Nawat (Pipil)

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Pipil (Nawat)

Spoken in

El Salvador
speaker 100 (1996)
Linguistic
classification
Language codes
ISO 639 -1

-

ISO 639 -2

cai

ISO 639-3

ppl

Nawat (Nahuat , Hispanic Náhuat) is the language of the Pipil , a uto-Aztec language of Central America that is close to the Nahuatl . The acutely threatened language is only spoken by a few (according to various sources, around 100 to 2000) elderly people in El Salvador , especially in the Sonsonate department . The language used to be common in Honduras and Guatemala .

Nawat is taught as a second language in a few schools, because all children otherwise only grow up with Spanish.

Linguistic features

The Pipil language has retained some features of Proto- Uto-Aztec that changed in the Nahuatl (Nawatl) of central Mexico. In the latter, in contrast to the language, the pipil developed from / t / followed by / a /, the phoneme / tl / [ tɬ ]. Similar to some variants of Nahuatl or Nahuat in Mexico, the Pipil language continues to use the sound [t] instead of the “modern” / tl /. The self-name Nawat is used both for the pipil and for phonetically related dialects in Mexico. The sound [t] is also used where there is a saltillo ( voiceless glottal plosive ) in classical Nahuatl , which, according to Lyle Campbell, can also be assumed to be the original feature of the Nawat. The Aztec vowel / o / is realized in the Nawat as [u].

The Nahuatl's absolute ending -tli is missing in the Nawat ( tan instead of tlantli , "tooth"). Furthermore, instead of double l there is a simple l (similar to many Mexican Nahuatl variants), at the end of the word -l instead of -lli ( tunal instead of tonalli , "day") instead of -l and -tli . This loss of the endings is a novelty or a simplification of the Nawat.

In contrast to the Nahuatl of Central Mexico, there is no prefix o- in Pipil to form past tenses. To create plural forms of the noun, syllables are generally doubled (reduplication), while this phenomenon occurs only to a limited extent in the Mexican Nahuatl. Furthermore, there are no post positions in the Pipil; however, some frozen forms indicate that they existed earlier, e.g. B. apan ("river" <"in / on the water"), kujtan ("undeveloped land, forest" <"under trees").

Classification and designation

Nawat and Nahuatl speakers can understand each other to a certain extent. Both languages ​​belong to a branch ("General Aztec") of the uto-Aztec languages, but they have been separated from each other well over a millennium. While Mexican authors in particular like to use the term “Nahuatl” to emphasize the togetherness with their native Nahuatl language, linguists and Pipil activists in El Salvador reject this, emphasize the independence of the language and insist on the term “Nawat "Or" Náhuat "without" tl ".

There are a number of Nahua variants in Mexico that have a “t” instead of “tl”, but have undergone different developments. Closely related to the Pipil language of El Salvador (much closer than to central Nahuatl) are only the Nawat dialects of the isthmus of Tehuantepec (Pajapan, Mecayapan, Tatahuicapan and Zaragoza in the state of Veracruz and the Nawat of Cupilco in Tabasco ), which are therefore also known as the Pipil del Golfo .

history

At the time of the Spanish conquest, Nawat was one of the most important languages ​​in what is now El Salvador. It was also spoken in areas that today belong to Honduras and Guatemala. The area of ​​the Pipil included the west of El Salvador as well as adjacent areas of Guatemala and Honduras.

Until the beginning of the 20th century, there were rural areas in El Salvador where the nawat dominated, especially in the department of Sonsonate.

La Matanza , "the massacre" after the suppression of the popular uprising under Agustín Farabundo Martí by General Maximiliano Hernández Martínez in 1932 , is considered to be the end of El Salvador's Pipil. It is said that people were killed simply because of the distinguishing feature that they spoke nawat (pipil) or wore “Indian” clothing. Around 30,000 people, mostly unarmed indigenous farmers, were killed in the process. Laws passed under General Hernández made the use of indigenous languages ​​officially punishable.

