Mixed Origins of Santiagueño Quechua Syntax

Abstract

Long-tenn contact of Santiagueilo Quechua speakers with the majority Spanish-speaking population has modified their linguistic repertoire. Language mixing on all linguistic levels, variable loss of competence in Quechua and language shift to Spanish were assessed by means of sociolingl.)istic interviews, linguistic elicitation techniques and ethnographic work. Language shift can be interpreted within a long-term sociohistorical pattern of social inequality and subordination of one group (Quechua-speaking, traditional American Indian culture} to another (Spanish-speaking, modem Euro-American culture}.This study attempts to insert Santiagueilo Quechua within current research on other syncretic or mixed American Indian-European languages such as Media Lengua, Mexicano and Michif Cree, all the result of intense cultural contact between American Indian and European languages. Sociohistorical Overview Jn Santiago del Estero (Argentina) Santiagueilo Quechua (called Quichua locally; SQ henceforth) is spoken mainly in the central departments located in the rural areas, especially along and in between the Dulce River and Salado River, which traversed the province from northwest to southwest. All SQ speakers can also speak regional Spanish with different degrees of fluency and native-language interference, though it is unlikely SQ monolingual speakers are found to be alive even among the oldest people. In these remote rural enclaves children grow up speaking SQ at home and acquire Spanish in school. Despite the existence of a 1983 provincial decree allowing the teaching of Quechua in primary schools, in actuality only a few schools recruited and trained bilingual teachers to do so (Censabella 1999:41). Nonetheless, SQ remains one of the few Argentina's indigenous languages taught in universities and institutes. It was Prof. Domingo Bravo, a self-taught Santiagueiio rural teacher, who almost single-handedly contributed to a renewed interest and preservation of SQ. Through his teaching of the language to a younger generation of SQ teachers and his publications he helped much to preserve the language. Indeed, much of what is known about SQ Kansas Working Papers in Linguistics v25, ppl J 1-120