.

Next, Navarro et al. (1933) find that distinction was the predominant norm in the province of Jaen by the beginning of the 20th century. The presence of seseo is noted in towns near the center of the province, such as Marmolejo, Andujar, and Baeza. Ceceo in Jaen is only found in Alcalá la Real and Castillo de Locubin, near the border with the province of Granada. In the case of Granada, the authors document the predominant norms as distinction and ceceo; what seseo there is in Granada is limited to a small northeastern section of the province in the towns of Montefrio and Algarinejo. In Málaga, Navarro et al. (1933) indicate that seseo and ceceo are the most common patterns: ceceo is the norm in the south and center of the province, while seseo is the norm in the north. For the province of Almería, the authors document the predominant norm to be distinction, while ceceo is found in some parts of the south of the province, and seseo is limited to the western town of Carboneras. In addition to providing a detailed account of sibilant norms in Andalusia, Navarro et al. (1933) also describe the presence of seseo in the southeastern part of the province of Murcia, in towns such as Cartagena and La Unión. This comprehensive article provides a general perspective of sibilant pronunciation norms in Spain around the early years of the 20th century, showing that variability and local norms had a robust influence in southern Spain.

In contemporary Spanish, the Royal Academy of Spain (RAS, 2010) documents that seseo is found in Andalusia and the Canary Islands. Consistent with the historical account of Navarro et al., the RAS describes that seseo can specifically be found in parts of various provinces and autonomous communities, including the southwest of Badajoz, the southeast of Huelva, the northeast and city of Seville, the south of Cordoba, the north of Málaga, in small parts of Jaen and Granada, and in Murcia, it can be found in Cartagena and La Unión. Most linguistic research in recent years has not shown the same level of encyclopedic treatment of the subject, instead providing a more focused perspective on sibilant pronunciation in particular cities in Andalusia.

For example, García (1991) presents sociolinguistic data from Málaga, in which ceceo tends to be favored by men of lower socioeconomic backgrounds. This author also uses data from Jaen to show that seseo and distinction are favored in urban areas and ceceo in rural ones. Approaching the topic from the perspective of dialect attrition and revitalization, Hernández and Villena (2009) focus on the extension of the central northern variety, considered to be the prestige form in Peninsular Spanish, in southern Spain. While the authors discuss several vernacular phonetic features of Andalusian Spanish, they also include relevant data about distinction, seseo and ceceo, including a tendency of convergence among young, urban, educated speakers in areas with regional varieties toward the northern-central variety of Spanish. The authors use previous eastern Andalusia research to observe that educated speakers tend to favor distinction instead of seseo. However, Hernández and Villena (2009) argue that this preference is not homogenous across Andalusia. Under the influence of the Seville regional standard, Western Andalusian speakers show a divergent pattern of pronunciation, favoring seseo or ceceo according to a complex set of social and stylistic factors. These tendencies are more common in urban centers, such as the city of Seville and Jerez, in contrast with eastern cities, such as Granada and Málaga. Hernández and Villena (2009) argue that the social prestige associated with distinction and its adoption in eastern Andalusia is a linguistic change in progress from above, as it is led by young, educated, urban speakers. This change, according to the authors, probably began in 1950 and continues to evolve under the influence of social factors, such as level of education, as is the case in Málaga.

In summary, the areas in which seseo and ceceo were traditionally used have evolved under the influence of the central northern variety considered to be the prestige norm in the country. This tendency is particularly strong among young, educated speakers in eastern Andalusia. In contrast, under the influence of the Sevillian regional standard, western Andalusia shows a divergent norm that favors seseo or ceceo, depending on a set of social and stylistic factors.

2.2 America

This panoramic review offers basic points of discussion to describe seseo in America. The work of Frago (2007, 2009) contextualized seseo in America as a historical development that reveals the close ties of American Spanish with Andalusian and Canary influences. This author argues that the presence of Andalusian settlers was key to language development between the 16th and 17th centuries. In twelve years, between 1598 and 1610, 7,135 sailors traveled to the Americas: 5,154 were Andalusians. Frago also argues that the consistent extension of seseo across America, along with other meridional Spanish features typical of Andalusia, are an indication of the influence of this region in the development of American Spanish. These conclusions are consistent with Kania and Kauffeld (2005: 66), whose historical investigation of written texts show there was “reliable textual evidence that seseo … was a well-established, identifiable trait in the language of Andalusia of linguistic transfer of Spanish to the Americas. And as part of the speech modality of the significant number of Andalusian emigrants to the New World, it quickly became a characteristic of American Spanish during its critical period of origin.” It is not only the influence of Andalusian settlers that is key to understanding the development of the seseo norm in America. In an alternative perspective, Sanz-Sánchez (2019) argues that the language contact situation, which included settlers of different origins and language backgrounds in the American colonies, including African and indigenous populations, created the conditions necessary to facilitate the selection of the merger of seseo as the unmarked sibilant pattern to be favored under these sociohistorical conditions.

