Autonomous Indigenous People Who Speak Nahuatl]

[micc2 at cox.net]

Piali compaleh huan comaleh,

I have worked for a short time interpreting for  a few Nahuatl defendants in court (mostly immigration cases).  The men I have worked with have come from the sierra de Puebla, and Guerrero. Based in this tiny sample,  It seems that most Nahuatl workers first go to Mexico City, Matamoros, Nuevo Laredo,or Ciudad Juarez.. Here in San Diego county, there is a large Mixteco community, as there is in L.A. county. I know of only one family of Nahuatl speakers. they came here from Guerrero. I also know there is one Huichol artisan that lives here. 

Perhaps until now, the Nahuatl speakers lived in more economically sustainable areas than the Mixteco and Maya. i have only met one Purepecha speaking immigrant here in San Diego, and a few Yoremi.


Mario
www.mexicayotl.org





---- Kier Salmon <k_salmon at ipinc.net> wrote: 
> On Aug 28, 2007, at 8:05 AM, John F. Schwaller wrote:
> > The top ten indigenous groups were:
> > 	Náhuatl        2,563,000
> > 	Maya            1,490,000
> > 	Zapoteco        785,000
> > 	Mixteco           764,000
> > 	Otomí               566,000
> > 	Tzetzal            547,000
> > 	Tzotzil              514,000
> > 	Totonaca        410,000
> > 	Mazateco       339,000
> > 	Chol                274,000
> Looking at this strikes a question that has been in my mind.
> I work as a spanish english medical and legal interpreter.  In the  
> course of the last 18 months I have run into many people speaking one  
> of the mayan dialects, Yucatec and Quiche being the most common,  
> Zapotec and Mixtec as well as a few who speak Cora and Tarascan (or  
> was it Tarahumara or was it Huichol *NW mountain range*?).  But never  
> have I found people who are bilingual spanish nahuatl.  I wondered if  
> it was because most nahuatl speakers ARE bilingual and thus I don't  
> know about it.  But people chat with me and I find out from names and  
> in general conversation about where they've come from.  The other  
> explanation that comes to mind is that the nahua don't want to come  
> to the USA... but then, why would the maya come in such numbers?
> This is the rankest curiosity; since I am interested in learning to  
> speak nahuatl, I've been paying attention and asking questions.  Does  
> anybody have a hypothesis?
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> Nahuatl mailing list
> Nahuatl at lists.famsi.org
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