Today over 200,000 people are classified as descendants of the Pipil civilization in El Salvador and Honduras. Of these, however, only a handful speak their language after all indigenous languages ​​of El Salvador were suppressed and persecuted in the 1930s.

documentation

The kinship of the Nawat with the Nahuatl of Mexico has been known since the Conquista, when the Tlaxcaltec allies of the Spaniards were able to understand the indigenous population of today's western El Salvador. In 1930, shortly before the Matanza , the German anthropologist Leonhard Schultze recorded myths of the Pipil during a three-month stay in the region of Izalco . It was not until 1935, after the genocide of the Pipil, that the myths appeared by Gustav Fischer in Jena.

Systematic documentation of the language did not begin until the second half of the 20th century. A major obstacle here was the difficulty in finding speakers at all, as hardly anyone was willing to profess their native language, Nawat , in view of the extreme persecution after the Matanza . The first works were published in 1953 by Juan G. Todd (Pipil in Nahuizalco ), in 1960 by Próspero Arauz ( Izalco ) and in 1969 by Pedro Geoffroy Rivas ( Cuscatlán ). Based on these publications, Lyle Campbell created a comprehensive work on language in 1985, so that it is now documented by narratives from the places mentioned, vocabulary and grammars. Efforts to document the language comprehensively are intensified in the present.

Todays situation

In the last census in El Salvador in 2007, 11,488 people identified themselves as “ indigenous people ”, mostly in historic Pipil areas. However, only 97 people named Pipil or Nawat as their mother tongue, 62 of them in the Sonsonate department , 22 in San Salvador and 13 in other parts of the country. The Nawat teacher Genaro Ramírez Vázquez (1933-2017) counted 133 speakers at the same time in Santo Domingo de Guzmán (Witzapan) alone , where he taught. In 2010, the linguist Jorge Lemus from the University of Don Bosco in San Salvador spoke of around 200 speakers nationwide, over 80% of whom were residents of Santo Domingo de Guzmán. He explains the longer preservation of the Nawat with the isolation of Santo Domingo, which has only had access to traffic via a paved road for a few years. In 2004, however, Lemus citing Genaro Ramírez stated that of around 200 speakers across the country, only around 10% had perfect language skills. Carlos Cortez from Santo Domingo de Guzmán (* 1985) is considered to be the youngest Nawat speaker at a fully native level, who learned Nawat as a teenager from his grandmother and now plays an important role in Nawat projects. A small number of native speakers are also available in Cuisnahuat , Caluco , Izalco and Nahuizalco (all in Sonsonate) as well as in Tacuba ( Ahuachapán ). There are no longer any monolingual Nawat speakers, all speakers have a full command of Spanish. The language is practically no longer audible in everyday life because it has not been passed on to the next generations since the matanza . Almost all native speakers belong to the oldest generation and have little opportunity to use their native language. The other languages ​​of El Salvador (the Mayan languages Pocomam and Chortí - which are still spoken in Guatemala -, Kakawira / Cacaopera and, as the last, Potón / Lenca ) are considered to be extinct: With the extinction of the Nawat, El Salvador would be the second country the American mainland to Uruguay, where indigenous languages ​​are no longer spoken.

Conservation and revitalization projects

Although Article 62 of the Constitution of the Republic of El Salvador recognizes the indigenous languages ​​as “cultural heritage” in Article 62 and formulates their preservation as a state goal, there has so far been no government program for the preservation of indigenous languages ​​such as intercultural bilingual education . However, since the 1990s there have been projects led by some indigenous communities and organizations to revitalize Nawat in El Salvador.