Guitarte (1983) documents distinction in the development of American Spanish based on metalinguistic analysis of data drawn from written texts. Based on this analysis, Caravedo (1992) proposes that there must have been a long period of variable usage between distinction and seseo before the latter prevailed as the predominant norm. Caravedo provides a document from J. de la Riva Agüero, describing distinction tendencies in the Andean region of Peru: whites and mestizos from Cuzco, as a rare exception among Latin Americans, produce the sound of c and z [as theta] in some Spanish words, such as in doce, diez and siete, which is prominent and distinct, contrasting with the Andean sibilant, as if it were in the heart of Castille.[footnoteRef:3] This description suggests that theta could be found in cases where we would expect distinction, as well as in contexts with underlying initial /s/ (i.e., siete), indicating variable usage similar to ceceo. Caravedo (1992) also presents data from 11 semi-guided interviews conducted in Cajamarca and Cuzco, Peru, where she finds that both communities contain speakers who produce an interdental variant in orthographic contexts corresponding to and . While limited, this documentation of oral data corroborates the historical observations of J. de la Riva Agüero. [3: Our translation, from the original: “los blancos y mestizos del Cuzco, por curiosísima excepción entre los hispanoamericanos conservan en unas pocas palabras castellanas el sonido de la c y la z, por ejemplo, en palabras como doce, diez y siete, que se distingue y resalta, oponiéndose a la s sibilante serrana tan bien como en el propio riñón de Castilla.”]

In contemporary Spanish, the Royal Academy of Spain (2010) reports that seseo, as produced with a predorsal fricative, is common in Las Antillas, Mexico, Guatemala, Costa Ricas, Honduras, Panama, the southern part of Venezuela, the majority of Colombia, Peru with the exception of the Andean zone, Ecuador, Bolivia, Uruguay, Paraguay, Chile, and Argentina. The RAS also reports that in Mexico, there is a predorsal dento-alveolar production of [s], which is especially long and tense. This type of production is documented in the center of Mexico and tends to be found in word-final position. There is a pre-palatal variant documented in New Mexico and Oaxaca that occurs in contexts following a voiceless stop (e.g. apesta ‘it stinks’ [apeʃta]). There is also an apico-alveolar variant in diverse, isolated areas of the Americas, such as Antioquia in Colombia and the Andean region in Peru. Finally, the RAS references a rounded apico-alveolar variant in northern Mexico and northeastern Colombia, as well as in Andean Ecuador, the Peruvian-Bolivian Sierra, and northern Argentina.

In conclusion, the most common tendency in the Americas is the use of seseante sibilant patterns, although variation exists, including rare cases of distinction and ceceo. In several investigations, it is concluded that the prominent influence of Andalusian and Canary Spanish facilitated the emergence of this seseo norm in the Americas. Additionally, from a historical point of view, in some accounts the socio-historical conditions of contact also contributed to the adoption of the unmarked system underlying seseo.

3. The role of variation

Seseante tendencies have been observed across peninsular literature for almost a century. Since Navarro et al. (1933) recognized variability in the phenomenon across geographic and social variables, other dialectologists and linguists have recorded increasingly complex instances of variation. In that early description, youth and higher education were predictive of distinction in western and northern Andalusia, whereas ceceo was found in abundance in the east and far south, serving as a marker of youth in Granada, and coexisting with seseo in coastal cities like Málaga. The latter two phenomena, which Navarro et al. (1933) group under the umbrella term of confusion, which we refer to as alternation, are not solely restricted to Andalusia, nor do they occur in all parts of the region, but rather, exist in a patchwork across Spain, a reality which has been intensely probed in recent years.

Dalbor (1980) analyzes to suggest that the frequency of seseo and ceceo in Sevillian Spanish are decreasing in the face of distinction. This author notes, nonetheless, the continued existence of alternation; not only the usage made by Navarro et al. in combining seseo and ceceo, but also a process of nonsystematic switching, and the use of intermediate allophones between the dental and apico-alveolar fricatives /s/ and /θ/. Dalbor’s argumentation brings two key points to the fore: first, that distinction has a correlation with education and prestige, leading to its increased usage, and second, that there is a spectrum of production that goes beyond the two stigmatized systems often described in contrast to distinction. In response to Dalbor’s analysis, González (1993) responds that although alternation exists in Seville, it has a degree of systematicity that can be explained through sociolinguistic and cognitive factors. González argues that factors like social prestige and maintaining two separate seseante and distinction registers within the mind result in the observed nonsystematicity.

While some of the tendencies observed by Navarro et al. remain applicable to contemporary Spanish, more recent data has shown not just broadscale variation, but also changes at the individual level among subcommunities within urban centers. In a series of studies focused on variation in sibilant norms, Melguizo (2007a, 2007b, 2009b) shows that social factors such as rural versus urban spaces, city of origin, social prestige, age, sex, and education all play a role in the tendencies of speakers currently living in or near Granada. Speakers from the small town of Pinos Puentes, for example, who live less than 11 miles from Granada center, have vastly lower rates of seseo and higher rates of ceceo than both Granadinos and rural dwellers who immigrated to the city.

Alongside ceceo, seseo, and alternation, another pattern evinced in the literature is the glottal [h]. In looking at a small sample of Sevillians, Marrero (2017) finds that jejeo holds a special position, being found occasionally in male speech, but often exclusively relegated to specific lexical items. It has mainly been documented in coastal areas of Spain, but can also be found in highly informal, familiar speech across Andalusia. Nonetheless, it has a highly negative evaluation, is infrequently used by educated speakers, and is often treated as colloquial (Marrero 2017: 11). Villena (2010), who represents the phenomenon as heheo, describes the production as stereotypical of the rural working class, leading to its low usage in urban spaces. Given the limited lexical contexts in which this variant is found, we focus in the following sub-sections on social variation in the production of ceceo, seseo, alternation, and distinction.

