INVESTIGADORES
GOLLUSCIO lucia Angela
congresos y reuniones científicas
Título:
The Chaco languages and the socio-historical dynamics of their peoples
Autor/es:
CITRO, SILVIA; GOLLUSCIO, LUCÍA; VIDAL, ALEJANDRA
Lugar:
Leipzig
Reunión:
Workshop; “Historical linguistics and hunter-gatherer populations in global; 2006
Institución organizadora:
Dept. of Linguistics, MPI
Resumen:
The Gran Chaco region is situated in the center of South America (territories of Argentina, Paraguay, Brazil, and Bolivia), along the fringe of the Matto Grosso Plateau in the North, the Salado River basin in the South, the Paraná and Paraguay Rivers in the East and the Andean foothills in the West. It is a vast subtropical plain of about 600.000 square kilometers with low forests and savanna formations, with a rich xerophytes flora and fauna. The Gran Chaco was inhabited mostly by nomadic or semi nomadic hunting-gatherers. In this sense, the name "chaco" seems to derive from a Quechua word meaning "hunting ground" (Métraux, 1946b). The Chaco region is one of the richest areas in South America in terms of its ethno-linguistic diversity. At the end of the 19th century, in the Gran Chaco more than 50 socio-political units spoke 22 languages with several dialectal variations that belonged to 6 linguistic families (Braunstein et al., 2002). Those marked in white are still spoken in Argentina. We have organized this presentation as follow. First, we describe the main cultural traits shared by the hunter-gatherers in the Argentine Chaco. Second, we sum up the colonization process and its consequences on the current sociolinguistic situation. Third, we outline the main typological features of three languages belonging to three different families: Wichi (Matako-Mataguayan), Pilagá (Guaycuruan), and Vilela (Lule-Vilela).             We intend to demonstrate that the Chaco region is a cultural area inhabited by peoples that share some general cultural traits, despite the internal differences caused by the fragmentation into different socio-political units with their own language. In addition, we underline the complex consequences of the colonization process. Although this process promoted similar changes in all aboriginal groups (incorporation of Spanish, conversion to Christianity, sedentarization and incorporation to the labor market), the politics of colonial and postcolonial agents were developed in different ways. This contributed to diversify the changes in the Chaco native cultures and languages. Then, we state that both the socio-cultural structures of the Chaco peoples and the transformations produced by the Colonization process promoted a dialectical tension between the homogeny and differentiation trends among these peoples. This led to the paradox of a Pan-Chaco cultural unity versus a vigorous dynamics of socio-political and linguistic differentiation within each ethnic complex.