Salsa music "Salsa" means 'sauce' in the Spanish language, and carries connotations of the spiciness common in Latin and Caribbean cuisine. In the 20th century, "salsa" acquired a musical meaning in both English and Spanish. In this sense "salsa" has been described as a word with "vivid associations". Cubans and Puerto Ricans in New York have used the term analogously to swing or soul music. In this usage "salsa" connotes a frenzied, "hot" and wild musical experience that draws upon or reflects elements of Latin culture, regardless of the style. Various music writers and historians have traced the use of "salsa" to
Cuban Spanish to the Venezuelan, Cuban, Costa Rican, Dominican, and Colombian dialects. The suffix "-ero" is often used with a place name to refer to a person from that place; thus "habanero", "guantanamera", etc. A person from Santiago de Cuba is "santiaguero" (compare "santiagués" "from Santiago de Compostela (Spain)", "santiaguino" "from Santiago de Chile"). "Wh"-questions, when the subject is a pronoun, are usually not inverted. Where speakers of most other varieties of Spanish would ask "¿Qué quieres?" or "¿Qué quieres tú?", Cuban speakers would more often ask "¿Qué tú quieres?" (This form is also characteristic of Dominican and Puerto Rican Spanish.) In