Just like in the U.S. where every region has its own accent, Andalusia has a unique accent and its own rich lexicon of expressions. The Andalusian accent can be fun and even humorous to learn and use. Andalusians are known for being jovial, carefree people with lots of personality and their character is reflected in the way they speak.

There was a rock group called El Koala that sang a hilarious song basically making fun of the way Spanish (Ok… Andalusian) hicks talk (among other things). Of course, the artists themselves are Andalusians, so no harm done. The accent this guy uses is totally extreme and I don’t think you’ll ever meet anybody who talks like that unless you go to the “quinto pino” (the middle of nowhere).

Anyway, if you wanna speak like an Andalusian, here’s how it’s done.

Sesear and Zezear

According to the rules of Castillian Spanish (AKA “Spanish”), the letter “z” is always pronounced like the English “th” in the word “think”. The letter “c” is pronounced like a “k” when it’s followed by an “a”, “o” or “u” but pronounced like the English “th” in the word “think” when followed by an “e” or an “i”. The letter “s” is always pronounced like an “s” as in the word “sink”.

However, in Andalusia some people don’t distinguish between “c/z” and “s”. Some people will pronounce everything like an “s”. To do so is called sesear. Other people pronounce everything like a “th”. To do this is called zezear. A person who does not sesea or zezea would pronounce the Spanish word cinco like “thinko” and the Spanish word sopa like “soh-pah”. People who sesea would pronounce the word cinco like “sinko” and the word sopa like “soh-pah”. People who zezea would pronounce the word cinco like “thinko” and the word sopa like “thoh-pah”.

The Letter “D”

When the letter “d” appears between two vowels, it’s often not pronounced, especially in the cases of “ado”, “ada”, “ido”, “ida”, “adi”, “edi”, and “odi”. For example, comprado becomes comprao. Comido becomes comío. Ladillo becomes laíllo. Dedillo becomes deíllo. And with the word jodido you’ve got two “d’s”, both of which fall into one of the common cases where the “d” is dropped. So, jodido becomes joío.

The Letter “R”

The letter “r” also gets dropped sometimes when it falls between two consonants. You’ll hear this most frequently in the word para which is often pronounced pá. Most of the time, however, the “r” is pronounced because otherwise there could be some serious and often embarrassing confusion about the word being said. For example, if you left the “r” out of the word pero (“but”) and pronounced it péo, you’d actually be saying pedo (notice the dropped “d”) which means “fart”.

The letter “r” can also change its sound to that of the following consonant, especially when followed by the letter “N” or “L”. For example, perla can become pel-la and carne can become can-ne.

The Letter “S”

The letter “s” is frequently aspirated (meaning you pronounce it like the English “h”), substituted with a slight break (like when some Americans pronounce “went out” as “weh’ out”), or dropped altogether. For example, the word este might be pronounced ehte, e’te or ete.

The Letters “R” and “L”

Some Andalusians will pronounce the letter “R” like and “L” or vice versa or sometimes switch them around. This usually only happens when the “R” or “L” is in the middle of a word. For example, salsa might be pronounced sarsa.

Final Consonants

Anytime you’ve got a consonant at the end of a word, it’s usually OK not to pronounce it. For example, all verbs end in “r” in the infinitive form. So, correr could be pronounced corré. Autobus could be pronounced autobú. Centro comercial (shopping mall) might be pronounced Centro comerciá.

-illo and -illa

Andalusians love to add “-illo” and “-illa” at the end of words. These suffixes are the same as “-ito” and “-ita” as in casa -> casita. In fact, Andalusians love to use “illo” so much that they’ll use it not only with nouns but with adjectives, too. For example, the adjective pesado can be turned into pesaíllo which would mean “a little heavy” or “kind of heavy” or, if you’re using Spanish slang, it could mean “kind of annoying”.

Example of an “Acento Granaíno”

Here’s a sample sentence as it would be written in Spanish.

El otro día estaba en un bar tomándome una copa con un granadino muy majo que había viajado por todo el mundo y que decía que… nada… que hay muchos sitios muy bonitos pero que uno de los sitios que más le gustó fue estados unidos.

Here’s the same sentence as it might be pronounced by a person from Granada with a heavy accent.

El otro día etaba en un bá tomándome una copilla con un granaíno mu majo que había viajao por tó er mundo y que desía que… ná… que hay mucho sitio muy bonito pero que uno de lo sitio que má le gustó fue estao unío.

And finally, here’s the same sentence translated into English.

The other day I was in a bar having a glass of wine with a very nice guy from Granada who had traveled all over the world. He told me that he’d been to a lot of beautiful places but that one of the places he liked most was the United States.

Things to Remember

Most people in Andalusia don’t have heavy accents and it’s very easy to understand them. Just as with any language, the people who have extremely heavy accents are usually people from rural areas or people with a very low level of education.

Granada is a city of intellectuals with over 80,000 students attending the University of Granada each year, accounting for over 25% of the population. Consequently, Granaínos tend to be especially easy to understand.

It can be fun to learn the Andalusian accent. But there’s absolutely no need to. You’ll have no problem communicating even if you speak Spanish with a heavy Texas accent!