3.1 Education and socioeconomic status

Nearly all descriptions of the Spanish sibilant system correlate ceceo with lower speaker education or socioeconomic level, while the variation governing seseo is more regionally complex. Overall, the increasing spread of distinction through the southern half of the Spanish peninsula is attributed to an increase in education since Franco’s rule, and with it a broader awareness of the central and northern standard. García (2008: 54), who focuses on the ceceante tradition in Jerez de la Frontera, points out that in the post-war era prior to 1975, higher education was mainly the realm of Spanish men. Post-Franco era social policy served to further reduce the numbers of Spaniards who had received no formal schooling or were illiterate from nearly 8 million in 1981 to slightly more than a million today. Regan (2017a) provides census data from western Andalusia to show that in Huelva, less than 5% of the population in 1950 had above a primary education, whereas today, nearly 80% of the population does. The result of these historical social changes in southwestern Andalusia is a trend in which women favor the innovative [s] production while men, with the exception of university graduates, prefer the conservative [θ]. More broadly, these changes lie at the core of a broader shift from ceceo --> seseo --> distinction that results from increased access to higher education, through which speakers are exposed to the central-northern norm, as we see in a variety of southern Spanish linguistic work from last four decades.

Dividing speakers by level of education, Carbonero (1985) defines three levels of socioeconomic status in the city of Seville: (1) an educated group with university degrees, (2) a medial group with high school degrees, and (3) a vernacular group without formal schooling. By tracing the degree to which each group used several non-standard local features (e.g., r/l neutralization, loss of /r/ and /l/, ceceo, and seseo), Carbonero found Labovian stratification. Trend ratios remain stable across groups with respect to variable production, but the most educated groups always produce the standardized variants most frequently, whereas non-standard variants were most frequent among the vernacular group. Importantly, the author showed that among vernacular speakers in Seville, less than 60 miles north of Jerez de la Frontera, there was 100% seseo in cases of underlying /θ/ and 19% ceceo in cases of underlying /s/, while speakers from the medial and educated groups used seseo, but no ceceo, reifying García’s results with respect to education from twenty-three years later.

Ruiz (2017) goes further still in a more recent portrayal of Sevillian sibilants. She classifies each of the categories distinction, seseo, ceceo based on a series of sociolinguistic factors, including education. The analysis of results depicts distinction as the most common among speakers with university degrees, seseo as common among those with primary and secondary education, and ceceo as mainly favored by speakers with little to no formal education. Santana (2017) also considers Sevillian sibilants, describing ceceo as a regional variant that is most favored by speakers with little formal education, while seseo was widespread throughout the community.

Analysis in eastern Andalusia has shown similar tendencies with respect to education. Analyzing 30 speech samples from Málaga, Ávila (1994) finds that age, sex, and other factors like parents' education and attitude toward language played some role in sibilant production. However, differences in age and sex are mostly resolved by differences in education, as a result of the social issues discussed previously. Those speakers who received higher-level education have an increased use of distinction, while the rest mainly follow the vernacular norm of alternation, mixing ceceo, seseo, and distinction. In Granada, Melguizo (2007a) found similar results comparing rural and urban speakers. Speakers with the lowest degree of education were most likely to use ceceo in both rural and urban groups. However, while urban dwellers were more likely to use less seseo with increased education, speakers with increased education among rural denizens of Pinos Puente had a greater likelihood of producing seseo. While seseo does not possess as much social capital in the west of Andalusia as in the east, Melguizo (2010: 86) suggests that it may be used in the higher social strata as a prestige form showing local identity and resisting classification as stigmatized.

Outside of Andalusia, linguistic descriptions of seseo and ceceo can be found in Badajoz and Murcia. Molina Ortés (2012) finds seseo in Fuente del Maestre, Badajoz, describing frequency as correlating with age and socioeconomic level. Younger speakers, who have had greater access to higher education, are more likely to favor distinction, whereas older speakers are more systematic in their seseante tendencies. Although he does not discuss seseo usage in Murcia at length, Villena (2007) does find that ceceo can be found in higher rates among speakers with lower education. University-educated speakers tend to use ceceo in nearly 5% of cases, whereas speakers without formal schooling use it closer to 52% of the time. As a means of explaining the appearance of both seseo and ceceo in Murcia, Sempere (2014) describes Murcian seseo as a variant of belonging, showing that one is part of a specific linguistic community despite the stigma associated with non-prestige speech, an analysis that can likely also be associated with the case of Badajoz.

Clearly, there are many parts of the Spanish world where seseo is the accepted norm, to the exclusion of all other sibilant allophony, such as the Spanish of the Americas and the Canary Islands. Similarly, in most parts of northern and central Spain, there is overwhelming use of distinction (although see García 2011:91 for a discussion of autonomous communities where seseo has been documented). It is therefore interesting to position Andalusia and parts of Murcia and Badajoz in comparison to these other regions, with education beginning what many describe as a slow push toward distinction.

