As it turns out, this isn’t nearly as silly as it sounds.  “Don’t they know they speak Spanish in Mexico,” you might ask?  Well, I’d be willing to be most of those 4,400 people probably know that.  In reality, “mexican” is actually a perfectly-correct name for the dialect of Spanish spoken in Mexico.  It’s true the vast majority of Mexicans and other Spanish speakers will refer to it as “mexican Spanish” or some such variant, but it’s not difficult to imagine a situation where the term “mexican” might be used.  Mexican Spanish is quite a distinct dialect, after all, full of all kinds of special slang and expressions not used elsewhere.  Perhaps differentiating between Mexican Spanish and Chilean Spanish by calling it “mexican” isn’t such a bad idea after all.

So remember, next time you hear somebody say “they speak mexican in Mexico,” he’s technically right.  Of course, that doesn’t mean he’s not also an idiot.

Significant Differences

• Othography: Many similarly-pronounced words are spelled differently e.x. Spanish mayor and Portuguese maior.
• Foreign Influences: The Portuguese language was more influenced by French and African languages than was Spanish, which was more insular. Thus, many Portuguese words borrowed from non-romance languages will sound completely foreign to speakers of Spanish.
• Arabic Substratum: Spanish has been strongly influenced by Arabic due to centuries of Moorish rule and has largely retained most of the medieval Mozarabic vocabulary. Portugal, on the other hand, was never under Moorish rule to the extent that Spain was and thus retains few Mozarabic influences today.