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Sergio Romero

The University of Texas at Austin, Department of Spanish and Portuguese, Associate Professor

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I am a linguistic anthropologist with an interest on the structural and sociocultural aspects of language variation and change. My current work examines language contact, the diachronic development of dialectal variation, its social meaning and the emergence of pastoral registers in indigenous languages, using both ethnographic and philological methods. My research focuses on Mayan languages, especially K'iche', Q'eqchi', Kaqchikel and more recently Awakatek and Ixil. I have also worked on Nahuatl, especially on the dialects formerly spoken in colonial Guatemala.

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Carlos Fredy Ochoa García

Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala USAC

Ruud van Akkeren

Universidad del Valle de Guatemala

Iyaxel Cojti Ren

The University of Texas at Austin

Carlos Fredy Ochoa

Universidad de San Carlos de Guatemala

Contributions in New World Archaeology

Jagiellonian University in Krakow

Ruud van Akkeren

Alejandro Garay

Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn

Diego Vásquez Monterroso

University of Edinburgh

Ignacio Carvajal

University of California, San Diego

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Book by Sergio Romero

MEMORIAL DE SOLOLÁ

Memorial de Sololá, 2025

This is the introductory study of my critical edition of the Memorial de Sololá, the longest colo... more

Language and ethnicity among the K'ichee' Maya

The Americas' First Theologies: Early Sources of Post-Contact Indigenous Religion

by Garry Sparks, Frauke Sachse, and Sergio Romero

The Theologia Indorum by Dominican friar Domingo de Vico was the first Christian theology written... more The Theologia Indorum by Dominican friar Domingo de Vico was the first Christian theology written in the Americas. Made available in English translation for the first time, Americas' First Theologies presents a selection of exemplary sections from the Theologia Indorum that illustrate Friar Vico's doctrine of god, cosmogony, moral anthropology, understanding of natural law and biblical history, and constructive engagement with pre-Hispanic Maya religion. Rather than merely condemn the Maya religion, Vico appropriated local terms and images from Maya mythology and rituals that he thought could convey Christianity. His attempt at translating, if not reconfiguring, Christianity for a Maya readership required his mastery of not only numerous Mayan languages but also the highly poetic ceremonial rhetoric of many indigenous Mesoamerican peoples.

This book also includes translations of two other pastoral texts (parts of a songbook and a catechism) and eight early documents by K’iche’ and Kaqchikel Maya authors. These texts, written in Highland Mayan languages both by fellow Dominicans and by Highland Maya elites demonstrate the wider influence of Vico’s ethnographic approach shared by a particular school of Dominicans. Altogether, The Americas’ First Theologies provides a rich documentary case example of the translation, reception, and reaction to Christian thought in the indigenous Americas.

https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-americas-first-theologies-9780190678302?cc=us&lang=en&

Papers by Sergio Romero

Language, ritual and political legitimation in colonial Guatemala

OXFORD HANDBOOK OF RITUAL LANGUAGE, 2024

The canonical view among linguistic anthropologists today emphasizes the deliberate density of me... more The canonical view among linguistic anthropologists today emphasizes the deliberate density of meaning and action embodied in ritual, and its multiple and simultaneous indexical and iconic articulations with multiple cosmological, political, and historical planes. In Stasch's concise synthesis: "Ritual is a poetically dense figuration of macroscopic order in microscopic action" (Stasch 2011: 160). The model highlights the myriad semiotic threads with which ritual is enmeshed with sacred beings and agency types, ancestral histories, social hierarchies, power relations, moral values, and, of course,

Dialectology and the history of Nahua peoples in Guatemala

MIGRATIONS IN LATE MESOAMERICA, 2019

Digital Resources: Colonial Nahuatl in Central America

OXFORD RESEARCH ENCYCLOPEDIA, LATIN AMERICAN HISTORY, 2019

Nahuatl is the Latin American indigenous language having the largest number of colonial documents... more Nahuatl is the Latin American indigenous language having the largest number of colonial documents. As with other colonial documents, the study of these manuscripts requires mastery of the language as well as the relevant historical and philological sources. The emergence of digital repositories in Mexico, the United States, France, and other countries has made hundreds of digital images available to scholars who would not have had access to these sources otherwise. Digital repositories also contain additional tools such as morphological parsers and dictionaries. These allow users to upload new images, transcriptions, and translations, turning digital archives into veritable platforms for scholarly exchange. The irruption of digital repositories promises to effect substantial changes in the field of Nahuatl studies.

