The recent posts by @cryotosensei on the nature of the chinese language have sparked nutritive conversations on the virtues of other languages as well, I personally being enthusiastic about English. That left me thinking... what can I say on my part about Spanish, my native language? At a personal level I use English exclusively: to look up for information, to read articles, to formulate thoughts and to write down notes on whatever subject I consider important to save and expand. I leave Spanish for conversation and for quick personal memos I may delete later... so... what can I say? ...
... I can't say that there are negatives on Spanish, it's just not as agile and expressive as English... but what about the positives? ... here is a list of what I consider to be virtues of the Spanish language:
- First of all, it's phonetically consistent, so words are pronounced exactly as written, always.
- Even in its modern, plain form, it sounds chivalrous in the medieval sense, so we tend to soften it for informal conversation by using a lot of slang and modisms that will make it look like it's a different language for a non-native speaker. We do thus use the plain strict form to express ourselves with absolute seriousness and respect, specially when talking to a person we either don't know personally or is older.
- It can sound so chivalrous and self-serious even for rather mundane situations that sometimes we express ourselves that way on purpose as a form of humour. That seriousness and sharpness does make it sound much less prettier than English (conversely, English for us sounds so much cooler that we are envious). Any expression I know that sounds beautiful in English sounds hopelessly empty and dumb in Spanish so much that we use said translations in a humorous manner.
- On that line, Spanish also sounds very sophisticated, with its many articles and conjugations (non existent in english), so that much that when I first started learning my now beloved English I was horrified that it felt like if I had to speak in a "brute" manner, like a caveman.
- It defines words with much more constrained and strict meanings, which is what makes it less expressive sometimes, but also much more precise for other purposes. For example "libre" means "free" as in "freedom" only, whereas if we want to say "free" as in "for free" the word is "gratis", with no overlapping in the slightest with the meaning of the word "libre". Pleasantly enough, the verb "to be" is expressed in Spanish in two strictly different ways: "to be" as in "ser", meaning "when one is something", is strictly different from "to be" as in "estar", meaning "when one is somewhere". That clarity is a double edged sword, for English also profits from the ambiguity, but I really like the sharpness of distinctions in Spanish all along the language.
I hope this interests you and many more discussions on this and other languages continue on SN! :)