Misplaced Pages

#158841

117-654: Latinx is a neologism in American English which is used to refer to people of Latin American cultural or ethnic identity in the United States . The gender-neutral ⟨-x⟩ suffix replaces the ⟨-o/-a⟩ ending of Latino and Latina that are typical of grammatical gender in Spanish . Its plural is Latinxs or Latinxes . Words used for similar purposes include Latin@ , Latine , and

234-487: A pitch accent , such as Nahuatl of Oapan, Guerrero . Many modern dialects have also borrowed phonemes from Spanish, such as /β, d, ɡ, ɸ/ . In many Nahuatl dialects vowel length contrast is vague, and in others it has become lost entirely. The dialect spoken in Tetelcingo (nhg) developed the vowel length into a difference in quality: Most varieties have relatively simple patterns of allophony . In many dialects,

351-502: A chronicle of the royal lineage of Tenochtitlan by Fernando Alvarado Tezozómoc ; Cantares Mexicanos , a collection of songs in Nahuatl; a Nahuatl-Spanish/Spanish-Nahuatl dictionary compiled by Alonso de Molina ; and the Huei tlamahuiçoltica , a description in Nahuatl of the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe . Grammars and dictionaries of indigenous languages were composed throughout

468-451: A complex morphology , or system of word formation, characterized by polysynthesis and agglutination . This means that morphemes – words or fragments of words that each contain their own separate meaning – are often strung together to make longer complex words. Through a very long period of development alongside other indigenous Mesoamerican languages , they have absorbed many influences, coming to form part of

585-409: A few hundred people, perhaps only a few dozen". According to the 2000 census by INEGI, Nahuatl is spoken by an estimated 1.45 million people, some 198,000 (14.9%) of whom are monolingual. There are many more female than male monolinguals, and women represent nearly two-thirds of the total number. The states of Guerrero and Hidalgo have the highest rates of monolingual Nahuatl speakers relative to

702-493: A great deal of autonomy in the local administration of indigenous towns during this period, and in many Nahuatl-speaking towns the language was the de facto administrative language both in writing and speech. A large body of Nahuatl literature was composed during this period, including the Florentine Codex , a twelve-volume compendium of Aztec culture compiled by Franciscan Bernardino de Sahagún ; Crónica Mexicayotl ,

819-529: A means of emphasizing that the origins of the letter X and term Chicano are linked to the Indigenous Nahuatl language . The x has also been added to the end of the term Chicano , making it Chicanx . An example of this occurred at Columbia University where students changed their student group name from "Chicano Caucus" to "Chicanx Caucus" in December 2014. The following year, Columbia University changed

936-583: A misguided romantic quest like that of the title character in Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes ; Scrooge , a pejorative for misers based on the avaricious main character in Charles Dickens ' A Christmas Carol ; and Pollyanna , referring to people who are unfailingly optimistic like the title character of Eleanor H. Porter's Pollyanna . Neologisms are often introduced in technical writing, so-called Fachtexte or 'technical texts' through

1053-827: A part of their efforts, missionaries belonging to several religious orders —principally Jesuits , as well as Franciscan and Dominican friars—introduced the Latin alphabet to the Nahuas. Within twenty years of the Spanish arrival, texts in Nahuatl were being written using the Latin script. Simultaneously, schools were founded, such as the Colegio de Santa Cruz de Tlatelolco in 1536, which taught both indigenous and classical European languages to both Native Americans and priests. Missionaries authored of grammars for indigenous languages for use by priests. The first Nahuatl grammar, written by Andrés de Olmos ,

1170-458: A person may replace a word with a nonsensical one of their own invention (e.g., "I got so angry I picked up a dish and threw it at the gelsinger"). The use of neologisms may also be due to aphasia acquired after brain damage resulting from a stroke or head injury . Nahuatl Nahuatl ( English: / ˈ n ɑː w ɑː t əl / NAH -wah-təl ; Nahuatl pronunciation: [ˈnaːwat͡ɬ] ), Aztec , or Mexicano

1287-424: A person's idiolect , one's unique patterns of vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation. Neologisms are usually introduced when it is found that a specific notion is lacking a term, or when the existing vocabulary lacks detail, or when a speaker is unaware of the existing vocabulary. The law, governmental bodies, and technology have a relatively high frequency of acquiring neologisms. Another trigger that motivates

SECTION 10

#1732851298159

1404-486: A politician or organization that uses the term. The League of United Latin American Citizens decided to drop the term from its official communication in 2021. Latinx has become commonly used by activists in higher education and the popular media who seek to advocate for individuals on the borderlines of gender identity . Herlihy-Mera calls Latinx "a recognition of the exclusionary nature of our institutions, of

1521-442: A quality or attribute of a perceived object, as opposed to its essence. In physics, new terms were introduced sometimes via nonce formation (e.g., Murray Gell-Man 's quark , taken from James Joyce ) or through derivation (e.g. John von Neumann's kiloton , coined by combining the common prefix kilo- 'thousand' with the noun ton ). Neologisms therefore are a vital component of scientific jargon or termini technici . Polari

1638-573: A spectrum of Nahuan languages are spoken in scattered areas stretching from the northern state of Durango to Tabasco in the southeast. Pipil, the southernmost Nahuan language, is spoken in El Salvador by a small number of speakers. According to IRIN-International, the Nawat Language Recovery Initiative project, there are no reliable figures for the contemporary numbers of speakers of Pipil. Numbers may range anywhere from "perhaps

1755-484: A style manual published together with the Asociación de Academias de la Lengua Española (ASALE). Regarding this decision, Darío Villanueva, RAE's director said, "The problem is we're confusing grammar with machismo." According to HuffPost , some refuse to use the term on the grounds that Latinx is difficult to pronounce in the Spanish language. Linguists Janet M. Fuller and Jennifer Leeman state that some people reject

