The differences between European and Mexican Spanish:
Spain and Mexico both have influential neighbours to the north and this sometimes shows up in the differences between the two varieties of Spanish.
Here is a very brief collection of terms I’ve noticed where Mexico follows an English form and Spain follows a French one:
| Mexico | Spain |
| licencia de manejar
(US Eng: driving license) |
carnet de conducir
(Fr: carnet de conduire) |
| reporte (Eng: report) | informe |
| extinguidor (Eng: extinguisher) | extintor (Fr: extincteur) |
| tanque de gasolina (US Eng: gas tank) | depósito de gasolina |
| computadora (Eng: computer) | ordenador (Fr: ordinateur) |
But this isn’t the whole story –
- Spain has taken the anglicism “marketing” while Mexico has “mercadotecnia”
- Spain has “parking” (via French) for “car park” where Mexico has “estacionamiento”
- Northern Mexico and the southern USA have some fascinating but low prestige “Spanglish” with words like “breca” for “brake” and “troca” for “truck”!