Grammatical gender agreement in Ondarroa Basque: A triangulation study of production and attitudes
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Publicado
20-01-2026
Gorka Basterretxea Santiso
Ager Gondra
Sara Gómez Seibane
https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9275-1949
Ager Gondra
Sara Gómez Seibane
Resumen
Basque (Euskera) and Spanish are two languages in contact in the Basque Country. One linguistic aspect both languages diverge in is grammatical gender agreement: while Spanish produces grammatical gender agreement, Basque does not. Interestingly, some western Basque varieties have been reported to exhibit Spanish-style gender marking with some adjectives derived from Spanish and only in oral production. However, no empirical study has corroborated this observation. Thus, with the aim of delimiting the (in)existence of grammatical gender agreement in Basque, this project triangulates the production of and attitudes towards grammatical gender use with 20 Ondarroa Basque speakers (a western Basque variety belonging to the province of Bizkaia). Results suggest that Spanish-style grammatical gender agreement is possible with Spanish-originated and Basque adjectives, and that it is perceived as natural, respectful, and part of Basque.
Cómo citar
Basterretxea Santiso, Gorka, Ager Gondra, y Sara Gómez Seibane. 2026. «Grammatical Gender Agreement in Ondarroa Basque: A Triangulation Study of Production and Attitudes». Anuario Del Seminario De Filología Vasca "Julio De Urquijo", enero. https://doi.org/10.1387/asju.27562.
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References
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Badiola, Lucia & Ariane Sande. 2018. Gender assignment in Basque/Spanish mixed determiner phrases: A study of simultaneous bilinguals. In Luis López (ed.), Code-switching - Experimental answers to theoretical questions. In honor of Kay González-Vilbazo, 15-38. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/ihll.19.02bad.
Bandalos, Deborah L. & Meggen R. Boehm-Kaufman. 2008. Four common misconceptions in exploratory factor analysis. In Charles E. Lance & Robert J. Vandenberg (eds.), Statistical and methodological myths and urban legends, 61-87. New York, NY: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203867266.
Basterretxea Santiso, Gorka. 2022. A triangulation study on gender agreement in Spanish by native Basque speakers. Revista Española de Lingüística (RSEL) 52(1). 7-37. https://doi.org/10.31810/rsel.52.1.1.
Basterretxea Santiso, Gorka. 2023. Linguistic landscape in a rural Basque area: A case study in Ondarroa. International Journal of Multilingualism 22(2). 209-227. https://doi.org/10.1080/14790718.2023.2256781.
Basterretxea Santiso, Gorka. 2024. “Aquí toman mucho sopa:” Linguistic variables as predictors of non-standard gender agreement production in Basque Spanish. Open Linguistics 10(1). 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1515/opli-2024-0025.
Basterretxea Santiso, Gorka. 2025. “Fallo garrafal y común entre vascoparlantes:” Attitudes and salience of grammatical gender agreement in Basque-Spanish contact. Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 18(1). 37-77. https://doi.org/10.1515/shll-2025-2002.
Bedialauneta Txurruka, Izaro & José Ignacio Hualde. 2023. Markina Basque. Journal of the International Phonetic Association 53(3). 1095-1121. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0025100322000032.
Bereziartua Etxebarria, Garbiñe & Beñat Muguruza Aseginolaza. 2018. Erabileraren gakoak egoera informaletan eta gazteen artean: hitanoa Azpeitiko gazteen artean. Hermes: Pentsamendu eta Historia Aldizkaria 60. 24-48.
Bereziartua Etxebarria, Garbiñe & Beñat Muguruza Aseginolaza. 2020. Euskal hiztun natiboak, ez-natiboak eta hitanoa. In Ekaitz Santazilia, Dorota Krajewska, Eneko Zuloaga & Borja Ariztimuño (eds.), Fontes Linguae Vasconum 50 urte: Ekarpen berriak euskararen ikerketari, 127-141. Pamplona: Nafarroako Gobernua. https://doi.org/10.35462/fontes50urte.8.
Buchstaller, Isabelle. 2006. Social stereotypes, personality traits and regional perception displaced: Attitudes towards the ‘new’ quotatives in the U.K. Journal of Sociolinguistics 10(3). 362-281. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1360-6441.2006.00332.x.
deCastro-Arrazola, Varun, Edoardo Cavirani, Kathrin Linke & Francesc Torres-Tamarit. 2015. A typological study of vowel interaction in Basque. Isogloss 1/2. 147-177. http://dx.doi.org/10.5565/rev/isogloss.19.
de Rijk, Rudolph P. G. 1970. Vowel interactión in Bizcayan Basque. Fontes Linguae Vasconum 5. 149-167. https://doi.org/10.35462/flv5.2.
