This article analyzes the construction of sign names in an emerging sign language from Mexico, the Yucatec Maya Sign Language (YMSL). Data comes from elicited interviews as well as natural interactions collected by the authors and signers from two different villages, Chicán and Nohkop. Despite YMSL being an isolate language, sign name construction…

Young urban migrants can be valuable actors in projects that aim to document and revitalize their Indigenous languages, especially when these efforts involve new technologies. Based on data from a Huastec (Tének) language documentation project in Mexico, this article describes the digital interactions of young migrants in the documentation and…

Purpose: Meeting the needs of Maya children in U.S. schools requires extensive training. Research is lacking in best practices to support students with intersectional identities. This article provides a roadmap centralized on Maya children's experiences, acknowledging the linguistic diversity of Maya immigrants, their language and cultural…

This article demonstrates how the Comparative Method can be applied to cross-linguistic research on language acquisition. The Comparative Method provides a systematic procedure for organizing and interpreting acquisition data from different languages. The Comparative Method controls for cross-linguistic differences at all levels of the grammar and…

Language communities differ in their stock of reference frames (coordinate systems for specifying locations and directions). English typically uses egocentrically-defined axes (e.g., "left-right"), especially when describing small-scale relationships. Other languages such as Tseltal Mayan prefer to use geocentrically-defined axes (e.g.,…

The purpose of this analysis was to study the linguistic features of Kaqchikel, a Mayan language currently spoken in Guatemala and increasingly in the United States, in an effort to better prepare teachers of English as a second language (ESL) or English as a foreign language (EFL) to address the distinct needs of a frequently neglected and…

This study examined the social organization of Guatemalan Mayan fathers' engagement with school-age children in a group problem-solving task. Twenty-nine groups of Mayan fathers varying in extent of Western schooling and 3 related school-age children (ages 6-12 years) constructed a puzzle together. Groups with fathers with 0 to 3 grades more often…

In this article, we apply tools from cultural historical theory to an analysis of a series of meetings between a group of linguists and one of Mayan women. The article describes a journey from the two groups' initial acquaintance to the formation of a shared object--a literacy project--thereby providing an analysis of six visits to Nebaj,…

Analysis of data from Kekchi, a head-marking language following Mayan patterns, can provide insight into case relations and pronominal reference in head-marking languages. Tensed verb constructions are examined, focusing attention on how the verb stem can determine both the number of referents and their semantic roles. The language's predication…

This paper considers the additional uses of CALL in the Endangered Language (EL) context. It briefly reviews ELs and reports on CALL for ELs in general. It then reviews the extra uses of CALL for ELs; these include changing negative attitudes towards the language, arousing interest in the language and contributing to language maintenance and…