Expressivity in Spanish

Abstract This chapter focuses on a set of expressive constructions in Spanish, with special reference to Rioplatense Spanish, a dialect spoken in Argentina. A Kaplanian perspective on meaning is adopted, according to which representational and expressive meanings are modeled in separated dimensions. The representational dimension is analyzed with the usual tools of possible world semantics, whereas expressive meanings are formally captured by relating linguistic expressions to sets of contexts, which ultimately provide use-conditions under which expressive correctness is evaluated. Syntax plays a crucial role in the derivation of use-conditions, whose calculus depends on different syntactic manipulations that connect grammar to contextual factors. Adjective expressives in prenominal position, mixed expressives in postnominal position, epithets, slurs, expressive intensifiers, and some aspects of the Rioplatense address and honorification systems are discussed, then, under this syntactic–semantic approach.