In 1996 a teaching project was started in three indigenous communities in the department of Sonsonate, for which the indigenous organization Asociación Coordinadora de Comunidades Indígenas de El Salvador (ACCIES) and the University of Don Bosco in San Salvador produced teaching material. The Office for Indigenous Affairs (Secretaría de Asuntos Indígenas, CONCULTURA) named in 1996 the number of 100 Nawat native speakers, 35 of them in Santo Domingo de Guzmán and 15 in Cuisnahuat . These speakers of the oldest generation - along with a few young speakers who are fluent in the language - give lessons to children on the basis of programs developed together with young indigenous people. In three municipalities in the department of Sonsonate - Cuisnahuat, San Ramón (municipality of San Antonio del Monte ) and La Ceiba (municipality of Santa Catarina Masahuat ) - which have expressed an interest in Nawat classes to ACCIES, two hours in the morning and two in the afternoon will now take place over three days Nawat teaches. A native speaker from Cuisnahuat teaches in San Ramón and La Ceiba, where there are no longer any native speakers. In 1998, the project sponsors founded the Comité de Rescate y Fortalicimiento Educativo Bilingüe Nahuat.

On September 27, 2003, in Santo Domingo de Guzmán, a number of linguists (including Jorge Lemus, Alan R. King and Monica Ward), teachers and others - second Nawat speakers and native speakers - founded the initiative for the recovery of the Nawat language (Iniciativa para la Recuperación del Idioma Náhuat) IRIN. Long-time chairman was Genaro Ramírez Vázquez (1933–2017), almost the only native speaker who wrote texts in Nawat. In addition to improving the reputation of the language, the initiative aims to provide comprehensive documentation of the Nawat, the production of literature and teaching materials in the language, and teaching in Nawat. She also wants to regain the natural oral transmission to future generations. In collaboration with the University of Don Bosco in San Salvador, she has developed Nawat textbooks and is involved in teacher training for Nawat school projects. In Izalco (Itzalku) , the "historic capital of the Pipil", is also the seat of the "Office for the Nawat Language" (Tajkwiluyan Ipal ne Taketzalis) . Separately, there is a project to translate the Bible into Nawat. The translation of the New Testament was completed in 2012 and has been available online ever since.

A project for teaching in Nawat in schools on a larger scale under the direction of Jorge Lemus was initiated in 2003, initially with 275 children in three schools; In 2008 there were 2500 students in eleven schools. The project is funded by the Fundación Círculo Solidario . Students have one to three lessons of Nawat per week and study with the textbooks from the University of Don Bosco and the IRIN initiative. Due to the lack of people of professional age with native Nawat knowledge, teachers with Spanish mother tongue must be used. With one exception, the teachers only learned Nawat during their studies or further training and continue to learn it during the project: They are Nawat students themselves. During teacher training, emphasis is placed on the ability to communicate on Nawat - vocabulary and formulations - in the classroom. This ensures that the Nawat lessons take place exclusively on Nawat, although the teachers do not yet have a very advanced level of the language. The places where this Nawat lesson takes place are Nahuizalco (Nawitzalku) , Izalco (Itzalku) and Santo Domingo de Guzmán (Witzapan) as well as other places in the Municipios Armenia , Izalco and Nahuizalco, all in the Department of Sonsonate, as well as San Juan Talpa in the department of La Paz . It is worth mentioning here that the nawat in the La Paz department, the region of the former Nonualcos , has already died out, so this is a "revival" in the true sense of the word. The anchoring of the teachers in the Pipil culture and their motivation to learn and pass on the language plays a central role in the project. Lidia Juliana Ama (* 1948), headmistress of the school “Dr. Mario Calvo Marroquín ”in Izalco, who with 665 (as of 2008) contributes the largest number of Nawat students to the project, emphasizes that her two Nawat teachers identify fully with the Pipil culture and the Nawat language. She welcomes efforts in the Ministry of Education to integrate Nawat into the public school program, but emphasizes that only teachers who, like their two colleagues, wholeheartedly devote themselves to their task, could actually carry it out.

According to the Don Bosco University, the revitalization projects at eleven schools made 3000 children and young people speakers of Pipil as a second language in 2009. They are able to hold simple conversations on Nawat. In December 2010, 28 teachers received a diploma from the University of Don Bosco, which entitles them to teach bilingual in Spanish and Nawat in public schools. These teachers come from schools in the Sonsonate department and from Concepción de Ataco (Ahuachapán department) and San Juan Talpa (La Paz department).

