Pre-Basque Phonology

[Rick Mc Callister]

[snip ]

>[Ed Selleslagh]

>Note that similar, but not always identical, usages exist in various European
>languages like regional colloquial Peninsular Spanish ('la Maruja'), regional
>colloquial Dutch ('de Jan'), German ('der Otto') etc. The definite article is
>only used when speaking ABOUT the person, not TO him/her.

>Ed.

	It's also used in colloquial Latin American Spanish but, in
general, to imply familarity --whether affection or contempt, or perhaps to
emphasize the sugject.It's sort of like "our Ed" or "that Ed". In some
forms of rural or popular Latin American Spanish, it seems pretty universal
and a lot of college educated Latin Americans, particularly women, avoid it
as a vulgarism. And "inappropriate" usage of the article before proper
names can mark people as hillbillies or uneducated. I've come across it
among Mexicans, Central Americans, Colombians, Peruvians and Chileans.
	The article before titles in the 3rd person is standard in Spanish.
	In Portuguese, of course, the article before proper names used in
the 3rd person is standard.
	It seems to work like a "non-vocative" case marker.

Rick Mc Callister
W-1634
Mississippi University for Women
Columbus MS 39701