Rimaykunawan, ñawpa yachaykunawan ima, sumaq mosqoypa kamariynin. Kikinmanta simikunaq hamut’ayninwan, qhelqaqpa willarikuyninwan ima

1 A dream made of words and ancestral knowledge

Dreams are a great mystery. In the Andes, we read dreams; they are part of the communication with the Pacha^[3] and her four worlds. Dreams are part of the oral tradition and appertain to the unique experience of each dreamer. As a synonym of aspiration, dreams are those collective or personal goals that we wish to achieve. But dreams are not only aspirations or goals to be achieved. They are also creations, innovations, hopes, realizations that become a reality with the words and the knowledge we inherit with them.

Since long ago, my dream has always been that the Cusco Runasimi,^[4] the language of my ancestors and my loved ones, would be part of the Academia — the world of science and technology — with the same value as any other language. It was not easy to achieve this. It required commitment, sacrifice and time for researching, finding sources, confronting ideas, rethinking or discarding them, until I eventually produced the final draft of my thesis.

It was an arduous task to achieve an adequate academic writing for my topic, which reconstructs the environment of a Quechua writer of the twentieth century, in close interaction with the present and the collective memory that endures and remains manifested in the native language. Walking in the footsteps of a great harawikuq^[5] (Quispe-Collantes 2019), writing my thesis in Runasimi was a reencounter with the deepest roots of my identity, as it engaged my knowledge of the language as a creation made with the words and knowledge of us, the Runakuna,^[6] and especially of the women of Ch’osecani, my homeland, from whom I constantly learn not to give up.

Quechua planning and policies involve a variety of organizations and actors (Hornberger and Coronel-Molina 2004; