Jopará is a mixed language spoken in Paraguay, combining the Spanish and Guaraní languages. Its name is from the Guaraní word for "mixed".
This term designates whatever form of communication using both languages at a same time.
It can be said that the 94% of the people of Paraguay who are assumed to speak Guaraní actually speaks Jopará.
Since 1992, under the Paraguay's Ministry of Education and Culture (MEC) act, Guaraní in its "pure form" has begun to be taught; differentiating from Jopará. This led to contradictory opinions: ones saying that these are the best means to preserve the language integrity and others arguing that how it's being taught differs greatly from the way it's spoken.
This Spanish creole language had been made up mainly of:
- borrowings from Spanish
- Spanish verbs conjugated with Guaraní pattern
- Guarani pospositions used for emotional expression and subtle meanings somewhat like the final particles in Japanese and their rough translation to Spanish that sometimes differ tremendously from their actual meaning in Spanish
Also some Spanish words when put in a sentence mixed with Guarani turn to have a different meaning that the one of Standard Spanish
- Use of Guarani pospositions between Spanish words instead of its prepositions, and vice versa
The percentage of gammatic sintaxis of Guaraní or Spanish used in speech varies depending upon the procedence of the speaker, the place where he's speaking, whom is he speaking to, about what is he speaking and firstly in the speaker's intention and how he wants the message to be interpreted. Generally the urban population tends to use more Spanish and the rural more Guaraní.
Jehe'a
editParaguayan Linguistics use the term jehe'a to denote a Guarani text with Spanish words unnecessarily borrowed written with Guaraní ortography.
This present-day phenomenon occur because it's easiest to use Spanish words that people are more familiar with and it's more practical than create new neologisms.
This caused very vigorous criticism to the MEC that writes educational books in this manner.
Examples
edit(Spanish words in green, Guaraní in brown)
- "Opresenta ilibro", instead of "Ohechauka ypy iñaranduka" (He introduces his book, lit.: se shows his object-that-keeps-knowledge for the first time)