Re: Future of Spanish

Another possibility: /tj/ --> /tS/, so that "tiene" becomes "chene", so
that instead of the vowel changing (e --> ie), the consonant changes (t
--> ch).  /dj/ could also become /dZ/.  Perhaps /kj/ and /gj/ could be
palatized (if those clusters even exist).  Maybe /tw/ could be
labialized, becoming /p/?  Same with /dw/.  That may be a little less
probable, tho.  Perhaps before the /tj/ to /tS/, the modern /tS/ could
be de-affricated to /S/.  I think that this happens in some dialects,
I've heard of "chile" being pronounced /Sile/.  Seeing as how <j> has
already become /h/ in many Latin American dialects, perhaps it could go
the way of the original /h/ and disappear, so that "dije" (/'di.he/)
would become /'dZi.e/.  I think it was Carlos who said that in Bogota',
all initial /f/'s have become /h/, thus /hransja/ for francia.  Those
h's would also be lost, thus /ra~Sa/ (with /sj/ --> /S/).  Thus, with
these changes that we've proposed.  Perhaps n~ might be lost, either
moving forward to /n/, or back to /N/, or perhaps becoming /nj/
(probably unlikely).  Maybe it would lose its nasality to become /j/ (I
think I've read of dialects that do that)

Gramatical changes:
Perhaps the -er and -ir verbs could completely fuse.  It seems to me
that they are already very similar, differing only in a small number of
forms.  Perhaps even the infinitives could become one form.  The ir a
construction could replace the future tense, thus boy a ablar instead of
hablare'.  OR, all verbs could go the way of "poner", etc. with their
futures, with epinthetic consonants added where necessary.  So that
pasar --> pa`tre' (<pastre' < pasre'), amar --> ambre' (pron. /a~'bre/),
and so on.  Loss of tu'/usted distinction.  Perhaps thru the adoption of
vos (bo`) as the singular pronoun, or the loss of "usted", or, more
likely, varying from dialect to dialect.  Indeed, those dialects that
retain "vosotros" might even retain that for the plural, thus both
singular and plurals would vary from dialect to dialect, in some
tu'-utede`, or bo`-utede`, and others tu'-bosotro`.  If medial /d/ were
to be lost, then ustedes would become ute^ (e^ indicating stressed
/E/).  Loss of the subjunctive?  If there were influence from English,
that might be likely.  Loss of este, ese, or aquel.  De + pronoun
replacing "su", thus "la casa de ute^" instead of "su casa", perhaps it
would be "la casa dute^", something like this has happened in Brazillian
Portuguese, where the same problem of ambiguity with "su" occured.

Orthographical changes:
Elimination of b/v distinction
Elimination of ll/y distinction (most LatAm dialects fuse those, yes?)
Elimination of h (except maybe where it's needed to distinguish between
homophones, like ha/a)