1872-506: A term still below the threshold of a neologism according to Merriam-Webster , is an example of the latter which has specifically spread primarily through Facebook group and Twitter account use. The suspected origin of this way of referring to dogs stems from a Facebook group founded in 2008 and gaining popularity in 2014 in Australia. In Australian English it is common to use diminutives , often ending in –o, which could be where doggo-lingo

1989-606: A type of dairy product ) from James Joyce 's Finnegans Wake . The title of a book may become a neologism, for instance, Catch-22 (from the title of Joseph Heller 's novel). Alternatively, the author's name may give rise to the neologism, although the term is sometimes based on only one work of that author. This includes such words as " Orwellian " (from George Orwell , referring to his dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four ) and "Kafkaesque" (from Franz Kafka ). Names of famous characters are another source of literary neologisms. Some examples include: Quixotic , referring to

2106-605: A typical Nahuan language. In some dialects, the /t͡ɬ/ phoneme, which was common in Classical Nahuatl, has changed into either /t/ , as in Isthmus Nahuatl , Mexicanero and Pipil , or into /l/ , as in Michoacán Nahuatl . Many dialects no longer distinguish between short and long vowels . Some have introduced completely new vowel qualities to compensate, as is the case for Tetelcingo Nahuatl . Others have developed

2223-423: A vowel i to prevent consonant clusters and one without it. For example, the absolutive suffix has the variant forms -tli (used after consonants) and -tl (used after vowels). Some modern varieties, however, have formed complex clusters from vowel loss. Others have contracted syllable sequences, causing accents to shift or vowels to become long. Most Nahuatl dialects have stress on the penultimate syllable of

2340-455: A word. In Mexicanero from Durango, many unstressed syllables have disappeared from words, and the placement of syllable stress has become phonemic. The Nahuatl languages are polysynthetic and agglutinative , making extensive use of compounding, incorporation and derivation. Various prefixes and suffixes can be added to a root to form very long words—individual Nahuatl words can constitute an entire sentence.. The following verb shows how

2457-480: Is Latin@ , which combines the written form of the ⟨-a⟩ and ⟨-o⟩ endings. Similar terms include Chicanx and the variant spelling Xicanx . Latine (plural: Latines ) as a gender-neutral term is less prevalent than Latinx within the U.S., although the opposite is true throughout the Spanish-speaking world. In the U.S., "Latine" arose out of genderqueer speakers' use of

SECTION 20

#1732851298159

2574-483: Is interdisciplinary . Anyone such as a lexicographer or an etymologist might study neologisms, how their uses span the scope of human expression, and how, due to science and technology, they spread more rapidly than ever before in the present times. The term neologism has a broader meaning which also includes "a word which has gained a new meaning". Sometimes, the latter process is called semantic shifting , or semantic extension . Neologisms are distinct from

2691-413: Is a blend of the words "breakfast" and "lunch", or through abbreviation or acronym , by intentionally rhyming with existing words or simply through playing with sounds. A relatively rare form of neologism is when proper names are used as words (e.g., boycott , from Charles Boycott ), including guy , dick , Chad , and Karen . Neologisms can become popular through memetics , through mass media ,

2808-497: Is a cant used by some actors, circus performers, and the gay subculture to communicate without outsiders understanding. Some Polari terms have crossed over into mainstream slang, in part through their usage in pop song lyrics and other works. Example include: acdc , barney , blag , butch , camp , khazi , cottaging , hoofer , mince , ogle , scarper , slap , strides , tod , [rough] trade ( rough trade ). Verlan ( French pronunciation: [vɛʁlɑ̃] ), ( verlan

2925-617: Is a language or, by some definitions, a group of languages of the Uto-Aztecan language family . Varieties of Nahuatl are spoken by about 1.7 million Nahuas , most of whom live mainly in Central Mexico and have smaller populations in the United States . Nahuatl has been spoken in central Mexico since at least the seventh century CE. It was the language of the Mexica , who dominated what

3042-521: Is also explored by Antonio Pastrana Jr., Juan Battle and Angelique Harris on LBGTQ+ issues. Valdes also uses the term in research on black perspectives on Latinx. A 2020 analysis found "that community college professional organizations have by and large not adopted the term Latinx , even by [ sic ] organizations with a Latinx/a/o centered mission", although some academic journals and dissertations about community colleges were using it. The University of California, Berkeley , has established

3159-560: Is any single-use term that may or may not grow in popularity; a protologism is such a term used exclusively within a small group; a prelogism is such a term that is gaining usage but still not mainstream; and a neologism has become accepted or recognized by social institutions. Neologisms are often driven by changes in culture and technology. Popular examples of neologisms can be found in science , technology , fiction (notably science fiction ), films and television, commercial branding, literature , jargon , cant , linguistics ,

3276-505: Is crucial in various industries and legal systems. Inaccurate translations can lead to 'translation asymmetry' or misunderstandings and miscommunication. Many technical glossaries of English translations exist to combat this issue in the medical, judicial, and technological fields. In psychiatry and neuroscience , the term neologism is used to describe words that have meaning only to the person who uses them, independent of their common meaning. This can be seen in schizophrenia , where

3393-577: Is debated among linguists. Lyle Campbell (1997) classified Pipil as separate from the Nahuatl branch within general Aztecan, whereas dialectologists such as Una Canger , Karen Dakin, Yolanda Lastra , and Terrence Kaufman have preferred to include Pipil within the General Aztecan branch, citing close historical ties with the eastern peripheral dialects of General Aztec. Current subclassification of Nahuatl rests on research by Canger (1980) , Canger (1988) and Lastra de Suárez (1986) . Canger introduced

