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  • I’m Miguel Centellas, a political science professor at Mount St. Mary’s University. Because of academic interests, I post frequently on Bolivian politics. I also occasionally discuss interesting books, pop culture, and daily life in Baltimore.
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Spanglish beer ads

August 26, 2007
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It seems some people are offended by recent beer ads by Annheiser-Busch (a swill I detest, for the record) because it uses Spanglish

Tan bueno como encontrar un parking en frente al building

in its ad campaign. The objections seem to be pedantic & based on not realizing that A) not all people speak the same Spanish, B) Spanglish is spoken by millions of people, and D) languages evolve in multicultural environments. I myself have used parquing and bilding when speaking Spanish (not Spanglish!). The simple rule of Spanglish is this: use the word w/ the fewest syllables (so “parking” beats “estacionamiento” hands down).

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Comments

Hi Miguel,
Thanks for your comment on my blog post. However, my blog entry was not about that particular Spanglish ad, but the other ones that appeared. The reason why I posted about the ads in the first place is because not all people speak the same Spanish. I didn't use that Spanglish ad in my initial commentary, because 1) it was probably one of the "clearest" ads in terms of being understandable and 2) I didn't see it that particular morning, as I was taking pictures of the other ads. Although, I still think it is important to look at; so I wrote up another post in regards to that ad.

That one particular ad is the only one that uses Spanglish. The other ads contains Spanish slangs that Anheuser-Busch picked and plunked from different countries, and which led to a good minute of trying to figure out meanings and origins of words that appeared in the ads. That's the basis of my analysis and argument. I still think that A-B used poor judgment when they decided to go forth with those ads without realizing that Spanish dialects have different vocabulary that separate them from one another.

Posted by L-K August 26, 2007 8:39 PM

    Oh, my comment was specifically aimed at people who were "offended" by the one Spanglish ad. I, too, believe that A-B probably used poor judgement in the execution of their ad campaign. But at the same time I appreciate their effort at recognizing that not all their consumers speak/read English-only (or even Spanish-only).

    Posted by mcentellas August 26, 2007 10:34 PM

      But where san one learn Spanglish? I heard of la carpeta and la trocka.

      Posted by Nenad August 26, 2007 11:53 PM

        I think Spanglish is one of those things you just learn by doing. And like most pigdin languages, there are few set "rules". That said, here are some websites:

        Diccionario de Spanglish

        Hispanic Scene (has a short list of Spanglish vocab)


        Posted by mcentellas August 27, 2007 8:11 AM


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