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Raúl and his wife Elena are getting ready to go out. Elena needs to know something about the weather in order to dress appropriately.

Elena:
Raúl, no sé si llevar un suéter o no. ¿Cómo es el tiempo?
Raul, I don't know whether to wear a sweater or not. How is the weather?

Raúl:
Bueno, en la tarde estaba nublado. Creo que va a llover. Además del suéter creo que debemos llevar un paraguas.
Well, this afternoon it was cloudy. I think it's going to rain. Besides the sweater I think we'd better take an umbrella.

They go out the door.

Elena:
Tienes razón. Ya está lloviznando.
You are right. It's already drizzling.

Another time Elena is speaking by phone with her tía (aunt):

Elena:
Tía, lo siento mucho pero no vamos a llegar a la hora de la cena. Hace mal tiempo y los vuelos están en atraso. Dicen que si sigue la tormenta los vuelos serán cancelados completamente.
Auntie, I'm sorry but we are not going to arrive by the dinner hour. The weather is bad and the flights are delayed. They say if the storm continues the flights will be completely canceled.

Tía:
No se preocupen, queridos. Cuídense y nos vemos más tarde.
Don't worry, dears. Take care of yourselves, and we'll see you later.

One day at the office Raúl is having a conversation with a coworker:

Raúl:
¡Qué tal este tiempo! Parece que hay un cambio del tiempo cada dos horas. Prefiero un clima donde el tiempo es menos variable.
What about this weather! It seems that there's a change in the weather every two hours. I prefer a climate where the weather is less variable.

Eduardo:
Por lo menos no es aburrido. Te gustaría vivir en Caracas, o en la región montañosa de Costa Rica. Dicen que el clima menos variable se encuentra en las latitudes tropicales a una altura de mil metros o más. ¿Qué dices?
At least it isn't boring. You would like to live in Caracas, or in the mountainous region of Costa Rica. They say the least variable climate is found in tropical latitudes at an altitude of one thousand meters or more. What do you say?

Raúl:
Basta de soñar. Con que las calles no están inundadas a la hora de salida y con irme a la playa el sábado, estoy satisfecho.
Enough dreaming. With the streets not being flooded at leaving time and with my going to the beach on Saturday, I'm satisfied.

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You probably want to talk Spanish even more than to read it at this point, but right from the beginning you can take advantage of the Spanish alphabet to cue pronunciation. The Spanish alphabet is one of the world’s best representations of a spoken language. Once you get used to the sound values for the letters you can forget about most of those distracting and strange-looking pronunciation guides you may have seen in other materials:

gracias, say “grah-see-ahs” (this is not only distracting, it’s inaccurate)

Also, you will want to practice some of those similarities and differences between English and Spanish sounds that will tend to carry over from your English speech habits when you are trying to form new Spanish speech habits. At first you will have to pay close attention to the models, trying to mimic them, and practice, practice, practice.

Pronunciation, after all, is the result of habitual physical articulation (voice and mouth movements). Habits that are repeated daily usually become well entrenched after about a month of practice.

Spanish Vowel Sound Formation

Spanish is a musical, sonorant language. It sounds that way to us partly because of its system of five cardinal vowels, almost like operatic singing vowels.

• The lowest vowel–most open in the mouth, with the tongue in the lowest position–is ‘a’. It is written with the letter “a” (yes, say “ah” — but short and crisp).
• Raise the tongue to mid-position, close the jaw a bit, and sing ‘e’ (like the vowel in the English “bait”, but don’t trail off into the y-sounding off-glide).
• Raise the jaw a bit more and also the tongue, spread the lips a bit more, and sing ‘i’ (yes, like the vowel in English “bee”, but keep it steady and short).
• ‘e’ and ‘i’ are the two front vowels. Now go back again to the open, low vowel ‘a’. Next, we’ll work on the two rounded back vowels.
• From ‘a’, round the lips, raise the tongue a bit, and sound ‘o’ (as in English “boat”, but don’t trail off into a “w” off-glide).
• For ‘u’, again round the lips, raise the tongue more, and close the jaw a bit more (like English “boo”, but again guard against the wuh-ish off-glide).