3510-486: Is difficult to pronounce, and is disrespectful toward conventional Spanish; the Royal Spanish Academy style guide does not recognize the suffix -x. Latinx is a term for a group identity used to describe individuals in the United States who have Latin American roots. Other names for this social category include Hispanic , Latino , Latina , Latine , and Latin@ (combining the letters "a" and "o" into

3627-537: Is no prescriptive control toward either syntax". Many people became more aware of the term in the month following the Orlando nightclub shooting of June 2016; Google Trends shows that searches for this term rose greatly in this period. A similar use of 'x' in the term Mx. may have been an influence or model for the development of Latinx . At Princeton University the Latinx Perspective Organization

Latinx - Misplaced Pages Continue

3744-536: Is not English have also criticized the term on the basis that it caters more to Latin Americans who are fluent in English and can pronounce the -x ending easily while ignoring gender neutral alternatives already employed by Latin American activists, such as -e ( Latine ). Linguist John McWhorter argues that, in contrast to other neologisms such as African American , Latinx has not become mainstream as of 2019 because

3861-711: Is now central Mexico during the Late Postclassic period of Mesoamerican history . During the centuries preceding the Spanish conquest of the Aztec Empire , the Aztecs had expanded to incorporate a large part of central Mexico. Their influence caused the variety of Nahuatl spoken by the residents of Tenochtitlan to become a prestige language in Mesoamerica. Following the Spanish conquest, Spanish colonists and missionaries introduced

3978-645: Is probably derived from the word nāhuatlahtōlli [naːwat͡ɬaʔˈtoːliˀ] ('clear language'). The language was formerly called Aztec because it was spoken by the Central Mexican peoples known as Aztecs ( Nahuatl pronunciation: [asˈteːkaḁ] ). During the period of the Aztec empire centered in Mexico- Tenochtitlan the language came to be identified with the politically dominant mēxihcah [meːˈʃiʔkaḁ] ethnic group, and consequently

4095-675: Is problematic, which in any other context progressives would recognize as an alienating and insensitive message." Democratic Senator-elect Ruben Gallego , who represented a majority-Hispanic congressional district in Arizona before 2025, advises Democrats not to use the term. Members of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus are hesitant to use the term until after usage continues to evolve to make it more common, according to California representative Raul Ruiz . In January 2023, Republican Governor of Arkansas Sarah Huckabee Sanders issued

4212-624: Is the only living descendant of the variety of Nahuatl once spoken south of present-day Mexico. During the 7th century, Nahuan speakers rose to power in central Mexico. The people of the Toltec culture of Tula , which was active in central Mexico around the 10th century, are thought to have been Nahuatl speakers. By the 11th century, Nahuatl speakers were dominant in the Valley of Mexico and far beyond, with settlements including Azcapotzalco , Colhuacan and Cholula rising to prominence. Nahua migrations into

4329-442: Is the predominant language for published research and studies, like-sounding translations (referred to as 'naturalization') are sometimes used. Alternatively, the English word is used along with a brief explanation of meaning. The four translation methods are emphasized in order to translate neologisms: transliteration , transcription , the use of analogues, and loan translation . When translating from English to other languages,

4446-481: Is the reverse of the expression "l'envers") is a type of argot in the French language , featuring inversion of syllables in a word, and is common in slang and youth language. It rests on a long French tradition of transposing syllables of individual words to create slang words. Some verlan words, such as meuf ("femme", which means "woman" roughly backwards), have become so commonplace that they have been included in

4563-431: Is unusual for a word to gain popularity if it does not clearly resemble other words. The term neologism is first attested in English in 1772, borrowed from French néologisme (1734). The French word derives from Greek νέο- néo (="new") and λόγος / lógos , meaning "speech, utterance". In an academic sense, there is no professional neologist, because the study of such things (cultural or ethnic vernacular, for example)

4680-599: Is widely accepted as having two divisions: General Aztec and Pochutec. General Aztec encompasses the Nahuatl and Pipil languages. Pochutec is a scantily attested language, which became extinct in the 20th century, and which Campbell and Langacker classify as being outside general Aztec. Other researchers have argued that Pochutec should be considered a divergent variant of the western periphery. Nahuatl denotes at least Classical Nahuatl, together with related modern languages spoken in Mexico. The inclusion of Pipil in this group

4797-486: The Petit Larousse . Like any slang, the purpose of verlan is to create a somewhat secret language that only its speakers can understand. Words becoming mainstream is counterproductive. As a result, such newly common words are re-verlanised: reversed a second time. The common meuf became feumeu . Neologism development may be spurred, or at least spread, by popular culture. Examples of pop-culture neologisms include

Latinx - Misplaced Pages Continue

4914-406: The 2020 United States presidential election , stated that for Democrats , while other factors played a larger role, the term "is, if nothing else, a symptom of the problem, which is a tendency to privilege academic concepts and linguistic innovations in addressing social justice concerns." He says that "[t]he message of the term   ... is that the entire grammatical system of the Spanish language

5031-619: The Executive Order to Respect the Latino Community by Eliminating Culturally Insensitive words from Official Use in Government , banning the use of Latinx in official Arkansas government communications. In February 2023, a group of Hispanic Connecticut lawmakers, including five Democrats, proposed a similar ban on formal state documents, calling the term offensive to Spanish speakers. State Representative Geraldo Reyes Jr., who introduced

5148-453: The Internet , and word of mouth , including academic discourse in many fields renowned for their use of distinctive jargon , and often become accepted parts of the language. Other times, they disappear from common use just as readily as they appeared. Whether a neologism continues as part of the language depends on many factors, probably the most important of which is acceptance by the public. It

5265-474: The Isthmus of Tehuantepec call their language mela'tajtol ('the straight language'). Some speech communities use Nahuatl as the name for their language, although it seems to be a recent innovation. Linguists commonly identify localized dialects of Nahuatl by adding as a qualifier the name of the village or area where that variety is spoken. On the issue of geographic origin, the consensus of linguists during

