Dear reader,<\/p>\n
This week let’s consider two Spanish words and their English translations: chachachá<\/em> (that infectious rhythm born in Cuba) and tamal,<\/em> which we looked at some weeks back.<\/p>\n From that musical colossus, Cuba, there emerged around 1953 another in a long line of dance sensations, a gently upbeat creation by composer, violinist and bandleader Enrique Jorrín. It derived from the danzón<\/em>, a rhythm generally played by smaller orchestras of refined or “French” sound, known as ”charangas”, with melodies typically carried by flute and violin.<\/p>\n Jorrín called his rhythm chachachá<\/em> due to its triple rhythmic figure and the swishing sound of the dancer’s shoes against the floor. (The original onomatopoeia apparently was shashashá.<\/em>)<\/p>\n In English, it loses the chá<\/em> and becomes simply “cha-cha”: the name no longer reproduces the rhythm. But why? We can suspect that phonetics played a role: it’s not easy for English speakers to pull off chachachá<\/em>’s three crisp syllables (though musicians typically have no such trouble).<\/p>\n Phonetics, too, helped make “tamale” the English singular of Spanish tamal<\/em><\/strong>. Besides the logical (though incorrect) inference that the singular of tamales<\/em> was tamale<\/em>, people’s ear told them that “tamale” sounded better in English—it has a pleasing sway and even conveys an exotic note in naming a food that for a century has been delighting North American taste buds.<\/p>\n So: one case of something lost, and another of something gained, in translation.<\/p>\n ¡Buenas palabras!<\/em><\/p>\n Pablo<\/p>\n A version of this article appeared in <\/em>La Prensa Latina (Memphis, Tennessee) published Oct. 21, 2012, along with a Spanish-language version.<\/em><\/p>\n Copyright © 2012 by Pablo J. Davis. All rights reserved.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Dear reader, This week let’s consider two Spanish words and their English translations: chachachá (that infectious rhythm born in Cuba) and tamal, which we looked at some weeks back. From that musical colossus, Cuba, there emerged around 1953 another in a long line of dance sensations, a gently upbeat creation by composer, violinist and bandleader Enrique Jorrín. It derived […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[93],"tags":[95,190,161,191,192,58,59,29,30,44,10,11,45,36,126,47,101,12,13,48,49,50,39,51,52,17,18,54,55,19],"class_list":{"0":"post-598","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-interflows-language-culture-blog","7":"tag-pablo-j-davis","8":"tag-certificado","9":"tag-certified","10":"tag-cha-cha","11":"tag-chachacha","12":"tag-comparative","13":"tag-cultura","14":"tag-cultural","15":"tag-culture","16":"tag-davis","17":"tag-english","18":"tag-english-spanish","19":"tag-espanol","20":"tag-hispanic","21":"tag-hispano","22":"tag-ingles","23":"tag-interfluency","24":"tag-interpreter","25":"tag-interpreting","26":"tag-julian","27":"tag-latin","28":"tag-latin-american","29":"tag-latino","30":"tag-pablo","31":"tag-pablo-julian-davis","32":"tag-spanish","33":"tag-spanish-english","34":"tag-traduccion","35":"tag-traductor","36":"tag-translation","37":"entry"},"yoast_head":"\n