3.2 Formality and prestige

Factoring alongside education must be the social consideration of prestige, formality and register that help to inform how speakers produce language. According to Dalbor (1980), even in the regions of southern Andalusia where ceceo was documented in mid-twentieth century dialect maps, there is a degree of overt prestige associated with the educated seseo variant, while ceceo is often considered the less normative and more rural variant. In an age of increased access to high levels of public education, distinction holds an even higher spot on the rung, with an ongoing demerger causing the southern ceceo and seseo to converge with distinction as a result of such factors as education, prestige, contact, and social mobility (Reagan 2017b).

In addition to overt prestige, covert prestige can also be seen to influence those communities that still use ceceo and seseo, depending on the local values placed on allophonic variation. Melguizo (2007b) offers a tripartite analysis of speech tendencies in Pinos Puente, such that speakers must take into consideration national, regional, and local norms in normal speech. While the national standard may be distinction and the regional norm is seseo in Granada, rural speakers from Pinos Puente diverge by instead using the ceceo norm expected of them in their own community, which has local covert prestige as compared to urban areas.

When analyzing community-based accounts, we can see the influence of covert and overt prestige more clearly. In a comparison of western and eastern Andalusian Spanish, Villena & Muñoz (2014) argue that the Sevillian norm is expanding in urbanized areas, while not reaching more isolated rural communities. Based on the tightly knit communities that exist outside of cities, and the traditional values associated with ceceo, the increased normalization of seseo and distinction in urban areas causes a reinforcement of vernacular norms outside of these spaces, avoiding the impending change from above occurring elsewhere. Meanwhile, urban speech adjusts accordingly as ceceo use increases in rural spaces: Ruiz (2017) argues that the increasingly stereotyped interpretation of ceceo in large cities as representative of a stigmatized rural vernacular causes its vanishingly low appearance in Seville (9.5% as compared to 75% distinction). For this reason, a feedback loop is developing in which the insularity of rural communities and the stigma of rurality in urban spaces is causing the increasing disappearance of ceceo, and making way for greater use of distinction in much of Andalusia.

Many authors have positioned ceceo as a stigmatized norm in opposition to seseo and distinction both. Regan (2017a) discusses the Huelvan trend toward a dialectal convergence with distinction as part of a larger Andalusian push away from the stigmatized non-standard national productions, and in the direction of the national prestige variant. In terms of formality of speech, Villena (2007) shows that 124 Murcian speakers use ceceo more in informal conversations, whereas distinction and seseo are used almost categorically in the reading of word lists and minimal pairs. Samper (2011) also argues distinction to be the de facto norm in Spain, with seseo holding a non-stigmatized position in Granada and some other parts of Andalusia.

Following the local-regional-national scale of Melguizo (2007b), ceceo can be described as holding the lowest rung on the prestige scale, with seseo existing in a more privileged regional position above it. However, just as ceceo use has diminished since the days when Navarro et al. (1933) described it, seseo has seen a reduction in its usage due to the perceived national prestige of distinction. Analyzing several vernacular forms in Granada, Valeš (2011) found a nearly 94% rate of distinction among 50 speakers who also followed the prestige norm of alternating the imperfect subjunctive ending –ra and –se. He argues that speakers who are aware of some prestige forms are more likely to control a variety of them in order to conform with the norms expected of speakers with high social profiles.

3.3 Age

As García (2008) references, the divide in Spanish education related to Franco’s rule also plays a role in age-related social differences. In recent studies of southern Spain, older speakers (often classified as those near or over 55) were raised under Franco in a country with illiteracy and reduced formal education, especially in rural areas, whereas younger speakers have had increased access to public and higher education. Unsurprisingly, it is the older speakers in many current studies who continue to employ ceceo (and seseo to some extent), whereas younger speakers increasingly employ the national norm of distinction. Blas (2019) points out that there has been a considerable decrease in the usage of seseo by younger speakers in Cartagena. In his analysis of the Murcian /θs/, Villena (2007) finds that speakers over 35 years of age are more likely to produce ceceo, but especially among speakers without a formal education. However, speakers without formal education and those with the highest degree of education differed the most considerably with respect to age, while speakers of all ages with primary and secondary education were much closer.

These differences seem to hold true across urban spaces in Andalusia, such as Seville, where seseo has a degree of regional prestige. Marrero (2016), for example, determines that older speakers in the upper class are most likely to use seseo and manifest the behavior of alternation, whereas younger, upper class speakers use distinction more readily. This trend is less pronounced when contrasting rural and urban spaces, though. For example, in his comparison of Pinos Puente and Granada, Melguizo (2009b) finds that denizens of rural Pinos Puente were considerably more likely to use ceceo at all ages (i.e., no age group was less than 67% likely to do so), whereas immigrants from that town to Granada had less than a 25% probability of ceceo, and it increased less dramatically across generations. In order to make a claim about the broader spread of distinction, it must be taken into consideration that studies of rural communities are harder to find, and seem to suggest trends based in social identity that do not always map directly onto urban trends.

Given that many of these studies rely on samples of apparent time, and given the dearth of data from over four decades ago, there is one final possibility to consider: age-grading. There is the possibility that what is now being observed is not the result of a change in progress, but rather a tendency of elderly speakers that correlates with education. Ruiz (2017) discusses the role of age in sibilant production in Alcalá de Guadaíra, a town about 10 miles southeast of Seville. While it is true that younger speakers seem to favor the prestige variant, she also distinguishes ceceo and seseo usage, arguing that while ceceo may be on the decline overall within Alcalá de Guadaíra, the lower rate of seseo seen among younger speakers can be interpreted as an age-graded variant, rather than a complete demerger of seseo and distinction. If true, this provides ample ground for future comparative analysis between Andalusian cities and outlying suburban and rural areas, to determine the extent to which ceceo usage is dropping in areas where it maintains covert prestige like Pinos Puente, as well as the future of seseo in places where it has been described for over a century.