5382-622: The Latin script , and Nahuatl became a literary language . Many chronicles , grammars, works of poetry, administrative documents and codices were written in it during the 16th and 17th centuries. This early literary language based on the Tenochtitlan variety has been labeled Classical Nahuatl . It is among the most studied and best-documented Indigenous languages of the Americas . Today, Nahuan languages are spoken in scattered communities, mostly in rural areas throughout central Mexico and along

5499-622: The Mesoamerican language area . Many words from Nahuatl were absorbed into Spanish and, from there, were diffused into hundreds of other languages in the region. Most of these loanwords denote things indigenous to central Mexico, which the Spanish heard mentioned for the first time by their Nahuatl names. English has also absorbed words of Nahuatl origin , including avocado , chayote , chili , chipotle , chocolate , atlatl , coyote , peyote , axolotl and tomato . These words have since been adopted into dozens of languages around

5616-599: The Mexican Plateau , pre-Nahuan groups probably spent a period of time in contact with the Uto-Aztecan Cora and Huichol of northwestern Mexico. The major political and cultural center of Mesoamerica in the Early Classic period was Teotihuacan . The identity of the language(s) spoken by Teotihuacan's founders has long been debated, with the relationship of Nahuatl to Teotihuacan being prominent in that enquiry. It

5733-519: The Valley of Mexico are generally more closely related to it than those on the periphery. Under Mexico's General Law of Linguistic Rights of the Indigenous Peoples , promulgated in 2003, Nahuatl and the other 63 indigenous languages of Mexico are recognized as lenguas nacionales ('national languages') in the regions where they are spoken. They are given the same status as Spanish within their respective regions. Nahuan languages exhibit

5850-639: The Zapatista Army of National Liberation and indigenous social movements) led to legislative reforms and the creation of decentralized government agencies like the National Commission for the Development of Indigenous Peoples (CDI) and the Instituto Nacional de Lenguas Indígenas (INALI) with responsibilities for the promotion and protection of indigenous communities and languages. In particular,

5967-618: The visual arts , and popular culture. Examples of words that were 20th-century neologisms include laser (1960), an acronym of light amplification by stimulated emission of radiation ; robot (1921) from Czech writer Karel Čapek 's play R.U.R. (Rossum's Universal Robots) ; and agitprop (1930; a portmanteau of Russian "agitatsiya" (agitation) and "propaganda"). Neologisms are often formed by combining existing words (see compound noun and adjective ) or by giving words new and unique suffixes or prefixes . Neologisms can also be formed by blending words, for example, "brunch"

SECTION 50

#1732851298159

6084-534: The "language group" labeled Nahuatl. The Ethnologue recognizes 28 varieties with separate ISO codes. Sometimes Nahuatl is also applied to the Nawat language of El Salvador and Nicaragua. Regardless of whether Nahuatl is considered to refer to a dialect continuum or a group of separate languages, the varieties form a single branch within the Uto-Aztecan family, descended from a single Proto-Nahuan language . Within Mexico,

6201-482: The "shift toward x in reference to people has already occurred" in limited academic settings and "for many faculty [in the humanities department at the University of Puerto Rico ] hermanx and niñx and their equivalents have been the standard ... for years. It is clear that the inclusive approach to nouns and adjectives is becoming more common, and while it may at some point become the prevailing tendency, presently there

6318-512: The 20th century was that the Uto-Aztecan language family originated in the southwestern United States. Evidence from archaeology and ethnohistory supports the thesis of a southward diffusion across the North American continent, specifically that speakers of early Nahuan languages migrated from Aridoamerica into central Mexico in several waves. But recently, the traditional assessment has been challenged by Jane H. Hill , who proposes instead that

6435-499: The 20th century, Mexican educational policy focused on the Hispanicization of indigenous communities, teaching only Spanish and discouraging the use of indigenous languages. As a result, one scholar estimated in 1983 that there was no group of Nahuatl speakers who had attained general literacy (that is, the ability to read the classical language) in Nahuatl, and Nahuatl speakers' literacy rate in Spanish also remained much lower than

6552-695: The American alt-Right (2010s), the Canadian portmanteau " Snowmageddon " (2009), the Russian parody " Monstration " ( c.  2004 ), Santorum ( c.  2003 ). Neologisms spread mainly through their exposure in mass media . The genericizing of brand names , such as "coke" for Coca-Cola , "kleenex" for Kleenex facial tissue, and "xerox" for Xerox photocopying , all spread through their popular use being enhanced by mass media. However, in some limited cases, words break out of their original communities and spread through social media . " DoggoLingo ",

6669-562: The Central group, while Lastra de Suárez (1986) places them in the Eastern Periphery, which was followed by Kaufman (2001) . The terminology used to describe varieties of spoken Nahuatl is inconsistently applied. Many terms are used with multiple denotations, or a single dialect grouping goes under several names. Sometimes, older terms are substituted with newer ones or with the speakers' own name for their specific variety. The word Nahuatl

6786-484: The Latinx Research Center, "a faculty-led research hub...that is home to cutting-edge research about the diverse Latinx community of the U.S." Some Republicans argue that the word is a product of liberal " wokeism ", while some Democrats argue that it disfigures the Spanish language and is an act of cultural appropriation. Matthew Yglesias of Vox , discussing Donald Trump 's gains among Hispanic voters in

6903-515: The Maya Kʼicheʼ people . As Tenochtitlan grew to become the largest urban center in Central America and one of the largest in the world at the time, it attracted speakers of Nahuatl from diverse areas giving birth to an urban form of Nahuatl with traits from many dialects. This urbanized variety of Tenochtitlan is what came to be known as Classical Nahuatl as documented in colonial times. With

