Rich linguistic variety across regions
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Spanish is the national language of Guatemala and the native language of many Guatemalans, but there is a significant portion of the population that does not speak or understand Spanish. There are over 20 native Mayan languages in Guatemala, including K’iche’, Kaqchikel, and Mam, among a myriad of other less widely spoken ones. Although these languages are progressively becoming more obsolete, it is important to consider non-Spanish speakers when thinking about media representation in Guatemala.
The existing power structure disadvantages native Mayan languages to Spanish in global and professional contexts. However, pride in indigenous languages remains strong and many communities teach younger generations to ensure their language preservation. Even though roughly 93% of the Guatemalan population speaks Spanish, an integral part of inclusion frameworks is including native languages and understanding the intense linking of identity and history to language use. Numerous studies link learning in your native language to educational outcomes.
Thus, stakeholders must examine ways to accommodate those who prefer or rely on a language other than Spanish in their media use. This could manifest in a few different ways, including providing native-language content to native speakers of Mayan languages, and building capacity through community radios to support indigenous people to develop and broadcast their own content.
Of the 22 languages native to Guatemala besides Spanish, K’iche’ is the most prominent with 1.68 million speakers, most of whom are from the western part of the country. Q’eqchi’ and Kaqchikel also have more than 1 million native speakers. While some variants are mutually intelligible, such as variants within the above three languages, cross-variant communication can still be quite challenging.
For example, K’iche’ and Mam, have some similarities, but they do not share enough linguistic features for a monolingual K’iche speaker to communicate effectively with a monolingual Mam speaker. They may be able to use Spanish to fill in the gaps, which indicates that they may not be monolinguals. Mam has over 840,000 speakers and four varieties overall. Mam extends beyond Guatemala into the Mexican state of Chiapas.
In addition to these four widely spoken Mayan languages, there are a plethora of other notable ones, including Poqomchi’, Achi, and Ixil, all of which are only native to Guatemala and have over 100 thousand speakers. These three languages are concentrated in the central or western-central part of the country, as are the majority of the languages that are only native to Guatemala. Many languages native to the northern, eastern, and far western parts of the country also exist in Belize and Mexico.
Q’anjob’al is the most widely spoken Mayan language that is not exclusive to Guatemala, with over 208,000 speakers, primarily in the Guatemalan department of Huehuetenango but also with a small pocket of speakers in Mexico. Furthermore, on the east coast of Guatemala, in the department of Izabal, there is a small group of Garífuna speakers. Unlike the languages on this list, Garífuna is not a Mayan language. It is an Arawakan language with speakers in Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Belize.
Providing content in Mayan languages may bridge the information gap for those who do not speak and understand Spanish. When thinking about indigenous inclusion through Mayan language content production and distribution, it may be helpful to target the languages with the most speakers, such as K’iche’, Q’eqchi’, Kaqchikel, and Mam.
