Morphosyntactic Integration of Single-Word Anglicisms in Border Mexican Spanish

Bibliographic Data

ID19487481
AuthorsRuben Roberto Peralta-Rivera (0009-0005-6294-5370, Universidad Autónoma de Baja California, corresponding author), Rafael Saldívar-Arreola (0000-0003-4541-5835, Universidad Autónoma de Baja California)
Year2026
Volume11
Issue5
Pages89
Publication date2026-05-05
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueLanguages (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2226-471X • E-ISSN: 2226-471X
PublisherMDPI AG (PUBLISHER • IT)
DOI10.3390/languages11050089
OpenAlexW7160306339
LanguageEN
References cited18

Loanword Research on Anglicisms has largely centered on lexical borrowing and phonological adaptation with comparatively limited attention to morphosyntactic integration in recipient grammars. This study examines the morphosyntactic behavior of 74 single-word Anglicisms—monosyllabic structures with monophthongal vowels—drawn from phonetically classified corpora of spontaneous Mexican Spanish produced by Spanish–English bilinguals in the Tijuana–San Diego border region. Building on prior acoustic analyses based on F1 and F2 vowel measurements, the study investigates the relationship between phonological adaptation and morphosyntactic integration. Results reveal a gradient pattern of incorporation. Anglicisms exhibiting Spanish-like phonetic properties tend to occupy canonical syntactic positions and show greater compatibility with Spanish functional morphology, whereas phonetically non-adapted forms more frequently resist morphological marking and display island-like behavior within otherwise Spanish clauses. The analysis examines distribution across nominal, adjectival, and prepositional domains and object positions to assess morphosyntactic integration degrees. The former is illustrated as follows: (1) guardo cash ([kaʃ]) por si acaso; (2) si hacen match ([mæʧ]), puede funcionar. Adopting a usage-based and contact-oriented perspective for syntactic borrowing, the study is situated within the Matrix Language Frame model and recent approaches to insertional borrowing. A central contribution lies in establishing a principled link between morphosyntactic behavior and an independently motivated phonetic classification, offering convergent evidence for the systematic integration of Anglicisms into Spanish grammar. At a broader analytical level, the study advances debates on syntactic borrowing and contact-induced change by demonstrating that Anglicisms are subject to Spanish morphosyntactic constraints rather than functioning as unconstrained lexical insertions, and by developing an interface-based account of borrowing that captures the gradient nature of grammatical incorporation in contact settings and contributes a corpus-based, empirically grounded perspective to typologies of borrowing in Spanish contact linguistics

Mid vowel · Object (grammar) · Optimality theory · Perspective (graphical) · Subject (documents) · Syntax · Vowel · Linguistics, Language Diversity, and Identity · Multilingual Education and Policy · Spanish Linguistics and Language Studies

Tools

Open DOIOpen Access