PARAGUAYISMS. PARAGUAYAN SPANISH AND GAURANI. JOPARÁ – “THE THIRD LANGUAGE” OF PARAGUAY. JUAN MANUEL MARCOS “GUNTER’S WHINTER”

In the article the peculiarities of the linguistic situation of
Paraguay are analyzed: the typical lexical units,
paraguayisms – “the linguistic units of Spanish and Guarani that
are contrasted with the spoken Spanish of other countries of Latin
America and Spain, which pose certain difficulties of rapid
comprehension for Spanish speakers”.
The description and general classification of paraguayisms is
made from several points of view.
Formal classification: phonetic paraguayisms; grammatical
(morphosyntactic); lexicals (even idioms and turns of speech).
Lexico-semantic calcification – from the point of view of the
appearance of connotations.
The linguistic situation of Paraguay is presented as the only one,
“ideal bilingualism”, with certain nuances of multilingualism.
Author rescues some peculiarities, most notable of the Spanish
and Guarani of Paraguay.
Article first reveals the linguistic units that belong to the lexical
paraguayisms of Spanish and Guaraní. The classification of
Spanish paraguayisms (occasionalism) is offered.
It is stated that lexical paraguayisms belong to idioms – fixed
expressions whose meanings cannot be deduced from the words
that compose it. It is a linguistic custom that allows condensing
an idea in a few words and transmitting this concept to all those
who share the same language
It offers the differentiation between proverbs and idioms. An
idiom, on the other hand, of saying, does not educate, does not
have that intention. Describe a situation, a personality trait and
nothing else. For example: Being a pig or eating more than a
remorse. An idiom can be a phrase or a single word
Speaking of the Paraguayan Guarani, it is stressed that it is not
only the language, but the philosophical stone of the race that
reveals its origin and destiny and is based on the own
cosmogony – set of beliefs, experience that form the culture of the
people, among which find the mythical story about the origins of
the world or the evolution of the Universe. According to the
Guarani, language is something divine because it was invented
and given to them by their God, Ñamandú.
Pay attention to the importance of careful analysis of the
mentality of the Guarani for the correct translation of written and
oral texts because the Guarani cosmogony takes us back to the
origins of the creation of the world, with a simplicity and
simplicity that any reasonably reasonable person can understand
without the complications of “mysteries” of which most civilized
cultures are full.
The historical aspects of the coexistence of Spanish and Guarani
are mentioned.
The author rescues the most remarkable peculiarities of the
Spanish of Paraguay and the Guarani. It is noted that the conquest
situation gave certain advantages to the development of the
Guaraní. There was no imposition of one culture over the other.
On the contrary, both of them went through a mutual process of
linguistic enrichment. This condition led to the mixture of two
different cultures and languages and the appearance of the “third
language” of Paraguay – jopará (guarañol, hispanicized Guarani),
which de facto is the “main language” of Paraguay today.
Some aspects of the formation of jopará are clarified:
morphosyntactic, lexical, in the first place.
Notice that the characteristics of the Paraguayan linguistic
situation are observed not only for the spoken language of the
people, but are they reflected in contemporary Paraguayan
literature, firstly in Juan Manuel Marcos’s novel “Gunter’s
Winter”, one of the ten most outstanding novels in the history of
Paraguayan literature.
In the base of this novel the functions of the paraguayisms in the
literature are shown, its aesthetic value is underlined in the
culture, the history and the soul of the Paraguayan people in
general.
Keywords: bilingualism, Paraguayan Spanish, Paraguayan
Guarani – language of images, paraguayisms, semantics,
jopara – “third Paraguayan language”, “Gunter’s Winter”