Are these historical Mexican novelas like mini-series that we see here in
the US? I would love to see those, but we get no Spanish language
broadcasts here in the Seattle area. Where could I get the videos or
DVDs? I just love costume dramas.
Also, a long time ago, my Spanish friend told me that my mother, who was
from New Mexico, spoke a very old Spanish dialect and she even told me the
province or area in Spain where it was once spoken, but I can't remember
it. Could it be Estremadura?
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, December 22, 2005 4:27
PM
Subject: Re: [ranchos] Given Names
Actually, they sound more like
Mexicans.
If you can get it in your area, try
to watch a novela called 'Alborada". It's a historical novel about
Mexico during the early 1800s. It'll give you a good idea of Mexico
during that time. There are other historical novelas about Mexico you can
either get on tape or CD.
It covers costuming, vanilla plantations, duelos,
thieves, people with titles, religious orders, Jewish relations, Catholic
Church, commerce with central America, la Nao de la China, ports of call,
commerce with other latinamerican countries (ties were closer than we think),
cochinilla, horses, carruajes, swordfighting, births (how registrations
were not aways true), legitimate and illegitimate, morals, etc.
Regarding hermanito, manito: this terminology is
found throughout the Spanish speaking world because of the priests telling the
new converts that they were hermanitos, so is that
particular pronounciation of acequia in just the way described
below. Puerto Ricans and Cubans are not the only ones who
pronounce it that way. I think that particular affectation of
speech -aspiration of sounds/vowels- is traced to a specific area of
Spain, the name of which escapes me right now. There are some
studies done by the University of Puerto Rico documenting this. The same goes
for the word colorao. That is rather common throughout
latinamerica.
Elvira
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Tuesday, December 20, 2005 8:08
PM
Subject: Re: [ranchos] Given
Names
They sound like Cubanos or Puertoriquenos to me.:)
Marge
On Dec 20, 2005, at 1:32 PM, Emilie Garcia wrote:
These people were
known as "manitos" (the priests had told them they were Hermanitos), and
their nasally speech was unique, an ancient 16th century Spanish, where
they dropped the first and last parts of words as in 'equia for acequia,
and 'manito for hermanito, and colorao for colorado, and they had beliefs
and practices unique to them. Due to more mobility nowadays, that is
all gone.
by Date 
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