polska: Culture of Latin America

Evidence: 100 • authority: 72

The culture of Latin America is the formal or informal expression of the people of Latin America and includes both high culture (literature and high art) and popular culture (music, folk art, and dance), as well as religion and other customary practices. These are generally of Western origin, but have various degrees of Native American, African and Asian influence. Definitions of Latin America vary. From a cultural perspective, Latin America generally refers to those parts of the Americas whose cultural, religious and linguistic heritage can be traced to the Latin culture of the late Roman Empire. This would include areas where Spanish, Portuguese, and various other Romance languages, which…

Evidence: 65 • authority: 72

Spanish (español) or Castilian (castellano) is a Romance language of the Indo-European language family that evolved from the Vulgar Latin spoken on the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. It originated in the Kingdom of Castile, a kingdom in north-central Iberia. Today, it is a global language with 519 million native speakers, mainly in the Americas and Spain, and about 636 million speakers total, including second-language speakers. Spanish is the official language of 21 countries, as well as one of the six official languages of the United Nations. Spanish is the world's second-most spoken native language after Mandarin Chinese; the world's fourth-most spoken language overall after English, Mandar…

Evidence: 65 • authority: 72

Latin (lingua Latina or Latinum) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally spoken by the Latins in Latium (now known as Lazio), the lower Tiber area around Rome, Italy. Through the expansion of the Roman Republic, it became the dominant language in the Italian Peninsula and subsequently throughout the Roman Empire. It has greatly influenced many languages, including English, having contributed many words to the English lexicon, particularly after the Christianisation of the Anglo-Saxons and the Norman Conquest. Latin roots appear frequently in the technical vocabulary used by fields such as theology, the sciences, medicine, a…

Evidence: 65 • authority: 72

Vulgar Latin, also known as Colloquial, Popular, Spoken or Vernacular Latin, is the range of non-formal registers of Latin spoken from the Late Roman Republic onward. Latin was in conversational use across many centuries, in many locations, and in various contexts. Thus, Vulgar Latin as a term is both controversial and imprecise, with scholars differing in opinion as to the extent of the differences from Classical Latin and whether this broad umbrella was in some sense a distinct language or speech variety. At its extreme, the theory of a separate Vulgar Latin, first developed in the early 19th century by the French linguist François-Just-Marie Raynouard, suggested that the common speech di…

Evidence: 59 • authority: 72

Portuguese (endonym: português) is a Western Romance language of the Indo-European language family, written in the Latin script. With approximately 267 million native speakers, it is the fifth-most spoken native language in the world, and the most widely spoken language in the Southern Hemisphere. It is the official language of eight countries — Portugal, Brazil, Angola, Mozambique, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau, São Tomé and Príncipe, and Timor-Leste — and is co-official with other languages in Macau, Equatorial Guinea, Goa Portuguese-speaking people or nations are known as Lusophone (lusófono). As a result of expansion during colonial times, a cultural presence of Portuguese speakers is also…

Evidence: 42 • authority: 80

Romance Languages as a Source for Spoken Latin

Evidence: 42 • authority: 80

22. From Latin and Vulgar Latin to Romance Languages

Evidence: — • authority: 88

Spanish + Portuguese = Mixing(?): Forcing the Issue. In sustained Spanish–Portuguese contact zones, there is often a mismatch between observable linguistic data and speakers’ views on the degree of resulting hybridity. Terms like “Portuñol/Portunhol” are suggestive of a “third” language, but little empirical evidence has been offered in support of such outcomes, and spontaneous speech does not provide the complete envelope of variation. The present study draws on data collected in Misiones province in northeastern Argentina, where vernacular Portuguese is spoken natively in rural households, and Spanish is first acquired informally. To empirically test popular notions of “Portuñol” hybridit…

Evidence: — • authority: 88

The Romance Conjugation in <i>-ēscō (-īscō) -īre</i> : Its Origin in Vulgar Latin. [Almost every Romance language has a number of verbs in -ir(e), in which some endings are taken from the Latin inchoatives. This conjugation had its origin in a blending of the old inchoative verbs in -ēscō with certain denominative verbs of the 4th conjugation (not with verbs of state in -ēre). The ēsc ō-forms came to be regarded as personal endings of denominative verbs. Hence -īscō, a collateral form of -ēscō, was preferred by a large section of the Latin-speaking territory, giving rise to a type -īscō -īre in some of the Romance languages.]

Evidence: — • authority: 72

The Portuguese-speaking world, also known as the Lusophone world (Portuguese: mundo lusófono), Lusophony (Lusofonia), or the Lusosphere (Portuguese: Lusoesfera) is the countries and territories in which the Portuguese language is an official, administrative, cultural, or secondary language. This article provides details regarding the geographical distribution of all Portuguese-speakers or Lusophones, regardless of legislative status. The prefix luso derives from the name of the ancient Roman province of Lusitania. Portuguese is one of the most widely spoken languages in the world and is an official language of countries on four continents. The Community of Portuguese Language Countries (CPL…

Evidence: — • authority: 72

Portuguese and Spanish, although closely related Romance languages, differ in many aspects of their phonology, grammar, and lexicon. Both belong to a subset of the Romance languages known as West Iberian Romance, which also includes several other languages or dialects with fewer speakers, all of which are mutually intelligible to a considerable degree. The most obvious differences between Spanish and Portuguese are in pronunciation. Mutual intelligibility is greater when written rather than spoken. Compare, for example, the following sentences—roughly equivalent to the English proverb "A word to the wise is sufficient," or, a more literal translation, "To a good listener, a few words are en…

Evidence: — • authority: 72

Papiamento (English: ), or Papiamentu (English: ; Dutch: Papiaments [ˌpaːpijaːˈmɛnts]), is a Portuguese-based creole language spoken in the Dutch Caribbean. It is the most widely spoken language on Aruba, Bonaire, and Curaçao (the ABC islands). The language, spelled Papiamento in Aruba and Papiamentu in Bonaire and Curaçao, is largely based on Portuguese as spoken in the 15th and 16th centuries, and has been influenced considerably by Dutch and Spanish. Lexical similarities between Portuguese and Spanish make it difficult to pinpoint the exact origin of some words. Though there are different theories about its origins, most linguists now believe that Papiamento emerged from the Portuguese-b…