The Elusive Chilean "s"

If you are gring@ and took Spanish in school and then went to Chile or spoke to a Chilean in Spanish, you probably noticed that chilensis is not exactly your standard high school Spanish.  One of the most notable differences is that pesky "s" sound (including "c"s that have the "s" sound and "z"s) that seems to escape most words.

But for the bad rap that the Chilean "s" gets, it's actually only omitted in specific circumstances, and very clearly pronounced in others.

Take, for example, the word Santiago.  Obviously you wouldn't omit the "S" sound from this word, since you'd be left with the totally unrecognizable "antiago."  But for words like español, más, rostro, and estándar, replacing the "s" sound with an aspirated "h" sound (ehpañol, máh, rohtro, and ehtándar) leaves the words recognizable as the originals.

So why is the s sound only left out of certain words at certain times?  Here is the pattern I've noticed:

The Chilean s sound is necessarily pronounced:

when it is the first sound in the word (necessarily preceding a voiced sound):
Santiago, cinco, zanahoria

when it succeeds and precedes voiced sounds (an s sandwich with voiced bread, if you will):
golazo, interesante, renunciar

and when it succeeds a voiceless sound and precedes a voiced sound:
acción, selección, recepción

It can be replaced with an aspirated "h" sound (generally barely audible):

at the end of a word (necessarily succeeding a voiced sound, and a vowel at that):
dos, más, sabes (doh, máh, sabeh)

succeeding a voiced sound and preceding a voiceless sound:
esperar, asco, estufa (ehperar, ahco, ehtufa)

This can even happen when the voiced sound is a consonant, e.g. the word constante, which is often pronounced conhtante.

(The patterns covered here are s-voiced (yes s), voiced-s (no s), voiced-s-voiced (yes s), voiced-s-voiceless (no s), and voiceless-s-voiced (yes s).  The other possible patterns -- s-voiceless; voiceless-s; voiceless-s-voiceless -- do not exist in Spanish, except occasionally in foreign/borrowed words or proper nouns.)


The way I see it, voiceless sounds tend to provide support for the voiced sounds around them, so if the soft yet voiceless s is all by herself with no other voiceless sounds, she's got to be the one providing that support.  The voiced sounds are counting on her!  

antiago: "S, the rest of us in the word 'Santiago' need you, otherwise no one will know what we are saying!  Help us!"

And if there is a fellow voiceless sound before her, she's got to speak up so she can provide the necessary softness to keep the word recognizable.

recepción: "Hey, s sound, make sure you make it into the middle of me, otherwise p will take over and no one will recognize me!"

But if there is another voiceless sound after her, like c or t or p, then she can do the hard work while s rests a little bit.  These sounds are a bit harder, so they can take on the voiceless consonant role solo for a spill.

t: "Don't sweat it, s, it's pretty clear this word is 'rostro'; I got this one, you go ahead and take a snooze."  

And at the end of a word where s follows a voiceless vowel, we already know what the word is by then, so the vowel can end the word softly by itself and s can take a rest there too.

do: "It's okay, s, dos is pretty much finished at do; you do give us a nice cushion but feel free to sit this one out."

There's no need for s to overextend herself!

There are some delicious examples of words with a mix of patterns and, therefore, a mix of pronounced "s" and aspirated "h" sounds:
cansahte, pasahte, nosotrah

Just one of the many chilenismos that makes Chilean Spanish absolutely fascinating to me.  Can you think of any more examples of mixed pattern s words?