Los manuscritos en náhuatl centroamericano y la historia cultural de Guatemala

ANALES DE LA ACADEMIA DE GEOGRAFÍA DE HISTORIA DE GUATEMALA, 2017

En este trabajo se describe y evalúa el acervo de manuscritos en náhuatl procedentes de lo que fu... more En este trabajo se describe y evalúa el acervo de manuscritos en náhuatl procedentes de lo que fue la capitanía de Guatemala. Se identifican tres variantes dialectales en base a la presencia de rasgos diagnósticos en los textos y se discuten las implicaciones analíticas de su estudio. Se ejemplifica el potencial de las fuentes en náhuatl para una historia cultural regional examinando documentos representativos de diferentes géneros notariales y pastorales: Títulos, informes de mandamientos, padrones de tributos, cartas, denuncias y testamentos. Finalmente se discuten las perspectivas y desafíos que presenta para la historia cultural guatemalteca el estudio filológico de las fuentes históricas centroamericanas en idioma náhuatl.

Nahuatl and Pipil in Colonial Guatemala: A Central American Counterpoint

ETHNOHISTORY, 2012

Nahuatl has often been described as a lingua franca in colonial Central America, but this conclus... more Nahuatl has often been described as a lingua franca in colonial Central America, but this conclusion has rested on a narrow range of Spanish and Nahuatllanguage documents. In this article we broaden the evidentiary base, analyzing a corpus of forty-six Nahuatl documents spanning the years 1549-1666 from Central America. Most of these documents date from the turn of the sixteenth century and are in the Central American Nahuatl dialect of Pipil. Some exhibit incorrect emulations of the Classical Nahuatl of central Mexico, brought to the region by the Spaniards' Nahua allies. Those written in Classical Nahuatl were generally produced in areas of significant Nahua and/or Spanish colonization. We conclude that Nahuatl in colonial Central America was significantly impacted by indigenous Pipil. As a vehicular language, Pipil was as useful as the central Mexican Nahuatl of the invaders, and it developed its own written standard. In general, Nahuatl of all kinds served as a vehicular language in colonial Central America for only about a century after conquest and followed the path of the invaders.

Grammar, Dialectal Variation, and Honorific Registers in Nahuatl in Seventeenth-Century Guatemala

ANTHROPOLOGICAL LINGUISTICS, 2014

This article examines honorific registers in Central Mexican and Guatemalan varieties of Nahuatl ... more This article examines honorific registers in Central Mexican and Guatemalan varieties of Nahuatl in seventeenth-century Guatemala, highlighting the importance of sociolinguistic methods for the dialectology of Mesoamerican languages. A comparative study of two pastoral texts reveals that the differences between the honorific registers of the Nahuatl varieties were quantitative rather than categorical: the structure of honorifics is the same (for all syntactic categories), but significant differences appear in the frequency of honorific marking, especially on verbs. Metalinguistic comments in Spanish sources provide evidence of the impact of these differences on stylistic marking, ethnic boundary work, and indexing of social status.

El Título de Santa María Ixhuatán: un texto del siglo XVII en náhuatl centroamericano

by Margarita Cossich Vielman and Sergio Romero

XXVIII Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala, 2014, 2015

The title of Santa María Ixhuatán was written around 1620 in a Central American variant of Centra... more The title of Santa María Ixhuatán was written around 1620 in a Central American variant of Central Nahuatl. It is the largest primary source written in Central Nahuatl and it is essential to clarify the pre-Hispanic and colonial history of the Nahua in Guatemala. Appears during a land dispute between Nahuatl-speaking settlers of Santa María Ixhuatán and its neighbors. It was described in the 70’s by Lyle Campbell and in the 90’s by Ichon and Grignon but none of these researchers translated in its entirety. According to Daniéle de Houve (Ichon and Grignon 1999) the text is divided into four parts 1. Legitimation of the residents of Santa María Ixhuatán. 2. Agrarian conflict, 3. Agricultural limits and 4. The evangelization. In this text we will present some advances in translation we are doing.

