Redefining Yanito

An analysis from the perspective of young adults in Gibraltar

Abstract

Gibraltar, as a British enclave located in the south of the Iberian Peninsula, presents a rich linguistic, social, and cultural landscape. This article is part of a doctoral thesis and it presents a reflection on the local variety spoken in Gibraltar: Yanito. The main goal is to offer a new definition of this local variety in young adults. For this purpose, I present examples extracted from a corpus with a total of 48 participants (aged 16-35) consisting of 16 focus groups of 3 people. Participants follow a guide of conversation to trigger the discussion of topics such as the local variety: the focus of this study. It is argued that the term yanito has undergone a semantic extension and that, for the younger generation, yanito is going through a transformation process in which the matrix language is changing. Following previous literature on this subject, I argue that this transformation is a reflection of a process of language shift in the community.