3.4 Sex

We have alluded to several contexts in which speaker sex has played a role alongside other factors in predicting sibilant usage. It has also become clear that the divide between rural and urban spaces is an important determining factor in the means by which covert or overt prestige affects production. In a comparative trend study of real time and apparent time data, Moya and Sosinski (2015) determine that there is an ongoing change in progress from seseo to distinction, led by upper class women in Granada as a top-down shift. Since 1940, seseo has dropped from almost three-quarters of sibilant production to under 20%, with one of the largest changes occurring among older speakers between 1995 and 2014. Similar results for seseo in Granada are obtained by Melguizo (2007a), who finds in her apparent time study that seseo usage was vastly outweighed by distinction in Granada. Men were less likely to employ distinction than women, supporting the claim that it is a female-led change within the city.

Regional norms govern sibilant production in western Andalusia as well. In an analysis of Sevillian patterns, Santana (2017) finds that although young women tend to use distinction much more than men for underlying /θ/ in onset position (2% vs. 62%), this trend is true at all age levels to some extent. However, women are about as likely as men to produce underlying /s/ as [θ] (i.e., about 7%), showing the reduced usage of ceceo and male-dominated preference toward seseo in Seville. Regan (2017a) finds that working class men from Huelva are the only group likely to use ceceo in favor of distinction. García (2008) similarly found that women from Jerez de la Frontera were more likely to use [s] than men, with middle-aged secondary and university educated women, elderly women educated for seven to ten years, and middle-aged university educated men all most likely to avoid ceceante tendencies.

Finally, Villena (2007) analyzes speaker sex, education and speech register in Málaga to show that men are more likely to use ceceo in all contexts, and that all groups use greater seseo in conversation than reading aloud with the exception of male speakers without formal schooling. These men show increased ceceo rates in reading-aloud tasks, supporting an interpretation of ceceo as a linguistic signal indicating social status, of which speakers seem to have a certain awareness or control. It is worth mentioning that women without formal schooling in Málaga, and those with only a primary education, used the non-sibilant ceceo production at a similar rate to women with a university education (i.e., roughly 3%), showing that regardless of education, women from Málaga avoid the male-dominant ceceo. This is further supported by a classification of ceceo based on speakers’ integration into the social networks of the city of Málaga – speakers with a smaller social network (14% ceceo) had less ceceo than those with greater contact with other speakers (34% ceceo).

3.5 Speaker identity

In addition to social variables that often serve as the focal point of sociolinguistic study (i.e., education, prestige, age, and sex), a small number of studies have also drawn attention to community based accounts and the way that certain variants spread based on social identity and linguistic accommodation across networks, including through immigration and religion. With respect to immigration, Melguizo (2007a) finds that immigrants from Pinos Puente to Granada used a medial degree of seseo and ceceo, reflecting both higher rates of seseo than rural speakers and higher rates of ceceo than urban speakers, while also producing higher rates of distinction than either rural or urban groups in a visible shift toward the national norm. In the Málaga context, Villena (2007) determines that speakers from Málaga have the highest rate of seseo, whereas those with greater rural connections in Málaga have increasingly higher rates of ceceo. The degree to which participants were exposed to national media also influenced ceceo: speakers with greater exposure showed reduced use of the stigmatized variable.

Finally, with respect to religion, there is evidence from Spanish-speaking Africa that ties language identity to sibilant production. Ruiz (1999) describes the Melillan seseo as being associated with religious affiliation. Religious differences were highly significant in distinguishing sibilant patterns: Christian participants were most likely to distinguish, whereas Muslim respondents strongly preferred seseo, although this trend was reduced among younger Muslim speakers. Navarro et al. (1933) also suggests that seseo may have originated in Hispano-Arabic communities, which supports Ruiz’s findings in Melilla.

These tendencies support an argument in favor of viewing sociolinguistic change through identity-based framework using community-based accounts to determine how speakers change their linguistic behavior based on social values and individual differences.

3.6 Political Speech – Pilot Study

There have been a number of claims that use of seseo and ceceo tie to speaker identity, especially from researchers in Málaga and Murcia (Villena 2010, Sempere 2014), as well as those who have considered the urban-rural divide (e.g., Melguizo 2007a). Rather than exclusively descriptive, these studies use an analytical lens to explain variation at an individual level based on power dynamics associated with certain forms. These trends reflect a growing body of research in sociolinguistic theory that associates speech to an accommodating tendency of speakers based on their known and expected audiences (see Bell 1984 on Audience Design). These tendencies have been analyzed fruitfully in radio contexts to determine gendered speech differences and to establish the extent to which standardized norms spread on the airwaves (Flores 2017, Hernández and Jiménez-Cano 2003). It has also been applied to political speech in recent years as a means to analyze how politicians’ use of regional or normative variants affects public perception (Hall-Lew, Coppock and Starr 2010, Hall-Lew, Friskney and Scobbie 2017, Hernández and Cutillas 2010, Hernández and Cutillas 2013).