The labyrinth of diversity: The sociolinguistics of Mayan languages

THE MAYAN LANGUAGES, 2017

Ethnicity, history and standard Ixhil (Ixil) Mayan

LANGUAGE & COMMUNICATION, 2017

This paper explores the tension between local ethnic identities and pan-Maya language ideologies ... more This paper explores the tension between local ethnic identities and pan-Maya language ideologies in the development of Standard Ixhil Mayan, a standardized variety recognized by the Guatemalan state and the Academy of Mayan Languages of Guatemala. Based on the analysis of interviews and publications in Ixhil, I examine how alternative ethnic identities are indexed through variations in orthographic conventions. As in other Mayan communities in the highlands of Guatemala, standardization is a contested field in which different notions of indigeneity are staged. I discuss the role of systemic tensions between the Maya movement and Ixhil communities and show how local dialectal stereotypes are being used to forge a pan-linguistic Ixhil super-ethnicity capable of buttressing local spaces of cultural sovereignty.

Bill Gates speaks K'iche'! The corporatization of linguistic revitalization in Guatemala

LANGUAGE & COMMUNICATION, 2016

Based on the study of the recent development of the K'iche' Facebook platform and Microsoft Windo... more Based on the study of the recent development of the K'iche' Facebook platform and Microsoft Windows' K'iche' version, I discuss the conflict between Western and Maya language ideologies embodied in current translation practices in Guatemala. International corporations prefer hiring individual translators and consultants and avoid engaging the indigenous institutions charged with standardization and linguistic revitalization. The lack of community sanction for local corporate proxies leads to contestation of the translators' credentials and provokes community turmoil. It also highlights opposed community views of globalization and OF the best strategies to cope with the challenges and opportunities it affords. Finally, I examine the consequences for indigenous language revitalization of the current political economy of social media and corporate software. In this paper I examine the social impact of the incipient production of corporate software and social media platforms in K'ichee', a Mayan language spoken in the western highlands of Guatemala. I focus on the development of the currently available Facebook K'ichee' interface application and of the upcoming K'ichee' version of Microsoft Windows. Both involved the cooperation of K'ichee' speakers from the township of Nahualá in western Guatemala as well as non-local corporate intermediaries working on behalf of Facebook and Microsoft. This case study illustrates the strife provoked in indigenous communities by corporate software and social media translation strategies. Rather than partner with indigenous institutions charged with language revitalization, corporations like Facebook and Microsoft prefer translation agencies and unpaid volunteers without the collective sanction of their language communities. We will see that this commodification of the craft of translation into indigenous languages heightens tensions among community members having conflicting views about native language, identity and globalization. Germane to this debate is the tension between a view of language as a personal skill owned by individuals, on the one hand, and language as an inalienable, iconic practice belonging to the community that no one should appropriate, on the other. In Guatemala, indigenous institutions such as the K'ulb'il Yol Twitz Paxil, the Maya-run " Academy of the Mayan Languages of Guatemala " (ALMG) have stressed consensus as a strategy to minimize conflicts over standardization and revitalization policy. K'ichee' shows substantial dialectal variation and dialect stereotypes are important ethnic markers for its speakers. Glottonyms such as " K'ichee' " or " Kaqchikel " were introduced by the Spanish to unify mutually intelligible regional varieties under one name. 1 The introduction of mutual intelligibility as diagnostic criterion

The emergence of negative concord in Santa María Chiquimula K’iche’ (Mayan): A variationist perspective

LANGUAGE VARIATION AND CHANGE, 2015

A Maya Version of Jespersen's Cycle: The Diachronic Evolution of Negative Markers in K’iche’ Maya

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF AMERICAN LINGUISTICS, 2012

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, a... more JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

The Fricativization of Intervocalic /l/ in Santa María Chiquimula K'iche'

VARIATION IN INDIGENOUS MINORITY LANGUAGES, 2009

"They Don’t Get Speak Our Language Right”: Language Standardization, Power And Migration among the Q'eqchi' Maya

JOURNAL OF LINGUISTIC ANTHROPOLOGY, 2012

of ethnicity, authority and education among the Q'eqchi' Maya. [Language ideologies, dialectology... more

"Our parents don't talk like us!": Migration, adolescence and new dialect formation in Q'eqchi' Mayan

A CELEBRATION OF THE LIFE AND WORK OF PIERRE ROBERT COLAS, 2014

El K'iche' evangeliza al Q'eqchi': La Theologia Indorum (K'iche') como modelo de discurso doctrinal para las Coplas de Luís de Cáncer (Q'eqchi')

