Linguistic Attitudes and Ideologies of Spanish High School Teachers towards Puerto Rican Spanish in Massachusetts

Abstract:This study analyzes linguistic ideologies and attitudes of Spanish high school teachers in Western Massachusetts towards Puerto Rican Spanish (PRS). An open-answer survey was conducted to examine the reactions of teachers towards utterances produced with well-documented Puerto Rican Spanish features. In the state of Massachusetts, Puerto Ricans represent the predominant Latino group, and, in some cities, such as Holyoke, they account for almost half of the population. This demographic points to PRS being the most widely spoken variety in the area. However, this does not mean that this is the Spanish variety that carries linguistic prestige or is used in academic settings. The prestige that a language variety possesses is related to linguistic ideologies and linguistic attitudes. The results of the study show that, while teachers have some linguistic variety awareness, prescriptive ideologies about language correctness still circulate among them.