Perceptions of Kichwa

The focus of this research paper is to discuss the different perceptions that the nonIndigenous community has about the indigenous language Kichwa and the communities that
speak Kichwa. The reasoning behind this research is that I was going to be studying abroad in
Ecuador for three months. Since I was not able to take any Anthropology courses while there, I
decided to conduct my own research for credit. I had always been interested in languages and
had previously completed a research paper on the Basque language of northern Spain for a class I
had with my advisor. Therefore, together we developed a plan for me to conduct research on a
local native language while I was studying abroad. I knew the Kichwa language was dominant in
the area, so I chose to research that language in particular. My advisor and I decided that I would
conduct interviews with people of the non-Indigenous community. However, in order to do so I
needed to obtain IRB (Institutional Review Board) approval, which was the next step in my
research process.
If research requires human participants, for example surveys or interviews, then IRB
approval is needed. The first step in getting this approval is filling out the IRB application. The
application asks about all the different aspects of the research project ranging from its name and
sources of funding to procedures and confidentiality. Besides the application I also needed to
submit any other documents that I would be using. I created a recruitment script to send to
potential participants and a consent form for them to read and sign before participating as well as
interview questions. I then translated these three documents into Spanish. I asked a previous
Spanish professor of mine who was also the chairperson for the department for help with the
translations. I had to submit the English and Spanish versions along with the application to the
IRB. After I submitted everything, I had to wait for the board to review my proposal. A few

weeks later they sent me revisions that I had to make before they could approve it. At this point I
was already in Ecuador. I communicated with my advisor and together we made the revisions
and then I resubmitted the documents. A few more weeks later they sent me a few more revisions
to make. I quickly completed those and resubmitted. Finally, with only a week left in Ecuador, I
received permission from IRB to conduct my interviews. During this process I became very
frustrated. There were many corrections that I needed to make, some of them more minor than
others. It took a lot of time to fix them, not only because there were many of them, but because I
had to wait for the responses from various people. Like I mentioned, I finally got approval with
only a week left. It was quite stressful trying to finish my classes and conduct interviews in four
days.
My next step was to conduct the interviews. My goal had been to get a minimum of ten
interviews, but with the limited time I had my new goal was to just get as many as possible. I
ended up with nine interviews in total. Before each interview the participant was required to read
and sign a consent form. It explained my research, its effects and benefits, risks for the
participant, confidentiality, and it had contact information. Also, as part of the consent form, the
participant had to choose whether or not they would allow me to record the interview. I had one
participant choose not to be recorded. They signed and initialed the form along with myself, and
when the interview was done I put each consent form in its own envelope and sealed it. That way
I could tell if someone had opened it.
Also, after I completed each interview, I transferred the interview from my recording
device to my password-protected computer, and then deleted it from the device. Later, after I
returned from Ecuador, I transcribed the interviews. This means that I listened to each interview
and wrote what each person said. Since I conducted the interviews in Spanish, I transcribed them

in Spanish as well and later translated them into English. I then sent copies of the recordings and
transcriptions to my advisor to keep them locked in a safe location for three years.
While in Ecuador and waiting for permission from the IRB, I looked for other sources
that would be helpful for my research. For example, the secretary at my school gave me
newspaper clippings that were in Kichwa and translated into Spanish. I also looked up Cuencas
local newspaper online, El Mercurio, and found articles about the Kichwa language and culture.
One of my teachers told me about a television station that sometimes had the news in Kichwa
and on Saturdays it had a summary in Kichwa of the Presidents speech he gives each Saturday.
However, I never got the chance to see either. Also, on a lot of the school trips I went on and
sometimes just during class I learned a lot of Kichwa words that were still used often among
people of both Indigenous and non-Indigenous backgrounds. I had wanted to go to the University
of Cuencas library to look for better materials on this topic, but it was closed most the time I
was there for break and for construction, so I never got the chance. That was also frustrating
because I was worried that I wasnt going to find enough decent and helpful sources.
Going into my research I suspected to learn about at least some discrimination and/or
negativity towards the Kichwa language. However, many of the people I interviewed said that
the Kichwa language is viewed positively. For example, when I asked one participant if she
thought the general point of view of Kichwa was negative and if people had respect for it, she
said, No, it is good, it is good, I like it, and, Yes, a lot of respect, it is the language of our
Indigenous. And we have a lot of respect, including our president, he speaks Kichwa.1 Other
quotes. They all personally supported the efforts of the Indigenous people and had good things to
say about them. However, one participant told me that she thinks the language does not interest
1 Janeth Cordero, interview by author, Cuenca, March 29, 2016. No, es bueno, es bueno, me gusta. S,
mucho respeto, es el lenguaje de nuestros indgenas. Y le tenemos mucho respeto incluso nuestro
presidente, habla kichwa.