LINGÜÍSTICA MISIONERA: ASPECTOS LINGÜÍSTICOS, DISCURSIVOS, FILOLÓGICOS Y PEDAGÓGICOS, 2019

"Brujos", mitos y modernidad en la historia oral k'iche'

Estudios de Cultura Maya, 2017

En este trabajo se examina la relación entre la tradición oral y las repre-sentaciones de la hist... more En este trabajo se examina la relación entre la tradición oral y las repre-sentaciones de la historia y la coyuntura social entre los k'iche's del altiplano de Guatemala. Se muestra que la tradición oral consta de una gran diversidad de géne-ros con estructuras discursivas y fuerza ilocutiva. Se discuten las aparentes incon-sistencias entre narrativas y se demuestra que son expresión de disensos, debates y ansiedades en el seno de las comunidades frente a los cambios impuestos por la modernidad guatemalteca. En particular, se analizan historias de santos y " brujos " y las diferentes y contradictorias posturas que dramatizan frente a la expansión de la Acción Católica y de las iglesias pentecostales en los años cincuenta y sesenta del siglo pasado. Se muestra que la tradición oral es también modelo prescriptivo de la naciente prosa en idioma k'iche'. PalabRas clave: historia oral, discurso, religión, k'iche', Guatemala. abstRact: This paper examines the relationship between oral traditions and K'iche' representations of history and current social and cultural dilemmas in the Guate-malan highlands. I show that oral tradition include a great variety of genres with different discourse structures and illocutionary force. I discuss apparent inconsistencies among narratives and show that they embody dissent and anxieties in K'iche' communities in regard to changes provoked by Guatemala's violent modernity. In particular, I examine stories of patron saints and " witches " and the different stances vis-à-vis religious conversion that they dramatize after the expansion of Catholic Action and Pentecostal denominations in the 1950s and 1960s. Oral traditions are also prescriptive models for the emerging K'iche' narrative prose.

MEMORIAL DE SOLOLÁ

Memorial de Sololá, 2025

This is the introductory study of my critical edition of the Memorial de Sololá, the longest colo... more

Language and ethnicity among the K'ichee' Maya

The Americas' First Theologies: Early Sources of Post-Contact Indigenous Religion

by Garry Sparks, Frauke Sachse, and Sergio Romero

The Theologia Indorum by Dominican friar Domingo de Vico was the first Christian theology written... more The Theologia Indorum by Dominican friar Domingo de Vico was the first Christian theology written in the Americas. Made available in English translation for the first time, Americas' First Theologies presents a selection of exemplary sections from the Theologia Indorum that illustrate Friar Vico's doctrine of god, cosmogony, moral anthropology, understanding of natural law and biblical history, and constructive engagement with pre-Hispanic Maya religion. Rather than merely condemn the Maya religion, Vico appropriated local terms and images from Maya mythology and rituals that he thought could convey Christianity. His attempt at translating, if not reconfiguring, Christianity for a Maya readership required his mastery of not only numerous Mayan languages but also the highly poetic ceremonial rhetoric of many indigenous Mesoamerican peoples.

This book also includes translations of two other pastoral texts (parts of a songbook and a catechism) and eight early documents by K’iche’ and Kaqchikel Maya authors. These texts, written in Highland Mayan languages both by fellow Dominicans and by Highland Maya elites demonstrate the wider influence of Vico’s ethnographic approach shared by a particular school of Dominicans. Altogether, The Americas’ First Theologies provides a rich documentary case example of the translation, reception, and reaction to Christian thought in the indigenous Americas.

https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-americas-first-theologies-9780190678302?cc=us&lang=en&

Language, ritual and political legitimation in colonial Guatemala

OXFORD HANDBOOK OF RITUAL LANGUAGE, 2024

The canonical view among linguistic anthropologists today emphasizes the deliberate density of me... more The canonical view among linguistic anthropologists today emphasizes the deliberate density of meaning and action embodied in ritual, and its multiple and simultaneous indexical and iconic articulations with multiple cosmological, political, and historical planes. In Stasch's concise synthesis: "Ritual is a poetically dense figuration of macroscopic order in microscopic action" (Stasch 2011: 160). The model highlights the myriad semiotic threads with which ritual is enmeshed with sacred beings and agency types, ancestral histories, social hierarchies, power relations, moral values, and, of course,