Di Garbo, Francesca & Matti Miestamo. 2019. The evolving complexity of gender agreement systems. In Francesca Di Garbo, Bruno Olsson & Bernhard Wälchli (eds.), Grammatical gender and linguistic complexity: Volume II: World-wide comparative studies, 15-60. Berlin: Language Science Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3446230.
Drager, Katie. 2018. Experimental research methods in sociolinguistics. London: Bloomsbury. http://dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781474251815.
Euskaltzaindia. 1991. Euskal gramatika: lehen urratsak-I. Bilbao: Euskaltzaindia.
Euskaltzaindia. 2002. Euskal gramatika laburra: Perpaus bakuna. Bilbao: Euskaltzaindia.
Euskaltzaindia. 2021. Euskararen gramatika. Bilbao: Euskaltzaindia.
Euskaltzaindia. s.a. Euskararen herri hizkeren atlasa. s.l.: Euskaltzaindia. https://www.euskaltzaindia.eus/ehha.
Eustat - Euskal Estatistika Erakundea - Instituto Vasco de Estadística. 2019. Sixth Sociolinguistic Survey. https://www.euskadi.eus/contenidos/noticia/eas_mas_noticias/en_def/adjuntos/inkesta_EN.pdf.
Eustat - Euskal Estatistika Erakundea - Instituto Vasco de Estadística. 2024. Ondarroa: know the current statistical situation and the historical evolution of your municipality. https://es.eustat.eus/municipal/datos_estadisticos/ondarroa.html.
Ferguson, Charles A. 2009. Simplified registers and linguistic theory. In Loraine K. Obler & Like Menn (eds.), Exceptional language and linguistics, 49-66. New York, NY: Academic Press.
Gómez Seibane, Sara. 2008. Concordancias de género en documentación vizcaína. Siglos XV-XVI. Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto doctoral dissertation.
Gondra, Ager. 2024. Ideological effects of language revitalisation and standardisation on traditional home language speakers: The case of Basque. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 46(9). 1-15. https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2024.2326506.
Hualde, José Ignacio, Gorka Elordieta & Arantzazu Elordieta. 1994. The Basque dialect of Lekeitio. Bilbao: Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea/Universidad del País Vasco.
Hualde, José Ignacio & Iñaki Gaminde. 1997. Vowel interaction in Basque: A nearly exhaustive catalogue. Anuario del Seminario de Filología Vasca “Julio de Urquijo” 31(1). 211-245. https://doi.org/10.1387/asju.8683.
Laka, Itziar. 1996. A brief grammar of Euskara, the Basque language. [Leioa]: Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea/Universidad del País Vasco.
Lambert, Wallace, Richard C. Hodgson, Robert C. Gardner & Samuel Fillenbaum. 1960. Evaluational reactions to spoken language. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 60(1). 44-51. https://doi.apa.org/doi/10.1037/h0044430.
Loewen, Shawn & Talip Gonulal. 2015. Exploratory factor analysis and principal components analysis. In Luke Plonsky (ed.), Advancing quantitative methods in second language research, 182-211. New York, NY: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315870908.
Loureiro-Rodríguez, Verónica & Elif Fidan Acar. 2022. The matched-guise technique. In Ruth Kircher & Lena Zipp (eds.), Research methods in language attitudes, 185-202. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108867788.
Marten, Heiko F., Luk Van Mensel & Durk Gorter. 2012. Studying minority languages in the linguistic landscape. In Durk Gorter, Heiko F. Marten & Luk Van Mensel (eds.), Minority languages in the linguistic landscape, 1-15. London: Palgrave-MacMillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230360235_1.
Meyerhoff, Miriam, Erik Schleef & Laurel MacKenzie. 2015. Doing sociolinguistics: A practical guide to data collection and analysis. New York, NY: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315723167.
Munarriz, Amaia & M. Carmen Parafita Couto. 2014. ¿Cómo estudiar el cambio de código? Incorporación de diferentes metodologías en el caso de varias comunidades bilingües. Lapurdum: Euskal ikerketen aldizkaria 18. 43-73. https://doi.org/10.4000/lapurdum.2494.
Ondarroako historia zaleak. 2005. Ondarroa 2004 urtekaria. Ondarroako Udala.
Osgood, Charles E. 1964. Semantic differential technique in the comparative study of cultures. American Anthropologist 66. 171-200.
