Changing language input following market integration in a Yucatec Mayan community

Padilla-Iglesias, Cecilia and Woodward, Amanda L. and Goldin-Meadow, Susan and Shneidman, Laura A. and Peña Garay, Marcela de Lourdes (2021) Changing language input following market integration in a Yucatec Mayan community. PLOS ONE, 16 (6). e0252926. ISSN 1932-6203

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Abstract

Like many indigenous populations worldwide, Yucatec Maya communities are rapidly undergoing change as they become more connected with urban centers and access to formal education, wage labour, and market goods became more accessible to their inhabitants. However, little is known about how these changes affect children’s language input. Here, we provide the first systematic assessment of the quantity, type, source, and language of the input received by 29 Yucatec Maya infants born six years apart in communities where increased contact with urban centres has resulted in a greater exposure to the dominant surrounding language, Spanish. Results show that infants from the second cohort received less directed input than infants in the first and, when directly addressed, most of their input was in Spanish. To investigate the mechanisms driving the observed patterns, we interviewed 126 adults from the communities. Against common assumptions, we showed that reductions in Mayan input did not simply result from speakers devaluing the Maya language. Instead, changes in input could be attributed to changes in childcare practices, as well as caregiver ethnotheories regarding the relative acquisition difficulty of each of the languages. Our study highlights the need for understanding the drivers of individual behaviour in the face of socio-demographic and economic changes as it is key for determining the fate of linguistic diversity.

Item Type: Article
Subjects: Oalibrary Press > Medical Science
Depositing User: Managing Editor
Date Deposited: 17 Feb 2023 07:27
Last Modified: 01 Jan 2024 12:45
URI: http://asian.go4publish.com/id/eprint/711

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