That’s it. You may be helped to remember the five-vowel system by keeping in mind a triangle that represents vowel tongue height, jaw openness and spreading or rounding of the lips:

Spanish Vowels: Articulation Chart

¹ The front vowels are accompanied by lip spreading.
² The back vowels are accompanied by lip rounding.
³ The central vowel [a] is neutral, similar to the mouth formation of “o” in English “pot”.

If you’d like to see and hear the Spanish vowels, watch this video: Learn Spanish Vowels Video.

Here is an amusing chant that has been used in some Spanish speaking countries by children learning the vowel letters and sounds. Try it, concentrating on the vowel and the word at the end of each line.

A.   El burro se va. — A.   The burro is leaving.
E.   El burro se fue. — E.   The burro has gone.
I.   El burro está aquí. — I.   The burro is right here.
O.   El burro soy yo. — O.   I'm the burro.
U.   El burro eres tú. — U.   You're the burro.

‘Burro’ is a good-natured reference to thick-headedness. Say this ditty over and over until you have banished all Englishy sound attachments to these letters.

The next lesson will deal with consonants, and putting together syllables, words and phrases.

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• b and v represent one phoneme, which we have symbolized [b]. However, there are several slightly different but predictable variants in the articulation of this sound. This variation has nothing to do with whether the correct spelling in a word is with b or v. The labio-dental or bilabial fricative (not a complete momentary stop of the air) variant occurs between vowels,and the completely stopped variant may occur at the beginning of words after pause (not in the middle of a phrase). Here, whether a b or a v is written, is basically a literacy question–the student must remember how the word looks. These sound the same:

haber — to have, to exist
a ver — let's see

• c before e and i, as well as s and z, all spell [s] in the varieties of Latin American Spanish. Reading is not a problem, but correct ortografía requires familiarity with the written form of words, a knowledge of European Spanish, or, in some cases, the ability to predict spelling from a knowledge of word origins and cognates.

cinta — ribbon
cinto — belt, girdle (compare English "cinch")

• c before a, o, and u always represents [k]

• d, and f are the only spellings for the [d] and [f] sounds. Check out [link] for some tips about d pronunciation.

• g represents a sound like English [g], but to have this value before i and e, the letter u must be inserted. Note here that if u after g is written with an “umlaut” (two dots on top, ü), the u is sounded and the g retains its [g] sound.

gana — win
guerra — war
guitarra — guitar
goma — rubber, eraser
gusano — worm
vergüenza — shame

• g before e and i directly,like the letter j, represents a sound like the “h” in English “he”, but a little harsher. In our consonant sounds chart, we have symbolized this sound as [h]. Here are some examples:

gigante say [higante] — giant
jinete say [hinete] — horseman
gerente say [herente] — manager
jerarquía say [herarkiya] — hierarchy

• h, the letter, represents no sound. Its presence or absence in ortografía is a literacy matter and mostly a result of word history. Its presence may indicate a syllable boundary. Before the letter u, it may be a spelling for [w].

hueco — hollow
huipil — a traditional dress
bahía (ba-í-a) — bay
dehesa (de-e-sa) — pastureland (Don't make make a glottal stop—a catch in the throat—between the two "e"s; just keep going and increase the stress slightly on the second "e")

• j represents the same sound as the g before i and e, which we have transcribed with the symbol [h] in the sound inventory. j can occur before all the vowels.

jarra — jar
jefe — boss
jirafa — giraffe
jota — the letter "j", (not one) iota
jugo — juice

The learner must acquire the ortografía of ji, gi, and je, ge as a literacy matter. Going from reading to sound is not a problem.

• k, the letter, is little used. It occurs only in borrowed words and scientific terms.

kiosco — kiosk
kilo(-) — kilo, thousand
karate — karate

• l represents a sound similar to English “l”, but with the tongue higher and more flattened (think English “clear”).

• ll, the doubled letter, represents a separate phoneme in European Spanish, and in very formal speech in some Latin American dictions. It is a palatalized l-sound, something like you might hear in English “million”. For such speakers, these words sound different:

callo — (I am) quiet
cayo — cay, small island

Generally, for Latin American speakers, they are collapsed into [y]; the ortografía must be acquired as a literacy matter.

• m is like English in all positions.