Dialectology and the history of Nahua peoples in Guatemala

MIGRATIONS IN LATE MESOAMERICA, 2019

Digital Resources: Colonial Nahuatl in Central America

OXFORD RESEARCH ENCYCLOPEDIA, LATIN AMERICAN HISTORY, 2019

Nahuatl is the Latin American indigenous language having the largest number of colonial documents... more Nahuatl is the Latin American indigenous language having the largest number of colonial documents. As with other colonial documents, the study of these manuscripts requires mastery of the language as well as the relevant historical and philological sources. The emergence of digital repositories in Mexico, the United States, France, and other countries has made hundreds of digital images available to scholars who would not have had access to these sources otherwise. Digital repositories also contain additional tools such as morphological parsers and dictionaries. These allow users to upload new images, transcriptions, and translations, turning digital archives into veritable platforms for scholarly exchange. The irruption of digital repositories promises to effect substantial changes in the field of Nahuatl studies.

Los manuscritos en náhuatl centroamericano y la historia cultural de Guatemala

ANALES DE LA ACADEMIA DE GEOGRAFÍA DE HISTORIA DE GUATEMALA, 2017

En este trabajo se describe y evalúa el acervo de manuscritos en náhuatl procedentes de lo que fu... more En este trabajo se describe y evalúa el acervo de manuscritos en náhuatl procedentes de lo que fue la capitanía de Guatemala. Se identifican tres variantes dialectales en base a la presencia de rasgos diagnósticos en los textos y se discuten las implicaciones analíticas de su estudio. Se ejemplifica el potencial de las fuentes en náhuatl para una historia cultural regional examinando documentos representativos de diferentes géneros notariales y pastorales: Títulos, informes de mandamientos, padrones de tributos, cartas, denuncias y testamentos. Finalmente se discuten las perspectivas y desafíos que presenta para la historia cultural guatemalteca el estudio filológico de las fuentes históricas centroamericanas en idioma náhuatl.

Nahuatl and Pipil in Colonial Guatemala: A Central American Counterpoint

ETHNOHISTORY, 2012

Nahuatl has often been described as a lingua franca in colonial Central America, but this conclus... more Nahuatl has often been described as a lingua franca in colonial Central America, but this conclusion has rested on a narrow range of Spanish and Nahuatllanguage documents. In this article we broaden the evidentiary base, analyzing a corpus of forty-six Nahuatl documents spanning the years 1549-1666 from Central America. Most of these documents date from the turn of the sixteenth century and are in the Central American Nahuatl dialect of Pipil. Some exhibit incorrect emulations of the Classical Nahuatl of central Mexico, brought to the region by the Spaniards' Nahua allies. Those written in Classical Nahuatl were generally produced in areas of significant Nahua and/or Spanish colonization. We conclude that Nahuatl in colonial Central America was significantly impacted by indigenous Pipil. As a vehicular language, Pipil was as useful as the central Mexican Nahuatl of the invaders, and it developed its own written standard. In general, Nahuatl of all kinds served as a vehicular language in colonial Central America for only about a century after conquest and followed the path of the invaders.

Grammar, Dialectal Variation, and Honorific Registers in Nahuatl in Seventeenth-Century Guatemala

ANTHROPOLOGICAL LINGUISTICS, 2014

This article examines honorific registers in Central Mexican and Guatemalan varieties of Nahuatl ... more This article examines honorific registers in Central Mexican and Guatemalan varieties of Nahuatl in seventeenth-century Guatemala, highlighting the importance of sociolinguistic methods for the dialectology of Mesoamerican languages. A comparative study of two pastoral texts reveals that the differences between the honorific registers of the Nahuatl varieties were quantitative rather than categorical: the structure of honorifics is the same (for all syntactic categories), but significant differences appear in the frequency of honorific marking, especially on verbs. Metalinguistic comments in Spanish sources provide evidence of the impact of these differences on stylistic marking, ethnic boundary work, and indexing of social status.

