34 high school. They only have one church and the presidency of the village. Moto-taxis, collective taxis and public trucks transport people from the village around town and to other towns. There are not linguistic landscapes or any advertisement in Mazateco, though the speaker announces important messages in both languages. As previously mentioned in chapter two, villagers might present different dimensions on bilingualism.
The specific location of this study is a bilingual elementary school named
‘Cuahutemoc’ which is located fifteen minutes from the town center by walking. It contains six classrooms and the principal’s office, four restrooms (two with water and two without water). Six female teachers work in the school, one male is the principal and another male is the domestic worker. The 1st, 2nd and 3rd grade classrooms are in the low level of the hill while 4th, 5th and 6th grade classrooms are in the upper level of the hill.
The groups contain from 12 – 20 students approximately. After the earthquake that Oaxaca suffered on September 19th, 2017, the state was expected to afford economic support for fixing the wall near the hill edge that collapsed after the earthquake, even though such support never happened. The school had to move into a provisional building and after one month that the support did not arrive they decided to go back to the school building.
35 school in San Mateo Yoloxochitlán the man that participated in this interview is the principal of the school who authorized the application of the instrument. The main characteristics of each person are summarized in the following table.
All their names have been changed to protect their privacy.
36 Table 2. Participants’ backgrounds and personal information.
Name and Age
Hometown and place of
birth
First and Second Language
Contacts with Mazateco.
Background
Daniela 45
San Mateo, originally from Huautla
L1
Spanish, L2 Mazateco
Huautla and San Mateo
Teacher of 6th grade, she learned Mazateco language with their classmates in her childhood. She married a villager from San Mateo Yoloxochitlán. She works as the sub-principal of the bilingual school. She has participated in some workshops for Mazateco language teaching and documentation.
Eleazar 35
San Mateo, originally from Huautla
L1 Mazateco, L2 Spanish
Chilchotla, San Mateo and Huautla
Teacher of the 5th grade of the primary school. Her concern about social issues that influence language transmission like family and ideologies are stated in her answers. Before starting the meetings with teachers in this interview she was one of the teachers that started to talk in Mazateco. Her volume of voice is one of the lowest from all teachers.
Julieta 38
Huautla de Jimenez
L1
Spanish, L2 Mazateco
San Mateo and San Antonio
Teacher of the 4th grade. She has acquired Mazateco as a second language through the interaction with her students. In the interview she shows a limited participation but clear when asked.
Ana 35
San Mateo, originally from Huautla
L1 Spanish, L2 Mazateco
San Lucas Z., San Antonio, San Mateo
Teacher of the 2nd grade of the primary school. She has Mazateco as her second language, she is not from San Mateo Yoloxochitlán, and she is committed with issues of language inequality and discrimination.
Leticia 35
Huautla de Jimenez
L1 Spanish, L2 Mazateco
Huautla and San Mateo
Teacher of 3rd grade, she also has a major as a lawyer. She has been in contact with other variants of Mazateco and has been in other schools where Mazateco is spoken. When talking about language and law and language policies she is the one that discuss the most about the topic.
Mónica 45
San Mateo L1 Mazateco, L2 Spanish
Mazatlán Villa, San Lucas Z., San Mateo
1st grade teacher from the institution, she is concerned with issues of language variation and usage, as well as the language as part of village identity. She is the one that has knowledge about literature or texts in Mazateco language from San Mateo.
Octavio 50
Huautla de Jimenez
L1 Spanish L2 Mazateco
San Mateo, Chilchotla and Huautla
He is the principal from the institution. His stance like other participants is very clear about the new educative reform and the importance of preserving the language and the role of new generations and parents in the process of language maintenance.
37 As we can appreciate in the table, the participants show different backgrounds in their
location, mother tongue, language acquisition, contacts with other variants and work experience, this gives diverse perceptions and understanding of the ethnic language. For some of them Mazateco was forbidden at schools, for others it was taught in the family and others had to learn Mazateco for work.
The second group of participants is integrated by twenty-one students who contributed in the questionnaire. The sample selected took into account the last grades of school since they are more conscious about their own bilingualism. Their ages range from eight to twelve years old, grades 4th and 6th (5th grade did not have class the day the instrument was administered), eleven boys and ten girls answered the questionnaire. One boy and one girl were handicap, in the 6th grade the boy did not take the questionnaire, the girl did. The test took around thirty minutes. It was managed on Friday 25th of May 2018. In the 6th grade it was applied at 9:45 am. (8:45 am. local area) and 10:30 am (9:30 am local area). Three people were absent in 6th grade that day while in 4th grade four students were absent, one girl arrived just at the end of the test (The questionnaire was not applied to her for not interrupting the teachers’ class).