Language, understanding of the self, and transformation of the sex-gender system in Indigenous Aymara of Southern Peru

Bermejo-Paredes S.; Maquera-Maquera Y.A. · Perfiles Educativos (2025) · DOI: 10.22201/iisue.24486167e.2025.47.61817

Resumen

An in-depth content analysis of the speech and communicative interactions occurring in sociolinguistic contexts and concrete life situations among the Indigenous Aymara of southern Peru is carried out through a qualitative-inductive open coding methodology. The objective is to understand the Indigenous-Aymara being and to interpret the complementary life experiences between warmi-chacha (woman-male) from the discursive structure constructedby the speakers. According to the results, dignity, respect, man-nature coexistence as a single living integrity and deeply relational-horizontal life are part of the ontological nucleus of the Aimara Indigenous being. In the absence of the concept of gender in Aymara, it is difficult to naturalize and legitimize roles and norms aligned with asymmetrical power relations between women and men; nevertheless, it is evident that interactions between people of both sexes constitute authentic expressions of dialogue, oral and corporal communicational inter-influence, charged with reality and naturalness, which at the same time confronts tensions and intertwines asymmetries. © (2025), (Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico). All rights reserved.

Instituciones: Universidad Nacional del Altiplano