7020-429: The Nahuatl language was often described as mēxihcacopa [meːʃiʔkaˈkopaˀ] (literally 'in the manner of Mexicas') or mēxihcatlahtolli 'Mexica language'. Now, the term Aztec is rarely used for modern Nahuan languages, but linguists' traditional name of Aztecan for the branch of Uto-Aztecan that comprises Nahuatl, Pipil, and Pochutec is still in use (although some linguists prefer Nahuan ). Since 1978,

7137-496: The New Philology, such that there is a 2001 English translation of Carochi's 1645 grammar by James Lockhart . Through contact with Spanish the Nahuatl language adopted many loan words, and as bilingualism intensified, changes in the grammatical structure of Nahuatl followed. In 1570, King Philip II of Spain decreed that Nahuatl should become the official language of the colonies of New Spain to facilitate communication between

SECTION 60

#1732851298159

7254-462: The Spanish and natives of the colonies. This led to Spanish missionaries teaching Nahuatl to Amerindians living as far south as Honduras and El Salvador. During the 16th and 17th centuries, Classical Nahuatl was used as a literary language; a large corpus dating to the period remains extant. They include histories, chronicles, poetry, theatrical works, Christian canonical works, ethnographic descriptions, and administrative documents. The Spanish permitted

7371-451: The Spanish language itself is a form of linguistic imperialism for Latin Americans . Another argument against Latinx is that "it erases feminist movements in the 1970s" that fought for use of the word Latina to represent women, according to George Cadava, Director of the Latina and Latino Studies program at Northwestern University . Writing for Latino Rebels, Hector Luis Alamo describes

7488-453: The Spanish language." Contrarily, it has been claimed that usage of the term "started in online chat rooms and listservs in the 1990s" and that its first appearance in academic literature was in the Fall 2004 volume of the journal Feministas Unidas . In the rest of the United States, it was first used in activist and LGBT circles as a way to expand on earlier attempts at gender-inclusive forms of

7605-916: The US found that they "perceive higher education as a privileged space where they use the term Latinx . Once they return to their communities, they do not use the term". A 2021 Gallup poll asked Hispanic Americans about their preference among the terms "Hispanic," "Latino" and "Latinx". 57% said it did not matter, and 4% chose Latinx . In a follow-up question where they were asked which term they lean toward, 5% chose Latinx . A 2021 poll by Democratic Hispanic outreach firm Bendixen & Amandi International found that only 2 percent of those polled refer to themselves as Latinx, while 68 percent call themselves "Hispanic" and 21 percent favored "Latino" or "Latina" to describe their ethnic background. In addition, 40 percent of those polled said Latinx bothers or offends them to some degree and 30 percent said they would be less likely to support

7722-478: The United States has resulted in the establishment of small Nahuatl speaking communities in the United States , particularly in California, New York, Texas , New Mexico and Arizona . Nahuan languages are defined as a subgroup of Uto-Aztecan by having undergone a number of shared changes from the Uto-Aztecan protolanguage (PUA). The table below shows the phonemic inventory of Classical Nahuatl as an example of

7839-481: The United States, some linguists are warning of impending language death . At present Nahuatl is mostly spoken in rural areas by an impoverished class of indigenous subsistence agriculturists. According to the Mexican National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI), 51% of Nahuatl speakers are involved in the farming sector and 6 in 10 receive no wages or less than the minimum wage. For most of

7956-488: The Uto-Aztecan language family originated in central Mexico and spread northwards at a very early date. This hypothesis and the analyses of data that it rests upon have received serious criticism. The proposed migration of speakers of the Proto-Nahuan language into the Mesoamerican region has been placed at sometime around AD 500, towards the end of the Early Classic period in Mesoamerican chronology . Before reaching

8073-506: The application of the term "shows a generational divide in the Hispanic community". In 2016, a student newspaper described the term as "sweeping across college campuses in the nation with the intent of creating inclusion while inadvertently pitting members of the Latino community into a cultural war". It received wider use after the 2016 Pulse nightclub shooting . As of 2018, use of the term Latinx

8190-644: The arrival of the Spanish in 1519, Nahuatl was displaced as the dominant regional language, but remained important in Nahua communities under Spanish rule. Nahuatl was documented extensively during the colonial period in Tlaxcala , Cuernavaca, Culhuacan, Coyoacan, Toluca and other locations in the Valley of Mexico and beyond. In the 1970s, scholars of Mesoamerican ethnohistory have analyzed local-level texts in Nahuatl and other indigenous languages to gain insight into cultural change in

8307-796: The character @). Another term is simply "Latin", which by itself is of a neutral gender , and can be stated in the plural as "Latins". Latinx is used as an alternative to the gender binary inherent to formulations such as Latina/o and Latin@ , and is used by and for anyone of Latin-American descent who does not identify as either male or female , or more broadly as a gender-neutral term for such. Pronunciations of Latinx documented in dictionaries include / l ə ˈ t iː n ɛ k s , l æ -, l ɑː -, - n ə k s , ˈ l æ t ɪ n ɛ k s / lə- TEE -neks, la(h)-, -⁠nəks, LAT -in-eks . Other variants respelled ad hoc as "Latins", "La-tinks", or "Latin- equis " have been reported. Editors at Merriam-Webster write that "more than likely, there

8424-451: The coastline. A smaller number of speakers exists in immigrant communities in the United States. There are considerable differences among varieties, and some are not mutually intelligible . Huasteca Nahuatl , with over one million speakers, is the most-spoken variety. All varieties have been subject to varying degrees of influence from Spanish. No modern Nahuan languages are identical to Classical Nahuatl, but those spoken in and around