• n always represents [n], but the sound is predictably different, depending on what sound follows. Between vowels, the sound is like English, but before consonants, as at the end of a syllable when the following syllable begins with a consonant, we hear assimilation to that consonant.

• ñ represents a palatalized n-sound, something like what you hear in English “onion”.

• p always represents [p]. Unlike in English, it is never aspirated produced with a puff of air upon release of the lips.

papa — potato (may sound a little like baba to an English speaker).

• q as in English is always followed by the letter u, but together they represent the [k] sound before e and i.

queso [keso] — cheese
quiso [kiso] — (s)he wanted

• r represents a sound made by a flap of the tongue against the alveolar ridge above the teeth–a sound famously unlike English r, but more like the middle sound in “ladder”, spoken quickly.

• rr — the double letter sequence, represents a distinct sound, in that the contrast between -r- and -rr- can distinguish word meanings. Consider these often-cited pairs:

caro — expensive
carro — car
pero — but, however
perro — dog

In these words, the -rr- is more prolonged than the sound represented by a single -r-. We usually call it a trilled sound. The place of articulation is the same for both. This contrast occurs only between vowels, so that even though you may hear words beginning or ending with a vigorous trill (listen to television and radio announcers!), only a single r is ever written in those positions. Why, then, is [rr] not included in the list of phonemes? Listen again to:

pero — but
perro — dog

In pero, the [e] is high, like the vowel sound in English mate, said quickly. However, in perro the [e] is somewhat lower, almost like the vowel in English pet. We can say that pero has a syllable division pe-ro, while perro has a syllable division per-ro. Listen for small systematic differences between the vowels in open (ending in the vowel) and closed (ending in a consonant) syllables. Here is an example of this vowel difference when the syllable-final consonant is not the same as the syllable-initial consonant beginning the next syllable:

pera pe-ra — pear
perla per-la — pearl

Perhaps this discussion is over-long,but we want to make a strong case for the reliability of the Spanish alphabet as a guide to the sound system. There are only two true digraphs (in which two letters represent a single sound), ch and ll. By contrast, -rr- is not a digraph but rather a consonant cluster.

• s always represents [s], although its pronunciation varies in context more than English [s]. In the everyday speech of some varieties of Spanish it may even disappear into a voiceless puff of air in word-final and syllable-final position (probably not something the learner should try). Remember that s, c, and z represent the same [s] phoneme for most speakers of Latin American Spanish.

• t always represents [t]

• v Remember that this letter represents the same phoneme as the letter b does. If you are spelling out a word (deletreo), v is called:

be corta — short b, and the letter b is called
be larga — tall b

• w the letter, is rare, as we mentioned in the beginning of this article, as is…

• x also mentioned above.

• y represents a consonantal sound somewhat like the first sound in English yes. Remember that y represents the same sound as -ll- for most speakers of varieties of Latin American Spanish. For the learner in this case the choice is a literacy matter for correct ortografía.

• z always represents a voiceless sound [s], never like English zoo. It may be noted that in some varieties and speaking styles a voicing of [s] may be heard before a syllable beginning in a voiced consonant. The main point is that for learners of varieties of Latin American Spanish, c (before e and i), z, and s all represent the sound [s], and which one to write is a literacy matter. These words sound the same:

cazar — hunt
casar — marry

So you can see, there are no sound-decoding problems for English-speaking learners. The relatively few spelling problems for writers are the same for both English-speaking learners and native Spanish speakers of Latin American varieties of Spanish. That is why we transcribe our textual materials with conventional Spanish ortografía.

For practice, try these lists of open syllables, just the way a six-year-old beginning to read might learn them. Read across the rows. (Later, you can practice going down the columns.)

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We know that you are interested in speech–speaking Spanish and understanding the spoken language.  However, in this lesson the goal is to pinpoint exactly how the letters are connected to the speech sounds–in other words, the basics of Spanish ortografía (orthography).  English speakers are used to this sort of study, after some six years of grade-school phonics and spelling rules.  You will see that Spanish spelling is far more consistent and transparent–that is, there are few rules and they apply without exceptions.  A little practice and you will be able to decode the pronunciation of text.  Then you will be empowered to to further your own learning wherever you see signs, ads, labels, notices, picture captions, bilingual instruction manuals–you get the idea.