El Título de Santa María Ixhuatán: un texto del siglo XVII en náhuatl centroamericano

by Margarita Cossich Vielman and Sergio Romero

XXVIII Simposio de Investigaciones Arqueológicas en Guatemala, 2014, 2015

The title of Santa María Ixhuatán was written around 1620 in a Central American variant of Centra... more The title of Santa María Ixhuatán was written around 1620 in a Central American variant of Central Nahuatl. It is the largest primary source written in Central Nahuatl and it is essential to clarify the pre-Hispanic and colonial history of the Nahua in Guatemala. Appears during a land dispute between Nahuatl-speaking settlers of Santa María Ixhuatán and its neighbors. It was described in the 70’s by Lyle Campbell and in the 90’s by Ichon and Grignon but none of these researchers translated in its entirety. According to Daniéle de Houve (Ichon and Grignon 1999) the text is divided into four parts 1. Legitimation of the residents of Santa María Ixhuatán. 2. Agrarian conflict, 3. Agricultural limits and 4. The evangelization. In this text we will present some advances in translation we are doing.

The labyrinth of diversity: The sociolinguistics of Mayan languages

THE MAYAN LANGUAGES, 2017

Ethnicity, history and standard Ixhil (Ixil) Mayan

LANGUAGE & COMMUNICATION, 2017

This paper explores the tension between local ethnic identities and pan-Maya language ideologies ... more This paper explores the tension between local ethnic identities and pan-Maya language ideologies in the development of Standard Ixhil Mayan, a standardized variety recognized by the Guatemalan state and the Academy of Mayan Languages of Guatemala. Based on the analysis of interviews and publications in Ixhil, I examine how alternative ethnic identities are indexed through variations in orthographic conventions. As in other Mayan communities in the highlands of Guatemala, standardization is a contested field in which different notions of indigeneity are staged. I discuss the role of systemic tensions between the Maya movement and Ixhil communities and show how local dialectal stereotypes are being used to forge a pan-linguistic Ixhil super-ethnicity capable of buttressing local spaces of cultural sovereignty.

Bill Gates speaks K'iche'! The corporatization of linguistic revitalization in Guatemala

LANGUAGE & COMMUNICATION, 2016

Based on the study of the recent development of the K'iche' Facebook platform and Microsoft Windo... more Based on the study of the recent development of the K'iche' Facebook platform and Microsoft Windows' K'iche' version, I discuss the conflict between Western and Maya language ideologies embodied in current translation practices in Guatemala. International corporations prefer hiring individual translators and consultants and avoid engaging the indigenous institutions charged with standardization and linguistic revitalization. The lack of community sanction for local corporate proxies leads to contestation of the translators' credentials and provokes community turmoil. It also highlights opposed community views of globalization and OF the best strategies to cope with the challenges and opportunities it affords. Finally, I examine the consequences for indigenous language revitalization of the current political economy of social media and corporate software. In this paper I examine the social impact of the incipient production of corporate software and social media platforms in K'ichee', a Mayan language spoken in the western highlands of Guatemala. I focus on the development of the currently available Facebook K'ichee' interface application and of the upcoming K'ichee' version of Microsoft Windows. Both involved the cooperation of K'ichee' speakers from the township of Nahualá in western Guatemala as well as non-local corporate intermediaries working on behalf of Facebook and Microsoft. This case study illustrates the strife provoked in indigenous communities by corporate software and social media translation strategies. Rather than partner with indigenous institutions charged with language revitalization, corporations like Facebook and Microsoft prefer translation agencies and unpaid volunteers without the collective sanction of their language communities. We will see that this commodification of the craft of translation into indigenous languages heightens tensions among community members having conflicting views about native language, identity and globalization. Germane to this debate is the tension between a view of language as a personal skill owned by individuals, on the one hand, and language as an inalienable, iconic practice belonging to the community that no one should appropriate, on the other. In Guatemala, indigenous institutions such as the K'ulb'il Yol Twitz Paxil, the Maya-run " Academy of the Mayan Languages of Guatemala " (ALMG) have stressed consensus as a strategy to minimize conflicts over standardization and revitalization policy. K'ichee' shows substantial dialectal variation and dialect stereotypes are important ethnic markers for its speakers. Glottonyms such as " K'ichee' " or " Kaqchikel " were introduced by the Spanish to unify mutually intelligible regional varieties under one name. 1 The introduction of mutual intelligibility as diagnostic criterion

The emergence of negative concord in Santa María Chiquimula K’iche’ (Mayan): A variationist perspective