For a revival of natural oral transmission of the language to future generations of the Don Bosco University with the Ministry of Education a monolingual nawatsprachiger kindergarten in Santo Domingo de Guzmán was established in August 2010 in cooperation (Witzapan) established that "Nawat-cradle" ( Cuna Nahuat or Xuchikisa nawat , "where the nawat blossoms"). Here native speakers look after the children and speak to them exclusively in Nawat.

The Nawat revitalization programs are met with resistance in places. Even in the indigenous Witzapan , many people continue to deny their indigenous origins or reject “backward-looking” Indian culture. Some call for English instead of Nawat lessons or mock people who speak Nawat on the street.

Under the FMLN government of Mauricio Funes , there was a certain recognition of the projects for the Nawat for the first time. Jorge Lemus received the El Salvador National Culture Prize in November 2010 for his work to preserve the Nawat. Mauricio Funes wants to have the national anthem sung on Nawat on official occasions. The support for Nawat projects has so far not been sustainable; there is no permanent, legally guaranteed funding.

literature

  • Tukalmumachtiak Nahuat (Lengua Náhuat, Primer Ciclo) . Asociación Coordinadora de Comunidades Indígenas de El Salvador (ACCIES) [undated]
  • Próspero Arauz: El pipil de la región de los Itzalcos (ed. Pedro Geoffroy Rivas). Ministerio de Cultura, San Salvador: 1960.
  • Jorge Alfredo Calvo Pacheco: Vocabulario castellano-pipil pípil-kastíyan. Izalco, El Salvador 2000.
  • Lyle Campbell : The Pipil language of El Salvador . Mouton grammar library (No. 1). Mouton Publishers, Berlin 1985, ISBN 3-11-010344-3
  • Comisión Nacional de Rescate del Idioma Náhuat: Ma Timumachtika Nauataketsalis / Aprendamos el Idioma Náhuat. Concultura, San Salvador 1992.
  • Comisión Nacional de Rescate del Idioma Náhuat: Ma Timumachtika Nauataketsalis (Aprendamos el Idioma Náhuat). Guía Metodológica para la Enseñanza del Náhuat. Concultura, San Salvador 1992.
  • Pedro Geoffroy Rivas: El nawat de Cuscatlán: Apuntes para una gramática. Ministerio de Educación, San Salvador 1969.
  • Alan R. King: Gramática elemental del náhuat. IRIN, El Salvador 2004.
  • Alan R. King: El náhuat y su recuperación. In: Científica 5 , 2004, Universidad Don Bosco, San Salvador, p.
  • Jorge E. Lemus: Page no longer available , search in web archives: El pueblo pipil y su lengua . (PDF; 9.7 MB) In: Científica 5 , 2004, Universidad Don Bosco, San Salvador, pp. 7–28.@1@ 2Template: Toter Link / old.udb.edu.sv
  • Consuelo Roque: Nuestra escuela náhuat Universidad de El Salvador, San Salvador 2000.
  • Juan G. Todd: Notas del nahuat de Nahuizalco . Editorial “Nosotros”, San Salvador 1953.