Padilla-Moyano, Manuel. 2018. Mailegatze morfologikoa eta generoa euskaraz. Fontes Linguae Vasconum 127. 229-248. https://doi.org/10.35462/FLV127.8.
Parafita Couto, M. Carmen, Amaia Munarriz, Irantzu Epelde, Margaret Deuchar & Beñat Oyharçabal. 2015. Gender conflict resolution in Spanish-Basque mixed DPs. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 18(2). 304-323. https://doi.org/10.1017/S136672891400011X.
Pérez-Tattam, Rocío, Maria José Ezeizabarrena, Hans Stadthagen-González & Virginia C. Mueller Gathercole. 2019. Gender assignment to Spanish pseudowords by monolingual and Basque-Spanish bilingual children. Languages 4(3). 58. https://doi.org/10.3390/languages4030058.
R Core Team. 2022. R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing. Vienna. https://R-project.org.
RAE and ASALE. 2009. Nueva gramática de la lengua española. Madrid: Espasa.
Reguero Ugarte, Urtzi. 2024. Ni la mitad te creas: Mitos, verdades y algunas curiosidades más sobre el euskera. Sevilla: Athenaica.
Schleef, Erik. 2014. Written surveys and questionnaires in sociolinguistics. In Janet Holmes & Kirk Hazen (eds.), Research methods in sociolinguistics: A practical guide, 42-57. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781394260867.
Trask, R. Larry. 2003. The Noun Phrase: nouns, determiners and modifiers; pronouns and names. In José Ignacio Hualde & Jon Ortiz de Urbina (eds.), A grammar of Basque, 113-170. New York, NY: Mouton de Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110895285.113.
Van Mensel, Luk. 2025. Minority languages and language ideologies. In Durk Gorter & Jasone Cenoz (eds.), The handbook of linguistic landscapes and multilingualism, 193-208. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell.
Zabala, Igone & Itziar San Martin. 2012. Basque and Romance languages: Languages with different structures. In Pello Salaburu & Xabier Alberdi (eds.), The challenge of a bilingual society in the Basque Country, 51-71. Reno, NV: Center for Basque Studies.
Zuazo, Koldo. 2013. The dialects of Basque. Reno, NV: Center for Basque Studies.
Zuazo, Koldo. 2019. Standard Basque and its dialects. New York, NY: Routledge.
Zubiri, Ilari & Entzi Zubiri. 2012. Euskal gramatika osoa. Bilbao: Ikasbook.
Amorrortu, Estibaliz. 2003. Basque sociolinguistics: Language, society and culture. Reno, NV: Center for Basque Studies.
Anderson, Tyler Kimball & Almeida Jacqueline Toribio. 2007. Attitudes towards lexical borrowing and intra-sentential code-switching among Spanish-English bilinguals. Spanish in Context 4(2). 217-240. https://doi.org/10.1075/sic.4.2.05and.
Arrizabalaga Basterretxea, Josu. 2025. Ondarruko Hiztegixe [online]. https://agirrearri.github.io/ondarruberbetan/.
Badiola, Lucia & Ariane Sande. 2018. Gender assignment in Basque/Spanish mixed determiner phrases: A study of simultaneous bilinguals. In Luis López (ed.), Code-switching - Experimental answers to theoretical questions. In honor of Kay González-Vilbazo, 15-38. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. https://doi.org/10.1075/ihll.19.02bad.
Bandalos, Deborah L. & Meggen R. Boehm-Kaufman. 2008. Four common misconceptions in exploratory factor analysis. In Charles E. Lance & Robert J. Vandenberg (eds.), Statistical and methodological myths and urban legends, 61-87. New York, NY: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203867266.
Basterretxea Santiso, Gorka. 2022. A triangulation study on gender agreement in Spanish by native Basque speakers. Revista Española de Lingüística (RSEL) 52(1). 7-37. https://doi.org/10.31810/rsel.52.1.1.
Basterretxea Santiso, Gorka. 2023. Linguistic landscape in a rural Basque area: A case study in Ondarroa. International Journal of Multilingualism 22(2). 209-227. https://doi.org/10.1080/14790718.2023.2256781.
Basterretxea Santiso, Gorka. 2024. “Aquí toman mucho sopa:” Linguistic variables as predictors of non-standard gender agreement production in Basque Spanish. Open Linguistics 10(1). 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1515/opli-2024-0025.
Basterretxea Santiso, Gorka. 2025. “Fallo garrafal y común entre vascoparlantes:” Attitudes and salience of grammatical gender agreement in Basque-Spanish contact. Studies in Hispanic and Lusophone Linguistics 18(1). 37-77. https://doi.org/10.1515/shll-2025-2002.
