About Learning Spanish with Berlitz
Spanish is the most widely spoken of the Romance languages, both in terms of number of speakers and the number of countries in which it is the dominant language. Besides being spoken in Spain, it is the official language of Mexico, Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico, of all the Central American countries except Belize, and of all of the South American countries except Brazil, Guyana, Suriname, and French Guiana. In the United States there are now more than 25 million speakers of Spanish, living mainly in California, Arizona, Texas, Florida, and New York, but also in many other states. Spanish is also spoken in the Balearic and Canary islands (which are part of Spain), in parts of Morocco, in Western Sahara, and in Equatorial Guinea. A variety of Spanish known as Ladino is spoken in Turkey and Israel by descendants of Jews who were expelled from Spain in 1492. All told, there are about 375 million speakers of Spanish. It is one of the six official languages of the United Nations.
Pronunciation and usage of Spanish naturally vary between countries, but regional differences are not so great as to make the language unintelligible to speakers from different areas. The purest form of Spanish is known as Castilian, originally one of the dialects that developed from Latin after the Roman conquest of Hispania in the 3rd century AD. After the disintegration of the Roman Empire, Spain was overrun by the Visigoths, and in the 8th century the Arabic-speaking Moors conquered all but the northernmost part of the peninsula. In the Christian reconquest Castile, an independent kingdom, took the initiative, and by the time of the unification of Spain in the 15th century Castilian had become the dominant dialect. In the years that followed, Castilian now Spanish became the language of a vast empire in the New World.
English words of Spanish origin include cargo, siesta, sombrero, mesa, hacienda, patio, armada, guerrilla, junta, plaza, canyon, rodeo, pueblo, adobe, vanilla, armadillo, tornado, embargo, and bonanza.