LANGUAGE VARIATION AND CHANGE, 2015

A Maya Version of Jespersen's Cycle: The Diachronic Evolution of Negative Markers in K’iche’ Maya

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF AMERICAN LINGUISTICS, 2012

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, a... more JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

The Fricativization of Intervocalic /l/ in Santa María Chiquimula K'iche'

VARIATION IN INDIGENOUS MINORITY LANGUAGES, 2009

"They Don’t Get Speak Our Language Right”: Language Standardization, Power And Migration among the Q'eqchi' Maya

JOURNAL OF LINGUISTIC ANTHROPOLOGY, 2012

of ethnicity, authority and education among the Q'eqchi' Maya. [Language ideologies, dialectology... more

"Our parents don't talk like us!": Migration, adolescence and new dialect formation in Q'eqchi' Mayan

A CELEBRATION OF THE LIFE AND WORK OF PIERRE ROBERT COLAS, 2014

El K'iche' evangeliza al Q'eqchi': La Theologia Indorum (K'iche') como modelo de discurso doctrinal para las Coplas de Luís de Cáncer (Q'eqchi')

LINGÜÍSTICA MISIONERA: ASPECTOS LINGÜÍSTICOS, DISCURSIVOS, FILOLÓGICOS Y PEDAGÓGICOS, 2019

"Brujos", mitos y modernidad en la historia oral k'iche'

Estudios de Cultura Maya, 2017

En este trabajo se examina la relación entre la tradición oral y las repre-sentaciones de la hist... more En este trabajo se examina la relación entre la tradición oral y las repre-sentaciones de la historia y la coyuntura social entre los k'iche's del altiplano de Guatemala. Se muestra que la tradición oral consta de una gran diversidad de géne-ros con estructuras discursivas y fuerza ilocutiva. Se discuten las aparentes incon-sistencias entre narrativas y se demuestra que son expresión de disensos, debates y ansiedades en el seno de las comunidades frente a los cambios impuestos por la modernidad guatemalteca. En particular, se analizan historias de santos y " brujos " y las diferentes y contradictorias posturas que dramatizan frente a la expansión de la Acción Católica y de las iglesias pentecostales en los años cincuenta y sesenta del siglo pasado. Se muestra que la tradición oral es también modelo prescriptivo de la naciente prosa en idioma k'iche'. PalabRas clave: historia oral, discurso, religión, k'iche', Guatemala. abstRact: This paper examines the relationship between oral traditions and K'iche' representations of history and current social and cultural dilemmas in the Guate-malan highlands. I show that oral tradition include a great variety of genres with different discourse structures and illocutionary force. I discuss apparent inconsistencies among narratives and show that they embody dissent and anxieties in K'iche' communities in regard to changes provoked by Guatemala's violent modernity. In particular, I examine stories of patron saints and " witches " and the different stances vis-à-vis religious conversion that they dramatize after the expansion of Catholic Action and Pentecostal denominations in the 1950s and 1960s. Oral traditions are also prescriptive models for the emerging K'iche' narrative prose.

Language, Catechisms, and Mesoamerican Lords in Highland Guatemala: Addressing “God” after the Spanish Conquest

Ethnohistory, 2015

The textual sources of indigenous Christianities in Guatemala embody a complex articulation of na... more The textual sources of indigenous Christianities in Guatemala embody a complex articulation of native thought, European language ideologies, and the diachronic development of the Christianization of different areas of Mesoamerica. The evangelization of the K'iche' became a model for the construction of pastoral Q'eqchi'. In contrast, the evangelization of the Pipil demanded substantial modifications of Mexican Nahuatl doctrinal language. Mutual intelligibility was not the only requisite to persuade and convert the natives. The local organization of speech genres and the indexical associations they effected were equally crucial. Spanish imperial designs, including Christianization, were global, but the texts that mediated them were woven with local threads. The creation of Christian registers in indigenous languages in Guatemala illustrates the confluence of coercion, resistance, and creativity behind the emergence of colonial indigenous religions.

