“¿Otra vez con fame? ¡Menudo llambión!”: an approximation to linguistic attitudes in Asturias

By adopting a matched-guise technique, the present study examines covert and overt attitudes towards Asturian, a minoritized language spoken in Asturias (Northwestern Spain). The two phonetic Asturian variants empirically analyzed are Asturian ‘f-’ and ‘ll-’ vs. Spanish ‘h-’ and ‘l-’, respectively. Given the current stigmatization of Asturian, the hypothesis is that guises in which the Asturian linguistic variants are employed will be judged as used by lower social status speakers in comparison to those in which the Spanish variants are uttered. Results support this hypothesis. Furthermore, examples of covert prestige towards Asturian were found in traits such as friendliness, generosity, and kindness. This project on Asturian linguistic attitudes can provide insight into the types of initiatives that can be considered to restitute the language’s social prestige, and thus give it additional social support with regards to its legal status.