Web links

Test Wikipedia on Pipil

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ See also Which is the correct form: Nahua, Nahuatl, Nahuat, or Nahual? SIL Mexico
  2. ↑ See also newspaper articles quoted below.
  3. ↑ Alan R. King: The Nawat Language ( Memento of the original from November 23, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / alanrking.info
  4. ↑ a b Jorge E. Lemus: El pueblo pipil y su lengua . 2004
  5. ^ Valentín Peralta Ramírez: El Nawat de la Costa del Golfo. Algunas semejanzas y diferencias estructurales con el náhuatl central (PDF; 324 kB) after 2005
  6. ↑ Hugh Byrne: El Salvador's Civil War: A Study of Revolution. Boulder, Colorado, Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1996
  7. ^ Leonhard Schultze: Indiana II - Myths in the mother tongue of the Pipil of Izalco in El Salvador . History of the Marburg ethnology (ethnology). Gustav Fischer, Jena 1935.
  8. ↑ Genaro Ramírez Vázquez (1933-2017). Tushik.org, July 26, 2017.
  9. ^ A b Carlos Chávez: El náhuat se extingue. La Prensa gráfica, July 14, 2008 ( Memento of the original from January 13, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / archive.laprensa.com.sv
  10. ↑ a b c d No hay nadie que sepa más de náhuat que yo. ( Memento of the original from September 29, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: La Prensa grafica , November 7, 2010; Jorge Lemus in an interview @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.laprensagrafica.com
  11. ↑ Roberto Valencia: ¡'Náhuat', levántate y anda! In: El Mundo , April 23, 2010
  12. ↑ German Rivas: http://www.laprensagrafica.com/el-salvador/social/160836-tiknekit-timumachtiat-ne-nawat-queremos-aprender-nahuat.html ( Memento of the original from December 25, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: La Prensa grafica , December 27, 2010  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.laprensagrafica.com
  13. ↑ Porfirio Flores: Educación bilingüe Nahuat en comunidades indígenas en El Salvador. Memoria Curso - Taller Nacional sobre Derechos Humanos y Pueblos Indígenas in El Salvador . ( Memento of the original from December 19, 2011 in the Internet Archive ; PDF; 466 kB) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. ACCIES Sonsonate, p. 12. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.iidh.ed.cr
  14. ^ The Nawat Language Recovery Initiative: IRIN
  15. ↑ Nawat Language Recovery Initiative: Nawat goes to school - The Universidad Don Bosco Nawat textbook project ( Memento of the original from July 9, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.compapp.dcu.ie
  16. ↑ The Office For the Nawat Language: TIT (Tajkwiluyan Ipal ne Taketzalis) ( Memento of the original of July 24, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.compapp.dcu.ie
  17. ↑ Ne Bibliaj Tik Nawat ( Memento of the original from July 27, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. ("The Bible on Nawat") @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / nebibliaj.org
  18. ↑ Edgardo Ayala: An Indigenous Language That Refuses to Die . ( Memento of the original from June 15, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. IPS, October 14, 2009 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.galdu.org
  19. ^ Jorge E. Lemus: Un modelo de revitalización lingüística - el caso del náhuat o pipil de El Salvador. ( Memento of July 8, 2014 in the Internet Archive ; PDF; 897 kB) Experiencias educativas de publicación No. 2, March 2008.
  20. ↑ Merlín Velis, Eugenio Castro: Ama, la historia de una indígena . ( Memento of the original from July 28, 2013 in the Internet Archive ; PDF; 2.6 MB) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. In: Diario Co Latino , January 27, 2010, p. 8. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.diariocolatino.com
  21. ^ Alfredo García: Náhuat, el renacimiento de una lengua - En 2003 quedaban solo unos 200 náhuat hablantes en todo el país. Seis años después, alrededor de 3 mil estudiantes de 11 escuelas reciben clases de este idioma . ( Memento of the original from September 28, 2012 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. elsalvador.com, August 28, 2009 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.elsalvador.com
  22. ↑ a b Salvando el náhuatl . vanguardia.com.mx, January 30, 2011
  23. ↑ a b Karla Patricia Montalvo: Nahuat - Una lengua herida . In: La Orbe , February 15, 2011  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / laorbe.com  
  24. ↑ lingüista Jorge Ernesto Lemus gana Premio Nacional de Cultura 2010. El Salvador Noticias, Nov. 5, 2010.  ( Page no longer available , searching web archives )  Info: The link is automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.@1@ 2Template: Dead Link / www.elsalvadornoticias.net  
  25. ^ Discurso del Presidente Mauricio Funes en la entrega del Premio Nacional de Cultura 2010. Contrapunto, 6 November 2010