Bedialauneta Txurruka, Izaro & José Ignacio Hualde. 2023. Markina Basque. Journal of the International Phonetic Association 53(3). 1095-1121. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0025100322000032.
Bereziartua Etxebarria, Garbiñe & Beñat Muguruza Aseginolaza. 2018. Erabileraren gakoak egoera informaletan eta gazteen artean: hitanoa Azpeitiko gazteen artean. Hermes: Pentsamendu eta Historia Aldizkaria 60. 24-48.
Bereziartua Etxebarria, Garbiñe & Beñat Muguruza Aseginolaza. 2020. Euskal hiztun natiboak, ez-natiboak eta hitanoa. In Ekaitz Santazilia, Dorota Krajewska, Eneko Zuloaga & Borja Ariztimuño (eds.), Fontes Linguae Vasconum 50 urte: Ekarpen berriak euskararen ikerketari, 127-141. Pamplona: Nafarroako Gobernua. https://doi.org/10.35462/fontes50urte.8.
Buchstaller, Isabelle. 2006. Social stereotypes, personality traits and regional perception displaced: Attitudes towards the ‘new’ quotatives in the U.K. Journal of Sociolinguistics 10(3). 362-281. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1360-6441.2006.00332.x.
deCastro-Arrazola, Varun, Edoardo Cavirani, Kathrin Linke & Francesc Torres-Tamarit. 2015. A typological study of vowel interaction in Basque. Isogloss 1/2. 147-177. http://dx.doi.org/10.5565/rev/isogloss.19.
de Rijk, Rudolph P. G. 1970. Vowel interactión in Bizcayan Basque. Fontes Linguae Vasconum 5. 149-167. https://doi.org/10.35462/flv5.2.
Di Garbo, Francesca & Matti Miestamo. 2019. The evolving complexity of gender agreement systems. In Francesca Di Garbo, Bruno Olsson & Bernhard Wälchli (eds.), Grammatical gender and linguistic complexity: Volume II: World-wide comparative studies, 15-60. Berlin: Language Science Press. http://dx.doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.3446230.
Drager, Katie. 2018. Experimental research methods in sociolinguistics. London: Bloomsbury. http://dx.doi.org/10.5040/9781474251815.
Euskaltzaindia. 1991. Euskal gramatika: lehen urratsak-I. Bilbao: Euskaltzaindia.
Euskaltzaindia. 2002. Euskal gramatika laburra: Perpaus bakuna. Bilbao: Euskaltzaindia.
Euskaltzaindia. 2021. Euskararen gramatika. Bilbao: Euskaltzaindia.
Euskaltzaindia. s.a. Euskararen herri hizkeren atlasa. s.l.: Euskaltzaindia. https://www.euskaltzaindia.eus/ehha.
Eustat - Euskal Estatistika Erakundea - Instituto Vasco de Estadística. 2019. Sixth Sociolinguistic Survey. https://www.euskadi.eus/contenidos/noticia/eas_mas_noticias/en_def/adjuntos/inkesta_EN.pdf.
Eustat - Euskal Estatistika Erakundea - Instituto Vasco de Estadística. 2024. Ondarroa: know the current statistical situation and the historical evolution of your municipality. https://es.eustat.eus/municipal/datos_estadisticos/ondarroa.html.
Ferguson, Charles A. 2009. Simplified registers and linguistic theory. In Loraine K. Obler & Like Menn (eds.), Exceptional language and linguistics, 49-66. New York, NY: Academic Press.
Gómez Seibane, Sara. 2008. Concordancias de género en documentación vizcaína. Siglos XV-XVI. Bilbao: Universidad de Deusto doctoral dissertation.
Gondra, Ager. 2024. Ideological effects of language revitalisation and standardisation on traditional home language speakers: The case of Basque. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 46(9). 1-15. https://doi.org/10.1080/01434632.2024.2326506.
Hualde, José Ignacio, Gorka Elordieta & Arantzazu Elordieta. 1994. The Basque dialect of Lekeitio. Bilbao: Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea/Universidad del País Vasco.
Hualde, José Ignacio & Iñaki Gaminde. 1997. Vowel interaction in Basque: A nearly exhaustive catalogue. Anuario del Seminario de Filología Vasca “Julio de Urquijo” 31(1). 211-245. https://doi.org/10.1387/asju.8683.
Laka, Itziar. 1996. A brief grammar of Euskara, the Basque language. [Leioa]: Euskal Herriko Unibertsitatea/Universidad del País Vasco.
