/tl/ en español mexicano. ¿Un segmento o dos?

Abstract

In Mexican Spanish the lexical frequency of /tl/ is much higher than in Peninsular Spanish, since it appears in a sizeable number of borrowings and toponyms from Nahuatl. The distribution of /tl/ in Mexican Spanish raises the question of whether /tl/ is actually better viewed a single segment in this Spanish variety (a stop with lateral release, like in Nahuatl), rather than as a sequence of segments, as in Peninsular Spanish. In this paper we test the hypothesis that /tl/ is monosegmental in Mexican Spanish. Our assumption is that reduced duration of /tl/ with respect to similar groups such as /pl/ and /kl/ would provide evidence for monosegmentalism. The experimental results do not offer support for the monosegmental hypothesis. Instead, they serve to establish that /tl/ is, in fact, an onset cluster in Mexican Spanish, not significantly different in its duration from other clusters. Interestingly, but not unexpectedly, word-medial /tl/ is shorter in Castilian than in Mexican Spanish. This follows from a well-known difference in syllabification between the two dialects. In conclusion, /tl/ is an onset cluster in Mexican Spanish, both word- initially and word-medially. In Castilian Spanish, on the other hand, it can only be a heterosyllabic group.