Language disloyalty in aymara native speakers of the department of law at “Universidad Pública de El Alto”

Abstract

This research was developed in sociolinguistic field, more specifically in the study of language attitudes. Thus this study was conducted with University students of the School of Law at Universidad Pública de El Alto, where we can evidence that most of the students are of Aymara origin. Moreover, this study is intended to contribute to revaluation of linguistic identity as well as the preservation of the Aymara language and culture. Thus the main goal of this research is to describe the factors that leading to Language Disloyalty. The methodology applied for the data collection was mixed (qualitative and quantitative) methods and the type of study was descriptive investigation. Likewise the techniques applied for this research were the interview and test administration and the data collection tool applied was the questionnaire. The theories that support this research are from sociolinguistics authors as: Joshua Fishman, David Crystal, David Harrison as well as some authors of Andean Sociolinguistics such as : Xavier Albó and Luis Enrique Lopez who have conducted some studies on language attitudes in our society. Regarding the results gathered from the questionnaires and interviews, we can state that the factors that lead to this phenomenon (Language Disloyalty) is due to Sociocultural factors such as Migration, Use of Aymara with the purposes of Affinity and Solidarity, Ethnic Identification. As well as Attitudinal factors as Ethnic Shamed, Social Discrimination and Sociolinguistic factors as Language Displacement, Diglossia, Communicative Accommodation, Phenomenon of the Negative transfer, Bilingualism which restrict the spreading out of their mother tongue. Likewise the students manifested that they are exposed to some Linguistic prejudices that denigrate their identity and these are reflected in the following statements : Aymara language is not a standardized language, Aymara language is spoken by indigenous people, Aymara speakers are considered as lower class, backward, uneducated and ignorant. As well as, in final results we observe that these students use more their mother tongue in a family domain than in the rest of domains as friend, University and society