Our current study performs a small-scale pilot in order to consider questions raised by researchers like Sempere (2014) about the social value of seseo or ceceo in regions where one or both may be stigmatized. In order to carry this out, we followed the theoretical approach used by Hernández and Cutillas (2010), in which political speech is considered to be performative and representative of local social norms, including speaker perception, sociolinguistic markers, and stereotypes.

3.6.1 Methods

We selected interviews with four male politicians from the province of Málaga, a region falling well within the domain of both seseo and ceceo (Villena 2007), in order to ensure the presence of non-distinction patterns. Despite the formal (and nationally-televised) nature of political interviews, selecting male speakers from a ceceante- and seseante-speaking region, talking with male interviewers increased the chance that regional norms might be produced. Two of the speakers were from the left-leaning PSOE party (i.e., Pepe Bernal and José Luis Ruiz Espejo, both professors), and the other two were from the right-leaning PP party (i.e., Elías Bendodo and José Francisco Salado Escaño, both high-ranking professional politicians). These speakers were all born within fifty miles of Málaga, were between 44-54 years of age in 2018, and had interviews on Málaga TV networks publicly available from within the last ten years.

In order to consider variation in the production of the dependent variable, we analyzed several acoustic measures to quantify variation in Praat (Boersma and Weenink 2017). These included duration, center of gravity, and average F1 and F2 height, as shown by Gordon, Barthmaier and Sands (2002) to be effective in the differentiation of fricatives across a variety of language families. Romero, Gaminde, Etxebarria, & Garay (2014) also analyzed these measures in an analysis seseo, showing not just the broad comparability of the measures, but also their effectiveness in this context. Given the difficulties referenced by Regan (2017a: 124) with respect to differentiating variable alternation between ceceo and seseo when coding a single phone, we chose to analyze all instances of underlying /θ/ and /s/ so as to have a clearer view of speaker tendencies in the system influenced by spreading distinction.

The data for seseo and ceceo were modelled in the R-based program Rbrul, which analyzes mixed-effects logistic regression models of social and linguistic significance and proposes the strongest array of factors to describe variation in the data (Johnson 2009).

3.6.2 Results

For each of the four politicians, the first 300 combined tokens of /s/ and /θ/ were coded in each interview following the 5-minute mark. As Díaz, Fafulas and Gradoville (2018) discuss with relation to vernacular variable style, the rate of non-prestige variant production is lowest in the first few minutes of an interview until a speaker becomes more at ease with their interlocutor. Therefore, the first five minutes of speech were excluded from consideration. Both politicians in the liberal PSOE party used at least a single ceceante production of /s/ as [θ], and at least four seseante productions of /θ/ as [s] within the first 300 tokens. The conservative PP politicians had no instances of ceceo, in contrast, and only one of the two speakers produced seseo (see Table 17.3).

Table 17.3: distinction, seseo and ceceo rates among Málaga politicians by political party

Production Type

Tokens

Percent

Fricative

Duration (ms)

Midpoint COG

Midpoint F1

Midpoint F2

/s/

391

65.17%

89.02

4045.98

1010.31

2393.00

[s]

385

98.47%

88.85

4057.14

1014.35

2396.00

Conservative

195

50.65%

88.41

3732.34

1117.02

2530.01

Liberal

190

49.35%

89.30

4390.49

908.97

2258.45

[θ]

6

1.53%

99.68

3329.81

751.35

2200.72

Liberal

6

100.00%

99.68

3329.81

751.35

2200.72

/θ/

209

34.83%

92.46

3520.34

848.16

2071.36

[θ]

194

92.82%

93.37

3454.26

870.88

2072.11

Conservative

103

53.09%

93.23

2129.13

812.19

2138.45

Liberal

91

46.91%

93.53

4954.13

937.31

1997.02

[s]

15

7.18%

80.66

4374.95

554.31

2061.62

Conservative

2

13.33%

64.35

2817.17

440.03

1989.13

Liberal

13

86.67%

83.17

4614.61

571.89

2072.77

Grand Total

600

100.00%

90.22

3862.88

953.83

2280.96

From an acoustic perspective, there are clear differences between the speakers. Based on center of gravity (COG), the two conservative speakers had a considerably lower frequency production of /θ/ as [θ] than their liberal counterparts. Formant values indicate that conservative [θ] is slightly higher and fronted on average than that of liberals. With respect to /s/ as [s], the conservatives were once again lower in average frequency (COG), but this time lower and fronted in terms of formants. For the variant /s/ as [θ], the liberal speakers had the lowest COG of any of their productions (3330 Hz); lower than both the distinction production of [s] (4390.5 Hz), and that of underlying /θ/ as [θ] (4954 Hz). Formant height indicates a tongue position higher than either the distinction allophone (i.e., 751.5 Hz vs 909 Hz and 937.5 Hz), and closest in frontness to the [s] allophone of /s/. Finally, for /θ/ as [s], the liberal production’s COG (4614.5 Hz) was medial to the aforementioned distinction variants’ average: the F1 was considerably more raised than any other production (572 Hz), and more closely resembled the [θ] allophone of /θ/ than that of the [s] allophone of /s/. Based on these results, we argue that these data indicate the production of intermediate variants that audibly resemble seseo and ceceo, but acoustically are more similar to the variants associated with the pattern of distinction. This suggests that while liberal politicians produced seseo and ceceo, they are also turning to the national norm.