8541-655: The coining of a neologism is to disambiguate a term which may be unclear due to having many meanings. Neologisms may come from a word used in the narrative of fiction such as novels and short stories. Examples include " grok " (to intuitively understand) from the science fiction novel about a Martian entitled Stranger in a Strange Land by Robert A. Heinlein ; " McJob " (precarious, poorly-paid employment) from Generation X: Tales for an Accelerated Culture by Douglas Coupland ; " cyberspace " (widespread, interconnected digital technology) from Neuromancer by William Gibson and " quark " (Slavic slang for "rubbish"; German for

8658-573: The colonial era via linguistic changes, known at present as the New Philology . Several of these texts have been translated and published either in part or in their entirety. The types of documentation include censuses, especially one early set from the Cuernavaca region, town council records from Tlaxcala, as well as the testimony of Nahua individuals. As the Spanish had made alliances with Nahuatl-speaking peoples—initially from Tlaxcala , and later

8775-503: The colonial period, but their quality was highest in the initial period. The friars found that learning all the indigenous languages was impossible in practice, so they concentrated on Nahuatl. For a time, the linguistic situation in Mesoamerica remained relatively stable, but in 1696, Charles II of Spain issued a decree banning the use of any language other than Spanish throughout the Spanish Empire . In 1770, another decree, calling for

8892-420: The community, only 10% of that subgroup preferred it to the terms Hispanic or Latino . The preferred term both among Hispanics who have heard the term and among those who have not was Hispanic , garnering 50% and 64% respectively. Latino was second in preference with 31% and 29% respectively. Only 3% self identified as Latinx in that survey. A 2020 study based on interviews with 34 Latinx/a/o students from

9009-437: The conquered Mexica of Tenochtitlan—Nahuatl continued spreading throughout Mesoamerica in the decades after the conquest. Spanish expeditions with thousands of Nahua soldiers marched north and south to conquer new territories. Jesuit missions in what is now northern Mexico and the southwestern United States often included a barrio of Tlaxcaltec soldiers who remained to guard the mission. For example, some fourteen years after

9126-403: The debate (as it has developed since then) is how the replacement silences and erases long-standing struggles to recognize the significance of gender difference and sexual violence." A 2019 National Survey of Latinos found that only 3 percent of Hispanic-Latinos have ever used "Latinx" to describe themselves. The League of United Latin American Citizens announced in 2021 that it would stop using

9243-464: The deficiencies in existent linguistic structures, and of language as an agent of social change", saying, "The gesture toward linguistic intersectionality stems from a suffix endowed with a literal intersection— x ." Some commentators, such as Ed Morales, a lecturer at Columbia University and author of the 2018 book Latinx: The New Force in American Politics and Culture , associate the term with

9360-470: The elimination of the indigenous languages, did away with Classical Nahuatl as a literary language. Until the end of the Mexican War of Independence in 1821, the Spanish courts admitted Nahuatl testimony and documentation as evidence in lawsuits, with court translators rendering it in Spanish. Throughout the modern period the situation of indigenous languages has grown increasingly precarious in Mexico, and

9477-441: The ending ⟨-e⟩ ; similar forms include amigue ('friend') and elle ( singular they ). In Argentina, efforts to increase gender neutrality in Spanish have utilized both grammatical genders together, as well as ⟨-@⟩ and ⟨-x⟩ endings. According to The New York Times , the ⟨-e⟩ ending has been more widely adopted because it is easier to pronounce. In Portuguese ,

9594-628: The federal Ley General de Derechos Lingüísticos de los Pueblos Indígenas ['General Law on the Language Rights of the Indigenous Peoples', promulgated 13 March 2003] recognizes all the country's indigenous languages, including Nahuatl, as national languages and gives indigenous people the right to use them in all spheres of public and private life. In Article 11, it grants access to compulsory intercultural bilingual education . Nonetheless, progress towards institutionalizing Nahuatl and securing linguistic rights for its speakers has been slow. Today,

9711-399: The grammatically masculine Latino, such as Latino/a and Latin@. Between 2004 and 2014, Latinx did not attain broad usage or attention. Use of x to expand language can be traced to the word Chicano , which had an x added to the front of the word, making it Xicano . Scholars have identified this shift as part of the movement to empower people of Mexican origin in the U.S. and also as

9828-658: The ideas of Gloria Anzaldúa , a Chicana feminist . Morales writes that "refusal to conform to male/female gender binaries" parallels "the refusal to conform to a racial binary". Scharrón-del Río and Aja (2015) have traced the use of Latinx by authors Beatriz Llenín Figueroa, Jaime Géliga Quiñones, Yuderkys Espinosa Miñoso, and Adriana Gallegos Dextre. The term has also been discussed in scholarly research by cultural theorist Ilan Stavans on Spanglish and by Frederick Luis Aldama and Christopher Gonzalez on Latinx super heroes in mainstream comics and Latinx graphic novels such as United States of Banana . The term and concept of Latinx

9945-431: The measure, called the term "offensive and unnecessary". Latinx has been the subject of controversy. " Linguistic imperialism " has been used as a basis of both criticism and support and the term has been rejected by many members of the Hispanic and Latino or Latin communities. In 2018, the Royal Spanish Academy rejected the use of -x and -e as gender-neutral alternatives to the collective masculine -o ending, in

10062-447: The name of Latino Heritage Month to Latinx Hispanic Heritage Month. Salinas and Lozano (2017) state that the term is influenced by Mexican indigenous communities that have a third gender role, such as Juchitán de Zaragoza , Oaxaca (see also: Gender system § Juchitán, Oaxaca, Mexico ). The term often refers specifically to LGBT people or to young people. Brian Latimer, a producer at MSNBC who identifies as nonbinary , says that

10179-550: The national average. Nahuatl is spoken by over 1 million people, with approximately 10% of speakers being monolingual . As a whole, Nahuatl is not considered to be an endangered language; however, during the late 20th century several Nahuatl dialects became extinct. The 1990s saw radical changes in Mexican policy concerning indigenous and linguistic rights. Developments of accords in the international rights arena combined with domestic pressures (such as social and political agitation by

