INDIANS and some more thoughts...

[Jose Maria Hernandez Gil]

This is a mail directed to Mario E. Aguilar and Yaoxochitl, but I think
it contains enough relevant information(*) to merit posting it to the
list.

I'll commence with an analysis of Yaoxochitl's mail. He/she makes a very
simple comment. Essentially that "indian/indio" should not be used when
referring to the people encountered by the Europeans in 1492 in that land
mass.

I agree.

To say otherwise would be to contradict obvious fact. It would be to say
that the sky is not blue (as in the specific wavelength of light that
most english-speaking humans have agreed upon to refer to as "blue".) A
mistake was made. To accept this fact leads to the next logical question:
Should be strive to correct this error in the language?

You cannot force people to change their opinions, much less force them to
accept the truth. One can try, but will most likely fail. You
(Yaoxochitl) say that we should. Yet you do the same thing that you're
criticising. You call "Columbus" "Columbus", yet his name was and always
will be "Cristoforo Colombo". Should you correct it? I think so.
Will/Could you change it? Probably not.

Then you say an indian is someone that is from India. India is a large
country. I'm positive there is someone somewhere there that is "indian"
yet does use "indian" to call themselves that. Can you force a Bengali or
Kashmiri to be "indian" just because they where born in India?

I could continue with Africa, which is an interesting example, but I
think you get the point. To bring to someone's attention an inaccurate
label is good, but people will not give it much value unless you are
willing to do the same for others, period.

On to Mario E. Aguilar. Frankly, I got lost reading your soliloquy. It
was so full of un-topical, irrelevant, random comments tied together with
personal attacks that I had to read it several times to see a point.

You say that even though "indian/indio" is incorrect, we should accept it
and move on. I do not agree with this anymore than I agree with calling
Taco Bell food mexican, but I see merit in this. Words are rather trivial
in the long run. There are other, much bigger things to worry about
(hunger, corruption, survival in general). But to say that ALL should
resign themselves to the label without at least giving a rational
explanation is quite immature.

I think that's it. If you two have a reply, please e-mail it to me
directly, no point in annoying others.

(*) On relevance: To many of you this discussion might seen rather
stupid. Perhaps, but this list is about nahuatl. Nahuatl is not a dead
language. Like most things in Mexico, many people have many opinions
regarding it that can be quite different and even contradictory. I also
believe that Mexicans today are not all that different from Mexicans that
lived 500 years ago or even 1,000 years ago. Language is important, but
so is the way the people who speak it/spoke it think. Debates such as
these are useful is learning a little more about the problems of Nahuatl
speakers (or at least their descendants.)

Chema