You have decided to learn Spanish. Now you need to decide which accent to learn: Spanish from Spain or from Latin America? And if it is from Latin America, then which country has the best Spanish? So many questions and you haven’t even started learning. To help you find out which Spanish do you really need, we have come up with some questions you will find useful:
Is there a “Better” Spanish?
The answer is: no. There is no country or city where you could say there is a better Spanish. In fact, Spanish (or any language) is good in the sense that it serves the purpose to communicate what you need to say. Therefore, the uses that a community makes out of the words they use are, for them, the best ones.
Are You Moving to a Spanish Speaking Country?
If the answer is “yes”, the best bet for you would be to learn the variation from the country in specific where you are planning on living. Remember there are even different ways to say “you”, so keep that in mind whenever you are learning the Spanish from that specific country. After you learn the actual vocabulary and expressions that will matter to you, and get familiar with the accent people have in that country, it will be way easier to pick up expressions from elsewhere.
What about a Standard Spanish?
There are words that you can use in every country and you could communicate effectively by learning what you would call a “standard” Spanish, that is to say, an average or accepted Spanish. Nevertheless, if you are actually going to live or interact with native speakers, you will very quickly realize that the “standard” Spanish could be very limited and most people will prefer to speak Spanish to you using the particular words from the popular use in that country.
An example could be you saying that something is cool or “es muy bueno” and a native speaker saying that the same thing is “muy chevere”. This last expression has more power than the standard word because it reflects the culture of the place. In other words, eliminates the barriers between you and the other speaker.
How Different are Spanish Accents?
Every Spanish speaking country has its own accent. Furthermore, you can be surprised by even bigger variety of accents within the country itself. For instance, in Colombia, you could find a neutral and clear Spanish accent in a city like Bogota, and in the towns around it too.But in the coastal region of the same country you’ll find a very different accent, where people tend to replace the sound of the letter “j” with an “s”. Words like: estas, or amigas would sound “ejtas” and ” amigaj”.
Finally, one word of advice in your quest for the best Spanish for you: If you are going to live in a specific place, learn the Spanish from there; otherwise, learn Spanish from a speaker who takes the time to speak clearly and as “standard” as possible.
Spanish is a very rich language with a lot of variations from country to country. As long as you identify the need you have for Spanish, you will easily know which variation of the language will be more useful for you to learn. Once you learn the variation of Spanish you need, you can easily learn and even use the vocabulary from other countries. Also, once you get the hang out of understanding one country’s accent, it will get easy to identify words from other Spanish speakers form other regions.
If you want to have a handy guide of Spanish words and sentences you can use, check out our free Spanish Survival Guide!
