Every country has a flag, food and symbols that identify them. But what about a single word?
During the 6th International Congress of the Spanish Language (VI Congreso Internacional de la Lengua Española) celebrated in Panama, the blog Papeles Perdidos, created by the newspaper El País, published an atlas of the representative words of Spanish-speaking countries. They asked 20 writers which word they consider “best reflects your country.” The storytellers, poets and essayists responded with what they consider the most authentic words from their country, and this the word from Cuba:
Cuban Spanish: ASERE
When asked about the most representative Cuban Spanish word, poet and novelist Wendy Guerra selected asere. She explains that this is a word of African origin.” Some say it means ‘I greet you,’ some say that in Lucumí (language) it means ‘crazy,’ but the truth is that the new generation of Cubans uses Asere and Asere que bolá as the most popular and common greeting that distinguishes us in the world.”
This Cuban Spanish word also has an alternate spelling, acere, and the Diccionario de Americanismos indicates that it also means “close friend.”
Do you agree that this word is the one that best represents Cuba?
Check out these other Cuba Spanish Slang Word articles.