Having considered these differences qualitatively, we analyzed the seseo data (i.e., /θ/ produced as [s] and as [θ]) in a mixed-effects logistic regression (Table 17.4). In our analysis, we found political affiliation to be the most predictive in the production of seseo. Conservatives only produced /θ/ as [s] in 2% of cases, whereas liberal politicians produced it roughly six times as frequently. No other social variables were considered in this small pilot study, but fricative duration and formant height proved predictive as well, with [s] tending to be shorter, higher, and slightly backer than [θ].

Table 17.4: Factors selected in mixed-effects logistic regression of Málagan politicians a comparing productions of /θ/ as [s] and [θ]

Variable

Factor

Log-odds

Tokens

%

Factor Weight

Political Affiliation

Liberal

11.496

104

12.5%

>0.999

Conservative

-11.496

105

1.9%

<0.001

Fricative Duration (ms)

Continuous

-1.174

Trend: +1

Midpoint F1

Continuous

-0.1

Trend: +1

Midpoint F2

Continuous

-0.09

Trend: +1

n=209 df=7 R2.fixed=0.143 R2.random=0.857 Log-likelihood=-23.2

aApplication value was /θ/ -> [s] and "Word" and "Speaker" were used as random effects

3.6.3 Discussion

Our findings from the study of seseo amid this cohort of politicians provides a number of interesting trends. First, there are traces of register effects in the analysis of acoustic correlates: speakers tend to produce the less-formal [s] more quickly than [θ], indicating that it is produced in more familiar or natural speech, whereas distinction is more expected in the midst of formal televised interviews. Second, there are signs of the underlying phonotactics of /θ/ in [s]: while this seseo [s] is higher and backer than [θ], it is considerably higher and backer than the allophone of [s] produced from an underlying /s/, gesturing toward the sort of intermediate fricatives discussed in depth by Dalbor (1980) and González (1993), as well as by Lasarte (2010) and others acoustically.

Finally, as discussed by Hernández and Cutillas (2013) with respect to a previous president of Murcia, socially recognized linguistic variables can form part of political speech in a performative way to reflect solidarity with an electorate. In the case of this political data, seseo tends to occur more among members of the PSOE, a party in power in Andalusia that shows a certain degree of pride in the militancy of its voters, and which, through rural and urban connections with Málaga, brings to bear both seseo and ceceo. By comparing these results to the Andalusian norms summarized by Melguizo (2007a), it becomes evident that these two subgroups are following distinct linguistic norms (Table 17.5).

Table 17.5: Tendencies of seseo, ceceo and distinction in Andalusian Spanisha

City

Seseo

Ceceo

Distinción

Seville

87%

6%

7%

Jerez

44%

47%

9%

Huelva

6%

23%

71%

Córdoba

51%

0%

49%

Málaga

31%

25%

70%

Current Pilot Study:

- Málaga Liberals

12.5%

3.1%

84.4%

- Málaga Conservatives

1.9%

0%

98.1%

Granada

40%

5%

55%

-Pinos Puente

3%

70%

17%

-Immigrants to Granada

12%

36%

66%

aadapted from Melguizo, 2007a. Sources: Carbonero, 1982 (Seville); Carbonero, 1992 (Jerez); Heras, 1996 (Huelva); Uruburu, 1990 (Córdoba); Ávila, 1994 (Malagá); Moya & Wiedemann, 1995 (Granada)

As Villena (2010: 203) describes with respect to vernacularisms with low prestige, speakers construct their identity by varying linguistic orientations demonstrated in speech. In this case, conservatives seem to be following the national standard of distinction, whereas liberals seem to be occupying a space between the national and regional one, with high rates of distinction alongside both seseo and ceceo. Further study is merited to determine both the extent to which this trend holds true in political circles, as well as the success that these performative speech trends enjoy in voters’ perception.

4. Pending issues

There are various sibilant phenomena to investigate in the Spanish context. While studies around seseo are numerous, urban areas of Andalusia receive significant attention, whereas rural and smaller urban/suburban areas rarely receive regular focus. Ruiz (1999) found that Melillans who identified as Muslim used no distinction, despite the broad spread of the norm among Chistian Melillans: to what extent is that still true, and how might this reflect broader social, educational, and cultural divides between the two groups? Melguizo (2007a, 2009b, 2010), Ruiz (2017), and García (2008) all look at small communities near major metropolitan areas, and determine the way that rural speech norms clash with urban ones: does this trend follow for rural communities outside of other cities where seseo or ceceo has been observed, such as in Badajoz (Molina Ortés 2012), Murcia (Sempere 2014), or Córdoba (Uruburu 1990)? Finally, in order to verify claims about changes in progress (Regan 2017b) versus age-grading (Ruíz-Sanchez 2017), studies are needed to track current norms in populations that have previously been studied to allow for longitudinal, real-time analyses that present comparable results and allow for strong theoretical claims.