¡Aquí se habla español! ‘Spanish is spoken here!’

In another lesson we have described the five vowel system, which is invariably represented by the five alphabet letters known as the Spanish vowels a, e, i, o, and u. The on-glides and off-glides involved in diphthongs, or complex syllabics, are also written with the regular vowel letters–either i or u–that keep their sound value.  So, for the learner, ortografía consists mainly in the correct use of the consonant letters.

Let’s begin as a linguist might, with a description of the consonantal sound system. When we have established these elemental sound contrasts, called phonemes, we’ll attach alphabetical spellings to them. The linguistic convention imagines the diagram of a person, facing left on the page. The points of articulation involving lips (1), teeth (2), gums (3), palate (4), back of the palate (velar) (5), are shown from left to right. The up and down dimension sorts the sounds by their manner of articulation: complete stoppage of the air coming from the lungs, creating friction by constricting the flow, directing it through the nose (nasals), and so on.

Consonantal Phonemes of Spanish:

These phonemes, or contrastive sound units, hold for varieties of Latin American Spanish. Peninsular Castilian Spanish–spoken in Spain–has the two additional contrasts, an interdental [th] and a palatal [ly], shown in parenthesis ().

We point out these two sounds because the spelling system recognizes the distinctions for European Spanish speakers, but presents a literacy problem for New World Spanish speakers who must learn the ortografía of the letters “c”, “s”,and “z”, as well as “ll” and “y” in the course of formal education.

Here’s the chart again, this time with the sound-spelling connections. The symbols inside brackets [] represent the sound units; the unbracketed symbols are regular alphabet letters:

As you can see, we have some points requiring clarification. There are two spellings for [b], three for [k], three for [s] (in Latin American Spanish), three for [y], three for [w], and two for [h]. Remember, [h] represents a sound; the LETTER h represents NO sound, ever.

Now, let’s focus on the Spanish alphabet and work toward the sound system. The conventional alphabet has:

a, b, c, ch, d, e, f, g, h, i, j, k, l, ll, m, n, ñ, o, p, q, r, s, t, u, v, w, x, y, z

Watch: Learn Spanish Alphabet Video

Click to open and play Spanish alphabet video.

All of these letters and letter combinations head up dictionary entry sections, usually with ch- following all other c-, ll- following all other l-, and ñ- entries following all n- entries (even though very few words begin with ñ). “W” is not considered a Spanish letter, but it is retained without respelling in a few borrowed words, especially those derived from proper names. “X” is also marginal in spelling, but at least it has an interesting story. Historically, in old Spanish words, it represented what we now write with the letter j, namely, a palatal or velar fricative. In Spanish America, where many of the native languages have a [sh] sound, x was put to that use (many place names in Yucatan use x: Uxmal, Chicxulub, etc., and retain that sound). Others formerly had the [sh] pronunciation but today sound the letter like “j” or “s” (Mexico, Xochimilco, respectively).

In the next lesson, we will cover the Spanish consonants indvidually.

1. The first concept to conquer if you want to learn how to speak Spanish is vowel and consonant pronunciation. Unlike English, Spanish vowels always sound the same–no long vowel sounds.

• a sounds sort of like the a in father
• e sounds sort of like the e in let
• i sounds sort of like the ea in tea
• o sounds sort of like the o in hope
• u sounds sort of like the u in super

2. Spanish vowels have a short crisp sound. Use loudness to indicate the stressed syllable rather than increasing the length and sound of the stressed vowel as in English.

Consider the word banana. Now pronounce it in Spanish. Yes, I know it’s really plátano, but the example shows you how to increase the volume of the stressed vowel, not change the sound. To learn how to speak Spanish, it’s imperative that you understand and practice this concept.

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3. A diphthong is when an unstressed i or u combines with another vowel in a syllable. The diphthong is pronounced as one syllable. To speak Spanish properly, do not change the sounds of the vowels, simply flow them together.

Try it:

siete — seven
ciudad — city

A stressed vowel between unstressed i or u in the same syllable is called a triphthong–as in the name of this country: Uruguay.

4. With the exception of the combinations iu and ui, stressed i and u do not form diphthongs with other vowels.

Example:

día — day

Watch: Learn Spanish Vowels Video

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