Are you a Náhuatl-speaker but feel the media is not providing you with the appropriate Olympic coverage in the language of your choice?
Worry no more: Starting Aug. 8 you will be able to read all about the Games in the 100 frases básicas del chino para los Juegos Olímpicos de Beijín 2008, a 100-page manual translating some of the world’s most popular sports into the pre-Hispanic language. This is, of course, for those who didn’t know that Tlapechmacuauhtapayolhuiliztli is Náhuatl for ping-pong.
Other useful things to remember:
Boxing=Ma’ixnamiquiliztli
Cycling=Omalacapainaliztli
Gymnastics: Tonacayomoliniliztli
Alas, the manual was not the work of Mexicans, but according to BBC Mundo, it is the brainchild of Dutch professor Rudolf van Zantwijk.
Oh, and in case you were wondering, we will work hard to bring home at least one gold medal, or Cozticteocuitlamachiopilcac.
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I don’t believe “pre-Hispanic” is the right adjective for Nahuatl. There are approximately one million speakers of Nahuatl today.
If we decide to put certain languages in the past, why not qualify Spanish as some outback dialect of Latin?
Why not refer to English as the language of Beowolf?
Mike, I believe “pre-Hispanic” refers to the historical period before the pinches conquistadores. It doesn’t mean the language is gone, it just refers to its origin. As such, I consider the remark to be accurate.
The reason why Spanish does not qualify as a dialect of Latin is because, in fact, it is not. Spanish is a Roman language, as French, Italian, Romanian and all the languages that derive from Latin. A dialect is a “version” of a language and does not qualify as one, which is why it is called a dialect.
As to English as we know it today, you might know it only exists as such since 1066, when the Normans invaded England and brought the French language to a country where “old English”, in its many dialects depending on the Kingdom (there were at least 7, but my memory is frail) was spoken, using a different grammar, alphabet, pronunciation and so much more than what you use today (actually, it was declined, just like Latin or German).
So no, it would just not be accurate to say that “English” is the language of Beowolf either.
Sandra,
We’ll have to ask Laura what she meant by stating that van Zantwijk had been “translating some of the world’s most popular sports into the pre-Hispanic language”. This would be true if he translated into, say, the language of the Maya hieroglyphs of 1,500 years ago. But he didn’t; he translated into the most widely spoken indigenous language in Mexico today. Literally then, this is anachronistic. Hence I don’t believe this is the right adjective to qualify modern Nahuatl.
If “pre-Hispanic” was used to refer to the origin of Nahuatl, this is also a curious–and I believe incorrect–usage of this adjective. “Pre-Hispanic”, of course, is a temporal division based on an important of historical event. It reaches back from the 1510s to…well…the Pleistocene. So, you are right, my comparisons are inaccurate. A more accurate comparison would be to affirm that Spanish is, say, a “pre-Napoleonic” language.
Of course, this is absurd, which is why you don’t refer to Spanish this way. Instead you correctly call it a Romance language (actually, you say Roman, but let’s not quibble). This refers to Spanish’s linguistic origins. Hence, if Laura’s intention was to refer to the linguistic origins of Nahuatl, like you did for Spanish, she should have said that the Dutch professor translated into a “Uto-Aztecan language”.
This is not just sophistic colloquy about the semantics of words; there is an issue here. On the face of it, I suspect Laura just used “pre-Hispanic” as a euphemism for “indigenous”. This is a common manifestation of the very strong tendency in Mexico (and the US too) to put indigenous people and indigenous civilization into the past and to define them based on their “origins”, meaning how they were at the time of European contact. This comes at a cost, notably denying to indigenous peoples the possibility that their cultures change and develop.
There are indigenous rock bands who sing in their language, indigenous authors who write in their languages…even recently Al Gore’s global warming movie was voiced-over into an indigenous Mexican language. Surely such activities are not correctly labeled “pre-Hispanic”?
Wow… I would think that “pre-Hispanic” would be a positive thing to the indigenous civilization. As in “you know, these guys were here before the conquistadores, and they actually had a language and a culture”.
But I could be wrong… maybe Mike is right about the “common manifestation of the very strong tendency in Mexico and the US to put indigenous people and indigenous civilization into the past” and so on and so forth…
The translation of Al Gore’s movie into an indigenous Mexican language would seem to prove this theory 😉
As far as Mr. Zantwijk’s work, who can validate that the word for ping pong in Nahuatl should be “un juego de pelota que se hace con una red en la mesa” (as the article states) and not “un juego de pelota blanca y pequeña que se hace con una red en la mesa”?
On that premise, aparently anyone can make up new words in Nahuatl. Right?
Relax Mike S, relax..