Lambert, Wallace, Richard C. Hodgson, Robert C. Gardner & Samuel Fillenbaum. 1960. Evaluational reactions to spoken language. Journal of Abnormal and Social Psychology 60(1). 44-51. https://doi.apa.org/doi/10.1037/h0044430.
Loewen, Shawn & Talip Gonulal. 2015. Exploratory factor analysis and principal components analysis. In Luke Plonsky (ed.), Advancing quantitative methods in second language research, 182-211. New York, NY: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315870908.
Loureiro-Rodríguez, Verónica & Elif Fidan Acar. 2022. The matched-guise technique. In Ruth Kircher & Lena Zipp (eds.), Research methods in language attitudes, 185-202. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108867788.
Marten, Heiko F., Luk Van Mensel & Durk Gorter. 2012. Studying minority languages in the linguistic landscape. In Durk Gorter, Heiko F. Marten & Luk Van Mensel (eds.), Minority languages in the linguistic landscape, 1-15. London: Palgrave-MacMillan. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230360235_1.
Meyerhoff, Miriam, Erik Schleef & Laurel MacKenzie. 2015. Doing sociolinguistics: A practical guide to data collection and analysis. New York, NY: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315723167.
Munarriz, Amaia & M. Carmen Parafita Couto. 2014. ¿Cómo estudiar el cambio de código? Incorporación de diferentes metodologías en el caso de varias comunidades bilingües. Lapurdum: Euskal ikerketen aldizkaria 18. 43-73. https://doi.org/10.4000/lapurdum.2494.
Ondarroako historia zaleak. 2005. Ondarroa 2004 urtekaria. Ondarroako Udala.
Osgood, Charles E. 1964. Semantic differential technique in the comparative study of cultures. American Anthropologist 66. 171-200.
Padilla-Moyano, Manuel. 2018. Mailegatze morfologikoa eta generoa euskaraz. Fontes Linguae Vasconum 127. 229-248. https://doi.org/10.35462/FLV127.8.
Parafita Couto, M. Carmen, Amaia Munarriz, Irantzu Epelde, Margaret Deuchar & Beñat Oyharçabal. 2015. Gender conflict resolution in Spanish-Basque mixed DPs. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition 18(2). 304-323. https://doi.org/10.1017/S136672891400011X.
Pérez-Tattam, Rocío, Maria José Ezeizabarrena, Hans Stadthagen-González & Virginia C. Mueller Gathercole. 2019. Gender assignment to Spanish pseudowords by monolingual and Basque-Spanish bilingual children. Languages 4(3). 58. https://doi.org/10.3390/languages4030058.
R Core Team. 2022. R: A language and environment for statistical computing. R Foundation for Statistical Computing. Vienna. https://R-project.org.
RAE and ASALE. 2009. Nueva gramática de la lengua española. Madrid: Espasa.
Reguero Ugarte, Urtzi. 2024. Ni la mitad te creas: Mitos, verdades y algunas curiosidades más sobre el euskera. Sevilla: Athenaica.
Schleef, Erik. 2014. Written surveys and questionnaires in sociolinguistics. In Janet Holmes & Kirk Hazen (eds.), Research methods in sociolinguistics: A practical guide, 42-57. Oxford: Wiley Blackwell. https://doi.org/10.1002/9781394260867.
Trask, R. Larry. 2003. The Noun Phrase: nouns, determiners and modifiers; pronouns and names. In José Ignacio Hualde & Jon Ortiz de Urbina (eds.), A grammar of Basque, 113-170. New York, NY: Mouton de Gruyter. https://doi.org/10.1515/9783110895285.113.
Van Mensel, Luk. 2025. Minority languages and language ideologies. In Durk Gorter & Jasone Cenoz (eds.), The handbook of linguistic landscapes and multilingualism, 193-208. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell.
Zabala, Igone & Itziar San Martin. 2012. Basque and Romance languages: Languages with different structures. In Pello Salaburu & Xabier Alberdi (eds.), The challenge of a bilingual society in the Basque Country, 51-71. Reno, NV: Center for Basque Studies.
Zuazo, Koldo. 2013. The dialects of Basque. Reno, NV: Center for Basque Studies.
Zuazo, Koldo. 2019. Standard Basque and its dialects. New York, NY: Routledge.
Zubiri, Ilari & Entzi Zubiri. 2012. Euskal gramatika osoa. Bilbao: Ikasbook.
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Esta obra está bajo una licencia internacional Creative Commons Atribución-NoComercial-SinDerivadas 4.0.
Esta obra está bajo una licencia Creative Commons Atribución-NoComercial-SinDerivadas 4.0 Internacional.