the people very much, that it is not that important. She said, I dont believe that it is something
negative but it is not very important to the people.2 In previous years, the dominant class
traditionally viewed the Indigenous peoples in general as backward and docile (Becker, 12).
When the Spanish arrived in what is now Ecuador, they forced the natives to give up their
culture, including their beliefs, customs, and language. They in turn imposed their own Spanish
language and culture on the people. Little by little, the Indigenous people began to lose and
forget their ways of life, including their language. This is one reason why many of the native
languages of Ecuador have become extinct or close to it. Language loss can be voluntary or
involuntary. For example, when the government of a country declares an official language or
chooses one for political purposes for schooling, the native languages take on a low status and
are perceived as inferior. Therefore, the Indigenous people often switch languages in order to
avoid the marginalization from the economic and political mainstream (Tern Maigua, 90). The
language that seems to have survived the best in Ecuador and that has the most speakers is
Kichwa (Tern Maigua, 12). Until about the 1950s, the Kichwa language was considered Yanga
Shimi, a language without any value (Tern Maigua, 13).
However, with the help of the National Confederation of Indigenous Nationalities from
Ecuador (CONAIE), this perception has gradually changed. In the 1960s the confederation began
a national political campaign to gain respect for the Indigenous Peoples education and land
rights (Tern Maigua, 13). CONAIE asked the Ecuadorian government to create an educational
program that would provide Indigenous children with a culturally appropriate education which
would include the use of Indigenous languages, trained teachers, and appropriate materials. Then

2 Emilia, interview by author, Cuenca, March 30, 2016. No creo que es algo negativo pero a la gente no
le importa mucho.

in 1988 the National Direction for Intercultural Bilingual Education (DINEIB) was created,
making Ecuador the first country in South America to have such a program (Tern Maigua, 13).
An example of such a language program is seen in the municipality of Caar in southern
Ecuador. The city, with help from the Unit for Research and Documentation, has developed a
training program for learning Kichwa. It is aimed at strengthening and disseminating this
native language, aimed at employees and workers of the municipal entity and citizens interested
in learning this language.3 The program will have classes at three different levels: elementary,
basic, and advanced.
The participants also told me about some of those efforts to revitalize the language. For example,
they told me about how some times the news is in Kichwa on television and the radio. Quotes. I
also learned a great deal about some of their other efforts by reading articles in the local
newspaper. For example, 35 percent of the population of the county Azuay is Indigenous with
about 3,974 people who speak Kichwa, and this area is considered to be the largest human
settlement of Kichwa speakers that is still preserved in this jurisdiction. Therefore, groups have
asked that voting be made available in Kichwa. For the elections in February of 2014, voting was
going to be done electronically. However, some of the leaders of the area knew that most of the
population was not trained or informed about how to use the devices, so they wanted trainings in
Spanish and Kichwa (Mendieta, 2013). The electronic voting equipment would be programmed
so that the information would be displayed on the screen in Kichwa. The language used on the

3 Municipio de Caar promueve el aprendizaje de la lengua Kichwa, El Mercurio, March 30, 2015,
(accessed April 22, 2016). The article was originally in Spanish. The translation from Spanish to English
was done by my browser and is not my own. orientado a fortalecer y difundir esta lengua materna,
dirigido a empleados y trabajadores de la entidad municipal y a la ciudadana interesada en aprender este
idioma.

touch screens will also be the information printed on the ballot (Equipos de voto electrnico
tendrn traduccin en kichwa, 2014).
In addition to language and educational programs, the Indigenous population now has its
own political groups. In June of 1990 a powerful Indigenous uprising swept across Ecuador,
threatening its white, elite power base. The CONAIE helped outline a program advocating for
Indigenous control over their own affairs. Indigenous militants actually began to call this
uprising a pachakutik, which is from the pan-Andean Quechua language (Becker, 12). In 1995,
Indigenous activists launched the Pachakutik Movement for Plurinational Unity as a medium to
compete for political office. It is often simply called Pachakutik and emerged after years of
debate on what its primary function should be. It represented the formation of a new political
movement in which Indigenous peoples and other sectors of Ecuadors popular movements
organized together as equals in a joint project to achieve common goals of a new and better
world (Becker, 9). The group opposed the governments neoliberal economic policies that
privatized public resources and functions and favored a more inclusive and participatory political
system.