Mesoamerican languages

Mesoamerican languages are Indigenous languages spoken across the cultural region of Mesoamerica. They belong to several distinct language families and share some features shaped by long-term contact.

Mesoamerica: A cultural region extending from central Mexico through much of Central America, defined by long-standing shared traditions. Its cultural boundaries frame the region where these languages developed and interacted.
Mayan languages: A family of Indigenous languages spoken chiefly in southeastern Mexico, Guatemala, Belize, and parts of Honduras and El Salvador. Mayan languages are among the region’s largest and best-documented language families.
Mesoamerican linguistic area: A proposed linguistic area whose languages share structural traits despite belonging to different families. It names the contact-based pattern found across many languages of the region.
Proto-Mayan language: The reconstructed common ancestor of the Mayan languages. Its reconstruction traces one major family’s history within Mesoamerica.
Language revitalization: Efforts to strengthen language use and transmission where a language is threatened or has lost speakers. Community programs address declining intergenerational transmission in several Mesoamerican languages.
Language family: A group of languages descended from a common ancestral language. Mesoamerican languages belong to multiple families rather than one shared lineage.
Uto-Aztecan languages: A language family extending from the western United States through Mexico, including Nahuatl languages. Its southern branches connect central Mexico to a family with a wide northern range.
Diffusion (linguistics): The spread of linguistic features between languages through contact rather than inheritance. Diffusion helps explain regional traits shared by unrelated language families.
Proto-Oto-Manguean language: The reconstructed ancestral language from which Oto-Manguean languages descended. It represents the deep ancestry of a major family concentrated in Mexico.
Language endangerment: The risk that a language will cease to be transmitted and spoken as a community language. Many Mesoamerican languages face unequal pressure from dominant national languages.

Linked from 7 pages