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This research aims to examine the nature of the orthographic reform proposals in the late nineteenth century in Spain, when Bourbon Restoration is established. From this moment, there is a resurgence of Spanish neography that, supported by the impulse from the different international reform movements, finds new reasons to expose its proposals and reform requests in some spaces of public opinion, specially in the press, which stands as the key piece for the orthographic discussion. This work will serve, from a general point of view, to evaluate the role of the written press in the resurgence of neographic actions in Spain; from a specific perspective, it aims to bring to light the reformist proposals from the historical press and to carry out its study taking into account the conjunction of the internal and external perspectives of linguistic historiography. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the uses in legal language of the terms allegality or allegal. Recently these terms have been incorporated into the Dictionary of The Royal Academic Spanish Academy of Language, however, there is a use of them in doctrinal, jurisprudential and even legal language. Firstly, the very definition provided by the Dictionary and its confusing or contradictory nature is studied. Next, the relationship of legality with the principle of permission is raised, that is, if in any case the absence of express regulation of a matter implies that there are a series of behaviors that are allowed by the legal system. On the other hand, it is evaluated if the allegality, the lack of a legal norm that regulates an area of social life, means that we are facing a legal gap or before spaces that cannot and should not be regulated by law. That is to say, if the behaviors not regulated by the law necessarily have to be resolved through the integration of the law or if they are aspects that do not belong to the legal sphere. We also study the fact that the allegal may represent a problem not so much of integration of legal norms but of interpretation of law, in which the attribution of meaning to normative statements may imply a lack of legal response. An analysis is made, below, of the use of terms «allegal» and «allegality» in the legal, jurisprudential and doctrinal discourse. From the legislative point of view, there are few cases in which the normative statements contain the terms allegal or allegality. Very exceptionally, in norms with a lower rank, and in general in the Statement of Reasons, these expressions are used. These terms are used in this speech as a synonymous with illegal. In the jurisprudential discourse we find that our courts make more frequent use of the terms allegal or allegality, even long before its incorporation into the Dictionary of the Royal Spanish Academy of Language. In this language, a plurality of meanings is given to the these statements, perhaps predominating their identification with the assumptions of illegality, the allegal is illegal. However, in other cases these expressions are used to refer to a legal situation with legal significance and the judge integrates the law to provide a legal response. The gaps in the law are resolved through the self-integration mechanisms provided by the legal system itself. But there are also cases in which legality is understood to be those cases that have no legal significance and therefore are unrelated to the judicial decision. The judicial discourse refers to these cases as cases that do not have to be regulated by the legal norm. As for the doctrinal language, it is necessary to point out that terms allegality o allegal also have a plurivocal character, probably having a greater weight than that in which the regulation of a matter is requested, de lege ferenda, citing reasons that would improve insufficient regulation. In most cases, the regulation and prohibition of certain behaviors is postulated. In this sense, the authors allude to the allegal as a pathology of the legal system that must be remedied by the legislator. Notwithstanding this, there are also cases in which conducts contrary to law and, therefore, punishable are indentified with illegality. This plurality of meanings and their redundant nature in some cases mean that we must reconsider the incorporation of these terms into legal language. From our point o view, they do not provide security and create confusion in different legal discourses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The preliminary findings from an unfinished investigation having a synchronic approach are presented. The objective of this study is to analyze the English loanwords that appear in the press of Santiago de Cuba city at the beginning of the XX century. This analysis will allow to draw significant conclusions concerning the presence of anglicisms in the Spanish spoken in Cuba. The methodology is based on a random revision of "El Cubano Libre" newspaper, at the time it is counted some aspects, namely: how many anglicisms were found, their typology, grammatical category, their frequency of appearance, and the year they were published in the dictionary of the Spanish Royal Academy. Among the outstanding results is remarkable that few English loanwords were registered in the dictionary of the Spanish Royal Academy, the topics more profitable to search were those of politics and sport, and the sort of anglicisms more frequent belong to the category of patent loanword. