What language is spoken in Chile?
The Castilian
Chileans speak Castilian (Spanish) like all South American countries - with the exception of Brazil - a legacy of Spanish colonization.
But beware! Chileans probably have one of the most pronounced accents of all Spaniards on the continent, along with Argentines. They have their own way of pronouncing certain words, speak fast and use many "Chileanisms" that their neighbors Peruvians, Bolivians or Argentinians do not necessarily understand...!
Three words are particularly well known: the "po", the "weon" and the "cachay"...
These three words are regularly used for anything and everything and adopt just about any grammatical status to the point of being used as a form of punctuation!
Po is a deformation of "pues" that is widely used by all Spanish speakers but which Chileans deform and abuse enormously. It doesn't bring any meaning to the sentence, and is similar to a comma.
Weon is a distortion of "huevon" which means "asshole". It is a very colloquial or even vulgar language and can be, depending on the context and intonation, either friendly or pejorative. Sometimes used up to 3 or 4 times in the same sentence, it also marks a punctuation mark, an affective or derogatory nickname.
Cachay means "you understand", the equivalent of a "you get it" that marks the end of a sentence without adding meaning. The ending in "AY" corresponds to the very particular Chilean accent used to conjugate verbs in the second person plural (pronounced "hi").
Chileans often make it difficult for foreigners to understand a simple sentence by adding unnecessary words, which can be tedious for foreigners.
When Peruvians or Bolivians say to you: Hola, como estas? (Hello, how are you?)
a Chilean tells you: hola, como estay po huevon? (pronounce: como s'tay po weon)
If you will hear these phrases very often, be careful with their use. It is indeed a very familiar language which, if all Chileans use it, can be misinterpreted and considered vulgar in the mouth of a foreigner because it is misused.
Amerindian languages
As in all South American countries other languages are present in Chile. While Castilian is the only official language, Amerindian and ancient languages are spoken in some regions without official recognition.- Mapuche in the Lakes Region
- Rapa Nui on Easter Island
- Quechua (Runa Simi), very little spoken, in the north, on the borders with Bolivia and Peru.
- Aymara also in the northern part bordering Bolivia.