10296-494: The naturalization method is most often used. The most common way that professional translators translate neologisms is through the Think aloud protocol (TAP), wherein translators find the most appropriate and natural sounding word through speech. As such, translators can use potential translations in sentences and test them with different structures and syntax. Correct translations from English for specific purposes into other languages

10413-442: The northeastern city of Saltillo was founded in 1577, a Tlaxcaltec community was resettled in a separate nearby village, San Esteban de Nueva Tlaxcala , to cultivate the land and aid colonization efforts that had stalled in the face of local hostility to the Spanish settlement. Pedro de Alvarado conquered Guatemala with the help of tens of thousands of Tlaxcaltec allies, who then settled outside of modern Antigua Guatemala . As

10530-429: The numbers of speakers of virtually all indigenous languages have dwindled. While the total number of Nahuatl speakers increased over the 20th century, indigenous populations have become increasingly marginalized in Mexican society. In 1895, Nahuatl was spoken by over 5% of the population. By 2000, this figure had fallen to 1.49%. Given the process of marginalization combined with the trend of migration to urban areas and to

10647-453: The place of articulation of a following consonant. The voiceless alveolar lateral affricate [t͡ɬ] is assimilated after /l/ and pronounced [l] . Classical Nahuatl and most of the modern varieties have fairly simple phonological systems. They allow only syllables with maximally one initial and one final consonant. Consonant clusters occur only word-medially and over syllable boundaries. Some morphemes have two alternating forms: one with

10764-565: The possibility that other Mesoamerican languages were borrowing vocabulary from Proto-Nahuan much earlier than previously thought. In Mesoamerica the Mayan , Oto-Manguean and Mixe–Zoque languages had coexisted for millennia. This had given rise to the Mesoamerican language area . After the Nahuas migrated into the Mesoamerican cultural zone, their language likely adopted various areal traits, which included relational nouns and calques added to

10881-459: The presidential candidate Elizabeth Warren , who is not Hispanic or Latina, which USA Today called "one of the highest profile uses of the term since its conception". A 2019 poll (with a 5% margin of error) found that 2% of US residents of Latin American descent in the US use Latinx , including 3% of 18–34-year-olds; the rest preferred other terms. "No respondents over [age] 50 selected the term", while overall "3% of women and 1% of men selected

10998-527: The problem of implied gender it aims to solve is more a concern of the intelligentsia than the "proverbial person on the street". According to HuffPost , "Many opponents of the term have suggested that using an un-gendered noun like Latinx is disrespectful to the Spanish language and some have even called the term 'a blatant form of linguistic imperialism ' ". Defending usage of the term against critics arguing linguistic imperialism, Brooklyn College professors María R. Scharrón-del Río and Alan A. Aja argue that

11115-569: The process of lexical innovation . Technical subjects such as philosophy, sociology, physics, etc. are especially rich in neologisms. In philosophy, as an example, many terms became introduced into languages through processes of translation, e.g., from Ancient Greek to Latin , or from Latin to German or English , and so on. So Plato introduced the Greek term ποιότης ( poiotēs ), which Cicero rendered with Latin qualitas , which subsequently became our notion of ' quality ' in relation to epistemology, e.g.,

11232-461: The question of whether to consider individual varieties to be languages or dialects of a single language is highly political. In the past, the branch of Uto-Aztecan to which Nahuatl belongs has been called Aztecan . From the 1990s onward, the alternative designation Nahuan has been frequently used instead, especially in Spanish-language publications. The Nahuan (Aztecan) branch of Uto-Aztecan

11349-559: The region from the north continued into the Postclassic period . The Mexica were among the latest groups to arrive in the Valley of Mexico; they settled on an island in the Lake Texcoco , subjugated the surrounding tribes, and ultimately an empire named Tenochtitlan . Mexica political and linguistic influence ultimately extended into Central America, and Nahuatl became a lingua franca among merchants and elites in Mesoamerica, such as with

11466-657: The scheme of a Central grouping and two Peripheral groups, and Lastra confirmed this notion, differing in some details. Canger & Dakin (1985) demonstrated a basic split between Eastern and Western branches of Nahuan, considered to reflect the oldest division of the proto-Nahuan speech community. Canger originally considered the central dialect area to be an innovative subarea within the Western branch, but in 2011, she suggested that it arose as an urban koiné language with features from both Western and Eastern dialect areas. Canger (1988) tentatively included dialects of La Huasteca in

11583-404: The simple Latin . Related gender-neutral neologisms include Xicanx or Chicanx . The term was first seen online around 2004. It has since been used in social media by activists, students, and academics who seek to advocate for non-binary and genderqueer individuals. Reception of the term among Hispanic and Latino Americans has been overwhelmingly negative, and surveys have found that

11700-653: The states of Puebla , Veracruz , Hidalgo , San Luis Potosí , and Guerrero . Significant populations are also found in the State of Mexico , Morelos , and the Federal District , with smaller communities in Michoacán and Durango . Nahuatl became extinct in the states of Jalisco and Colima during the 20th century. As a result of internal migration within the country, Nahuatl speaking communities exist in all states in Mexico. The modern influx of Mexican workers and families into

11817-739: The term General Aztec has been adopted by linguists to refer to the languages of the Aztecan branch excluding the Pochutec language . Speakers of Nahuatl generally refer to their language as either Mexicano or with a cognate derived from mācēhualli , the Nahuatl word for 'commoner'. One example of the latter is the Nahuatl spoken in Tetelcingo , Morelos, whose speakers call their language mösiehuali . The Pipil people of El Salvador refer to their language as Nāwat . The Nahuas of Durango call their language Mexicanero . Speakers of Nahuatl of

