Zapotec, as Mother Tongue. (English)

                                  MOTHER TONGUES

A Mother Tongue is a form of identity. In our own surroundings , is the group of sounds, words and phrases that identify us, makes us feel part of a group or a community, giving us a sense of belonging. In that, resides its importance, because it becomes a tool of sociolinguistic identity. Languages have always been threatened, but now more than ever, when we seem to live the era of standardization of fashions, consumption, styles, music, etc. And, unfortunately, this standardization is working its way in the Linguistic field, at an alarming pace, taking us to a serious stage of deterioration of local uses, changing them for what’s trendy, but that current, seems to be taking with it, many features of our identity.

 Surprisingly, the arrival of The Spaniards, also marks the beginning of the efforts to rescue the Zapotecand other Languages as  mother tongues, since its preservation would prove vital for the friars and their work.

 On the rescue of the Zapotec Language, since the Colonial era, the work of Fr. Juan de Córdova stands out. He was a bright Dominican priest that, because of differences with the hierarchy of his order, was removed from his post of Provincial Minister in 1570, and he retired to his “Zapotec Mission” (probably Teititpac). In 1578 he was named head of the Convent of Tlacochahuaya, and he lived there until he was really old, and requested to move to The Main House of St. Hipólito, in the City of Oaxaca where he died.

 

Is in the work of Father Córdova, that many projects of study and preservation of Zapotec, have been based on, since his works give us a deep insight of that Language.

 

 

This time, we bring you a project that we have called “Oral rescue” because we are focusing our efforts in what we currently speak in Tlacochahuaya, and we will base our lessons in the writing s of Father Córdova, some elders in our town and other resources at hand.

We hope it’s useful, and it can help us all, to focus our efforts, in the preservation of our Language, and that, at the end will help to strengthen our identity and our sense of belonging to a Zapotec community like Tlacochahuaya.

Greetings.

 

 

 

Bibliography: “Art of The Zapotec Language” Fr. Juan de Córdova.

“ Bills of the Second International Congress of Dominicans, in Salamanca”