Aula 8

Chile is often regarded as a homogenous and monolingual Spanish-speaking nation, especially compared to other South American countries. Spanish is considered the official language of Chile, though there is no legal document that formally proclaims it. One of the peculiarities of Chilean language policy is that it has no legal provision of any language in the Political Constitution of 1980, which is very significant. There is hardly any linguistic law in Chile, except Law 19.253 of 1993, known as the “Indigenous Law” on the protection, promotion, and indigenous development, which contains several provisions concerning indigenous languages. Some programs are running like the Intercultural Bilingual Education Program created in 1996, because of an agreement between the National Corporation for Indigenous Development (CONADI) and the Ministry of Education (MINEDUC), under the Indigenous Law 19.253 (1993), for fostering education in the indigenous language. Apart from looking at the linguistic provision from a sociolinguistic perspective, the paper will critically look at some of these language management initiatives of the Chilean government.

Since the Spanish colonization, Chile has maintained a relationship of marginalization and exclusion with the indigenous peoples. Although Chile prides itself on being a multilingual and multicultural country, the facts show that it is still far from it. Indigenous languages are made invisible while English and Spanish occupy Chilean´s elite bilingualism dream. This study aims to engage with the ongoing debate on languages, indigenous groups' rising movements in Chile, and language-related issues.