11934-479: The term as a "bulldozing of Spanish". In a 2015 article published by the outlet as part of a debate on the term, Alamo wrote: "If we dump Latino for Latinx because it offends some people, then we should go on dumping words forever since there will always be some people who find some words offensive." Wayne State University professor Nicole Trujillo-Pagán has argued that patriarchal bias is reproduced in ostensibly "gender neutral" language and stated, "Less clear in

12051-443: The term as their preferred ethnic identifier". A 2020 Pew Research Center survey found that only 23% of US adults who self-identified as Hispanic or Latino had heard of the term Latinx . Of those, 65% said that the term Latinx should not be used to describe them, with most preferring terms such as Hispanic or Latino . While the remaining 33% of US Hispanic adults who have heard the term Latinx said it could be used to describe

12168-412: The term in its official communications, calling it "very unliked" by nearly all Latinos. A 2024 study found that use of the term Latinx by Democratic politicians alienates Latino voters from the party, and that Latino voters are less likely to support Democrats who use Latinx than those who use Latino in their otherwise identical messaging. Similar gender-neutral forms have also arisen. One such term

12285-464: The total Nahuatl speaking population, at 24.2% and 22.6%, respectively. For most other states the percentage of monolinguals among the speakers is less than 5%. This means that in most states more than 95% of the Nahuatl speaking population are bilingual in Spanish. According to one study, how often Nahuatl is used is linked to community well-being, partly because it is tied to positive emotions. The largest concentrations of Nahuatl speakers are found in

12402-399: The use of Latino(a) , with parentheses , is preferred over Latino/a , with a slash . Neologism Neologisms are one facet of lexical innovation , i.e., the linguistic process of new terms and meanings entering a language's lexicon . The most precise studies into language change and word formation , in fact, identify the process of a "neological continuum": a nonce word

12519-421: The use of Latinx to refer to people regardless of gender because they see it as a one-size-fits-all term that erases diversity, preferring to switch between -o/-a/-x when referring to specific individuals. Those who oppose the term in its entirety have argued that the -x is artificial, unpronounceable, an imposition of English norms on Spanish, or overly faddish . Many non-binary Latinos whose first language

12636-417: The vast majority prefer other terms such as Hispanic and Latina/Latino to describe themselves with only 2–3% using Latinx . A 2023 Pew Research Center survey found that roughly half of U.S. Latinos were not aware of the term Latinx ; of those aware of it, 75% said it should not be used, including 36% who found increased usage to be a bad thing. Critics say the term does not follow traditional grammar,

12753-515: The vocabulary, and a distinctly Mesoamerican grammatical construction for indicating possession. A language which was the ancestor of Pochutec split from Proto-Nahuan (or Proto-Aztecan) possibly as early as AD 400, arriving in Mesoamerica a few centuries earlier than the bulk of Nahuan speakers. Some Nahuan groups migrated south along the Central American isthmus, reaching as far as Nicaragua. The critically endangered Pipil language of El Salvador

12870-516: The voiced consonants are devoiced in word-final position and in consonant clusters: /j/ devoices to a palato-alveolar sibilant /ʃ/ , /w/ devoices to a glottal fricative [h] or to a labialized velar approximant [ʍ] , and /l/ devoices to a fricative [ɬ] . In some dialects, the first consonant in almost any consonant cluster becomes [h] . Some dialects have productive lenition of voiceless consonants into their voiced counterparts between vowels. The nasals are normally assimilated to

12987-469: The world. The names of several countries, Mexico, Guatemala and possibly Nicaragua , derive from Nahuatl. As a language label, the term Nahuatl encompasses a group of closely related languages or divergent dialects within the Nahuan branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family. The Mexican Instituto Nacional de Lenguas Indígenas (Indigenous Languages Institute) recognizes 30 individual varieties within

13104-400: Was first used. The term has grown so that Merriam-Webster has acknowledged its use but notes the term needs to be found in published, edited work for a longer period of time before it can be deemed a new word, making it the perfect example of a neologism. Because neologisms originate in one language, translations between languages can be difficult. In the scientific community, where English

13221-410: Was founded in 2016 to "unify Princeton's diverse Latinx community" and several student-run organizations at other institutions have used the word in their title. The term appears in the titles of academic books in the context of LGBT studies , rhetoric and composition studies , and comics studies . On June 26, 2019, during the first 2020 Democratic Party presidential debate , the word was used by

13338-669: Was limited nearly exclusively to the United States. Manuel Vargas writes that people from Latin America ordinarily would not think of themselves using the term unless they reside in the United States. The term was added to the Merriam-Webster English dictionary in 2018, as it continued to grow in popularity in the United States, and to the Oxford English Dictionary in 2019. Jeffrey Herlihy-Mera writes that in Puerto Rico,

13455-424: Was little consideration for how [ Latinx ] was supposed to be pronounced when it was created." The first records of the term Latinx appear in the 21st century, but there is no certainty as to its first occurrence. According to Google Trends , it was first seen online in 2004, and first appeared in academic literature around 2013 "in a Puerto Rican psychological periodical to challenge the gender binaries encoded in

13572-452: Was presumed by scholars during the 19th and early 20th centuries that Teotihuacan had been founded by Nahuatl-speakers of, but later linguistic and archaeological research tended to disconfirm this view. Instead, the timing of the Nahuatl influx was seen to coincide more closely with Teotihuacan's fall than its rise, and other candidates such as Totonacan identified as more likely. In the late 20th century, epigraphical evidence has suggested

13689-489: Was published in 1547—3 years before the first grammar in French, and 39 years before the first one in English. By 1645, four more had been published, authored respectively by Alonso de Molina (1571), Antonio del Rincón (1595), Diego de Galdo Guzmán (1642), and Horacio Carochi (1645). Carochi's is today considered the most important colonial-era grammar of Nahuatl. Carochi has been particularly important for scholars working in

#158841