The importance of the symbolic utterances in the survival of the Mapuche language in Chile

Abstract

This essay intends to describe some important facts that have sustained the survival of the Mapuche language and culture in Chile, South America. The analysis of a corpus collected in situ from diverse contexts including social events, material objects, cultural institutions, ritual ceremonies and supernatural events leads to conclude that brief and longer utterances elicited by native and some non native speakers, both positively or negatively, have remained throughout the times in the Chilean society in a situation of dinomia from the linguistic and sociocultural point of view. This group of ritual symbols encodes past and present beliefs and cultural values that have remained up to the present, thus contributing positively in the encouragement and permanence of the Mapuche language and culture in Chile.