Mito y lengua en las crónicas indígenas de Guatemala

Anales de la Academia de Geografía e Historia de Guatemala, 2014

Se examina la construcción del discurso histórico en las crónicas escritas en idiomas indígenas d... more Se examina la construcción del discurso histórico en las crónicas escritas en idiomas indígenas de lo que hoy es la República de Guatemala. Comparando documentos en kaqchikel, k'iche', q'eqchi' y náhuatl, se muestra, primero, que a pesar de las afinidades temáticas con mitos de origen mexicano las crónicas guatemaltecas pertenecen a un espacio lingüístico y cultural propio. Segundo, se discurre sobre la noción de Mesoamérica, no como área cultural, sino como espacio discursivo en el cual durante el período post-Clásico se difundieron una serie de prácticas rituales e ideas políticas entre grupos lingüística y étnicamente distintos. La difusión de discursos políticos y religiosos, más que la migración, la conquista o el desplazamiento lingüístico, explican la estructura léxica y poética de las crónicas guatemaltecas. En tercer lugar, se examina el contexto colonial en la selección de temas y composición de los textos en idiomas indígenas. Se hace hincapié también en la forma sutil en que ideologías lingüísticas de origen europeo han influido en la lectura que los estudiosos hacen de las relaciones de intertextualidad entre fuentes mexicanas y guatemaltecas.

Dominican lessons taught and sung- The Coplas of Luis de Cancer.pdf

THE AMERICAS' FIRST THEOLOGIES: EARLY SOURCES OF POST-CONTACT INDIGENOUS RELIGION, 2017

Lingüística Histórica de lenguas indomexicanas. Hallazgos y discusiones recientes. Historical Linguistics of Indomexican Languages. New findings and recent discussions.

by Lucero Melendez, Marcela San Giacomo, Cristina Buenrostro Díaz, Sergio Romero, Frank Trechsel, and Carlos Wagner

La lingüística histórica es quizá una de las vertientes de estudio menos atendidas por las distin... more La lingüística histórica es quizá una de las vertientes de estudio menos atendidas por las distintas investigaciones gramaticales en lenguas indomexicanas. Con el fin de subsanar los huecos que existen, las editoras de este volumen convocamos a diversos mesoamericanistas especialistas en esta materia con la idea de abordar tanto el estudio histórico-comparativo de las lenguas indomexicanas (y también de algunas que se extienden más allá de las fronteras de México), así como los avances recientes en este campo de estudio.

Reading the First Books: Multilingual, Early-Modern OCR for Primeros Libros

by Sergio Romero, Anton duPlessis, Kent Norsworthy, Hannah Alpert-Abrams, and Matthew Christy

Enhancement of optical character recognition (OCR) technologies to improve researchers' ability t... more Enhancement of optical character recognition (OCR) technologies to improve researchers' ability to discover and search early modern, multilingual printed texts. During this phase, the project team would focus on books printed in the Americas before 1601. Funded by the National Endowment for the Humanities.

La temporalidad de la acción ritual en Mesoamérica: discursos, textos e imágenes - The temporality of ritual action in Mesoamerica

by Valentina Vapnarsky and Sergio Romero

Programa del encuentro de la red internacional (GDRI) RITMO "Crear, destruir, transformar en Meso... more

La temporalidad de la acción ritual - Ritual temporality - 2018 Oaxaca

by Valentina Vapnarsky and Sergio Romero

La temporalidad de la acción ritual en Mesoamérica: discursos, textos e imágenes Mesa-taller RITM... more La temporalidad de la acción ritual en Mesoamérica: discursos, textos e imágenes Mesa-taller RITMO En el marco del Coloquio COLOV VIII (http://www.colov.org/) Centro Académico y Cultural San Pablo, Biblioteca de investigación Juan de Córdova OAXACA 21 y 22 de abril 2018 En este coloquio taller se hará reflexión sobre las dimensiones temporales de la actividad ritual en las sociedades de Mesoamérica del pasado y del presente. Se enfocará el tema desde el discurso ritual y desde las representaciones escritas e iconográficas relacionadas. Se enfatizarán perspectivas pragmáticas para el análisis de datos vocales, verbales, textuales, glíficos e imágenes en su articulación precisa con la performance ritual. Se admitirán también otros acercamientos relevantes en los campos de la antropología lingüística, la epigrafía, la iconografía y la semiótica. Partiendo de rituales específicos, se busca dilucidar las temporalidades que estructuran los actos rituales. Se hará hincapié en el papel de las palabras, los textos y las imágenes como índices y anclajes temporales, a la vez que como motores de transformación del tiempo.

The Persistence of Language

Studies in Anthropological Linguistics, 2013