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National Geographic Magazine in Spanish "Mexican Indigenous Languages \u200b\u200b[Articles]


Mexican indigenous languages \u200b\u200b[Articles]



For

Staff Paipai

chuj This girl, the Mexico-Guatemala border, no longer speaks the language of their ancestors, in danger of extinction in Mexico. Social movements have contributed to the priority is not to reaffirm the identity through language. Photo of Samuel Herrera Castro. By Cristina Buenrostro and Lucero Melendez In all languages \u200b\u200bcan express what their speakers who need to communicate. This depends on what each culture considers important and relevant. In chuj (Mayan language spoken in the border with Guatemala) is a word that means inside the human body: k'o'ol, and is as important used in the greetings. Not enough to say how are you, as we do in English. In chuj wach

wonders' am ak'o'ol, literally had significantly

okay inside?

may think that in Mexico a few indigenous languages \u200b\u200bare spoken. Not so. According to the National Institute of Indian Languages \u200b\u200b(INALI) in this country 364 variants spoken language associated with 68 languages, which in turn belong to 11 different linguistic families. It comes to almost six million the number of speakers. The study of indigenous languages \u200b\u200bof Mexico is important and urgent because the amount of spoken currently maintains a downward trend. Many, even in danger of extinction. One of the most serious cases is represented by the languages \u200b\u200bPaipai, Kumeyaay and Cocopah of Baja California, with fewer than 200 speakers each. Although not all cases are so dramatic, we should not underestimate the reality: the work of documentation do linguists should be a priority.
However, accurately determining the linguistic diversity of Mexico would require an army of scholars documenting and analyzing the existing variants. The calculation would be approximate, and variable for different reasons. For example, in recent decades Mayan languages \u200b\u200bhave increased in Mexico, such as border, for various social and political movements their speakers have settled in Mexico. This is the K'iche ', Ixil, Cakchiquel, and chuj Jakaltek, among others.

An example of all this difficulty is the language huasteco, member of the Mayan language family, spoken in southeastern San Luis Potosi and northern Veracruz. According to data from the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI), its speakers are more than 150 000, making it difficult to consider at risk of disappearing. But in reality, many localities in Veracruz younger generations no longer have to use this language as a means of communication, so you should consider the potential risk of extinction in the near future. Nahuatl
The case sheds light on the point of the variants. The name itself is given to the language, which belongs to the Uto-Aztecan language family (which are also associated with the Tarahumara and Huichol, among others). But it is not the same as speaking Nahuatl in the state of Guerrero in Jalisco; recorded differences in some level of linguistic (phonological, morphological, syntactic and / or lexicon). One of the conditions for the existence of variation is the geographical distance, but not always. For example, the Zapotec-in oto-language family-hose can not be considered a single language, as even in neighboring communities are linguistic variations (there have been 30 only for 64 to Nahuatl and Zapotec).

This case can extend into many other languages \u200b\u200bof Mexico whose change triggered the need to study them independently. This relates to what is known as "birth" of a language, long and gradual process that can last centuries: two dialects differ in different levels of grammar, to the extent that they are no longer the same language. At present there is frequent talk of "new languages" because the trend is the opposite: extinction.

However, and based on official data, in Mexico 68 indigenous languages \u200b\u200bare spoken, not considering that because the issue of variants some cases could result in different languages \u200b\u200bbut whose result would be a language. "Languages \u200b\u200bor dialects? Non-linguistic perspective, it is common to refer to indigenous languages \u200b\u200band dialects, a name that carries a pejorative and inequality.
Some argue that they are dialects because they have no grammar or writing ... A fallacy! Are languages \u200b\u200bin every sense of the word, with its own grammatical complexity: you can encode anything that their speakers need express. The dialect refers to language variations (for social, geographical and / or cultural) within a single language. For example, each of English speakers also speak a dialect (that of Mexico, Argentina and Spain, among many others).
Some national indigenous languages \u200b\u200bhave a long written tradition, with records even before the English. This is the case of the Mayan language Ch'olan classical classical earliest records date back to 200 AD C. and lasted more than 13 centuries through a system of hieroglyphic writing logosyllabic type (combining signs that correspond to words and others who represent syllables). The types of media where records are preserved Classic Maya to this day include monolithic monuments, such as stelae, architectural elements such as lintels and jambs, shell objects such as ceramic vessels, and codices. Another case of pre-Hispanic linguistic register from the south of Veracruz, where he found the monument in the wake of "La Mojarra." Has a writing system whose decryption is not possible because there is still debate which language registered in the registration. Even after the colonial era, many indigenous languages \u200b\u200bwere studied and learned by the friars to indoctrinate. Only the sixteenth century printed books were found 47 records of different indigenous languages, not including civil and manuscripts which were not printed as books. The task of learning an indigenous language was not easy for the friars found many grammatical differences with it and that cultural categories, grammatically encoded and expressed through language, had no direct counterpart in Castilian. Very large should be the surprise of the monks to not find the word "religion" between the languages \u200b\u200bof the new world. It is one among many examples of cultural differences that materialize in the languages, and through them we can access to systems of thought very different from ours. Arts, vocabulary, grammar and general colonial documents constitute the written record precedent of many indigenous languages. That linguists are used to compare them to current languages \u200b\u200bto warn their differences and even date them. Many do not survive to this day, as the chicomuselteco, Mayan family member who spoke in Chiapas and of which we know only a brief confessional dated in the second half of the eighteenth century. will have to ask: is all right within? The study of indigenous languages \u200b\u200bof Mexico is important and urgent, as we opened the doors of knowledge to understand the cultural wealth of our country. Taken http://ngenespanol.com/2009/08/01/lenguas-indigenas-mexicanas-articulos/