There are also a number of broader questions regarding sibilant systems in the Spanish context. Regan (2017a: 124), for example, references some of the methodological issues involved with classifying sibilant production, as a classification of only /θ/ or /s/ provides half of a picture of a speaker’s tendencies, and cannot allow for distinction between seseo/ceceo and seceo/ceseo. We have already seen some instances of studies that begin to probe speaker identity based on sibilant usage (e.g., Sempere 2014, Villena 2010, etc.), and that seseo serves as a regional Andalusian prestige variant, or of ceceo as a vernacular prestige variant. It is unclear to what extent this variable can serve as a means of determining speaker identity, but based on the pilot study conducted here, it may be promising for future consideration.

Finally, given the focus of this chapter on Spanish sibilants, it seems fitting to acknowledge some additional variability. Ruch (2010) discusses a phenomenon whereby /st/ clusters are produced as the affricate /ts/ in western Andalusian Spanish, causing other /Ct/ contexts to follow (e.g., /eksakto/ [eksatsakto]). Pollock (2020) analyzes variability in the Andalusian affricate sibilant /tʃ/, finding that some social factors predict a more fronted variant that also approximates an affricated /ts/. The presence of this sibilant variation in Andalusian Spanish provides fertile ground for future theoretical and statistical work, including on rural/urban differences, individual identity, and longitudinal differences related to a possible de-merger of seseo and ceceo into distinction.

5. Existing approaches and concluding remarks

In this article, we presented a general perspective of seseo in the Spanish-speaking world. In our first sections, we described the historical development of the current sibilant system, as well as the geographical distribution of sibilant phenomena in Spain and America. Much early work focused on dialectological descriptions of data across regions, providing comparative analyses in the service of better description (Navarro et al. 1933, García 1991). This also included a tendency to use representative data from a city to make broader regional and even national claims (Dalbor 1980, Frago 1989, Caravedo 1992). While these results provided descriptions that have been used in real time analyses to consider changes over time, the results of many of these studies treated large groups of speakers as monolithic, with certain social divisions taking a background in favor of generalizations.

Next, we presented the most recent findings in sociolinguistic research by focusing on a diversity of social factors such as education and social status, formality, age, sex, and community-based accounts. In the mid-1990s, the dialectological took a turn toward the sociolinguistic, with a greater emphasis being placed on quantitative statistical methods to support broader claims. In one instance, Villena (1996) integrated community-based accounts into a study of the vernacular in Málaga so as to analyze seseo along a continuum of nine social variables. Studies in this time period also began to complicate a binary view of variables as stigmatized or normative; Villena (1996: 135) pointed to a tertiary regional standard on which sibilant variants could be judged to help describe intra-community and intra-speaker variation. Ruiz (1999) pointed to the role of religious background in explaining seseo usage in Melilla. Ávila (1994) found a host of social factors conditioning sibilant variation in Málaga that could differentiate individuals. Moya and Wiedemann (1995) pointed to the differences between the speech recorded in the linguistic atlas ALEA, the linguistic and ethnographic atlas of Andalusia, and the trends observed in their own research. Studies like these developed an analysis based off of complex statistical models that pointed to the increased influence of some factors over others in sibilant production.

During the 2000s, studies on seseo pushed the ‘90s trend to reveal more nuanced details based on a host of interacting factors. Given the increasing understanding of individual differences being acknowledged by statistical models, it became commonplace to include certain factors, like education, sex, and age, alongside new ones to come to terms with gaps in the data. Melguizo (2007a, 2007b, 2009b, 2010) looked at the intersection of these common variables with the immigration status and rurality of participants. García (2008) found social networks to pose a major role, as participants used ceceo considerably more with speakers inside their network than those outside. Lasarte (2010) examined the acoustic correlates of /s/ and /θ/, finding systematic variation in acoustic traits across speakers that correlate to ceceo and seseo. In this study, we begin to see the dependent variable itself being questioned in its binary form, as Lasarte quantifies the phone though an analysis of segment intensity.

Although the second decade of the century has only recently come to a close, it might be best to classify the work from that decade as focusing more tightly on single social variables that affect seseo at an individual or regional level. Building on the previous social model from Málaga, Villena and Ávila (2014) refine their tripartite vernacular-regional-national approach to focus on community stratification, socioeconomic class, and community-based accounts, allowing them to consider the relation between individuals’ social identity and the speech norms that they evince. Iribar & Túrrez (2015) analyzed a broad collection of acoustic correlates beyond intensity, including formant height, band width, frication frequency and intensity, in order to explain the spread of variable seseante tendencies in the Basque country. Regan (2017b) analyzes center of gravity and intensity, and draws on sociolinguistic theory regarding dialectal merger to make broader claims about the spread of distinction at the expense of seseo and ceceo due to changes in social norms. Blas (2019) acknowledges the importance of covert and overt prestige in the understanding of geolinguistics, which can help explain the manner in which innovative variants gain prestige and emanate from an urban center while stigmatized traditional variants are retained in rural and suburban areas at differing rates.

We also presented empirical evidence from a pilot study of political speech, according to which party affiliation has a significant effect in the use of local norms such as seseo and ceceo in our sample from Málaga. With this pilot study, we hope to provide initial data that may be useful in future investigations about political speech and seseo. There remains a variety of sibilant phenomena to investigate in the Spanish context as well. While studies around seseo are numerous, it often seems that the most urban areas of Andalusia receive significant attention, whereas rural communities rarely receive regular focus. Overall, Andalusian Spanish provides fertile ground for future theoretical and statistical work, including on rural/urban differences, individual identity, and longitudinal differences related to a possible demerger of seseo and ceceo into distinction.

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