A. In Chile there is a variation of the second person familiar form, that is similiar to the voceo of other Latin American countries (such as Argentina).  It is often spoken among friends by younger people to sound cool.  It is kind of a "street slang."  Also a form of it is used by people from rural areas or lower socio-economic status.

It's very common to use this form when joking around or to show insolence. The Chilean form of voceo (which they don't call voceo, by the way) is almost the same as the familiar form or el tutear.

The main difference between this form and the regular familiar form are in the present indicative and imperative tenses, which are conjugated the same. Conjugate AR, IR, and irregular ER verbs in the vosotros form and simply drop the "s." To conjugate regular ER verbs, conjugate them in the vosotros form as if they were an IR verb.

• For example:

  estáis	¡Estay loco!
  venís	Vení pa' ca.
  sois	Tú soy...
  váis	¿Adónde vay?
  querís*	¿Qué querí?
  tenís*	¿Qué tení?

B. Chileans often aspirate the "s" sound.

• For example:

  más o menos	maomeno
  muchas gracias	mucha gracia
  es lo mismo	e lo mimo

C. Also, the "d" sound is often aspirated in past participles and words that end in "do" or "da".

• For example:

  cara de palo	care palo
  comida	comía
  encachado	encachao
  empanada	empaná
  nada que ver	na' que ver
  pelado	pelao
  pescado	pescao

D. Another peculiarity of common Chilean speech is the suffix "po". It is added to the last word of a sentence for extra emphasis. It comes from pues, however it has no real meaning.

• For example:

  Sí.	Sípo.
  No.	Nopo.
  Ven a la playa.	Ven a la playa, po.

© Copyright 2006 ChileZine Co. All rights reserved.
Written and compiled by Eric Canfield.