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the Spanish grammatical tradition, the variation between modal periphrasis deber and deber de + infinitive has been analyzed under two antagonistic points of view. Since the early eighteenth century, the Spanish Royal Academy sets up a rule that establishes a rigid functional dichotomy between both of them: epistemic values for deber de, and deontic ones for deber. However, the low compliance in the use of this rule at all times has led other linguists to deny this distinction, and to establish this phenomenon as a prototypical case of free variation. Nevertheless, our data, taken from some recent variationist research both in the synchrony and in the diachrony axis, show that both approaches are based on erroneous assumptions. Certainly, "anomalous" uses, ie. not adjusted to the normative rules, have taken place over the centuries, but this does not mean that the selection of the periphrasis has been anarchic. For the specific case of the periphrasis deber de, these data show the remarkable persistence over time of some factors (and not just epistemic modality, but also the negative polarity and the contextual intensification), whose positive influence on the prepositional variant has brought vitality in some periods (Golden Ages), while in others it has prevented the consummation of a definite change favourable to the non-prepositional variant. Finally, it is also proposed that the association between these factors and deber de, much less common and more marked in discourse than others, could explain the minor presence of this periphrasis throughout history. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines language users' attitudes toward language reforms proposed by the Real Academia Española (RAE) (Spanish Royal Academy) in 2010 by analyzing readers' comments posted online in response to an article byEl País,the major newspaper in Spain, which presented those reforms. This project combines the theoretical notion ofargumentation schemesby Fairclough and Fairclough [2012.Political discourse analysis: A method for advanced students. London: Routledge] and Systemic Functional Linguistics, in particular the Transitive Model [Halliday, M. A. K., & Matthiessen, C. M. I. M. (2004).An introduction to functional grammar(3rd ed.). London: Arnold, p. 282] to observe how thoseargumentation schemesare linguistically constructed and to connect linguistic forms, discourse practices, and social processes. This study classifies readers' comments/reactions considering rejection and acceptance of the changes and the most commonargumentation schemes(Fairclough & Fairclough, 2012, p. 23) displayed for each position. The majority of the arguments fall into four general categories against the proposed orthographic and spelling changes: (1) deterioration of the language, (2) RAE's failure to fulfill its duties, (3) language users' proprietary rights, and (4) rationality (logic) or two main categories in favor: (1) respect for the institution RAE and (2) rationality (logic). This classification explores issues related to language attitudes, language and senses of belonging, language and identity, and language and ideology, revealing ways in which members of a speech community express their ties and relationship with the language they speak. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article focuses on the Spanish Royal Academy (RAE, Real Academia Española) and its publication of the Spanish language dictionary "Ortografía de la Lengua Española" (Spanish language orthography). The author discusses the norms and criteria employed to decide what is considered correct usage of the Spanish language and reflects on the response of the RAE to linguistic and cultural trends. He also presents some examples from the dictionary which will be presented on November 28, 2010 at the Guadalajara Book Fair, in Mexico.

This paper examines the role of official institutions such as the Academies of the Spanish Language and the Instituto Cervantes in the creation of a Hispanic linguistic community, which is meant to represent a guarantee of cultural unity across the Atlantic after two hundred years of independence. This article highlights the project's faults: the neocolonialist aspects of its linguistic policy, and the submission of particular members of the Spanish American academic and social elites in these metropolitan-inspired initiatives. It also examines the economic logic behind such initiatives in the global market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the issue of whether Miguel de Cervantes stuttered in his works. Although the author agrees with other scholars that Cervantes stuttered, he explains the he finds scanty evidence to prove this and relies on intuition than solid textual evidence. Despite the lack of evidence, the author establishes the relevance of the condition to his writing and the necessity to inquire further. The author attempts to overcome in his study the definition of stuttering given by the Dictionary of the Spanish Royal Academy.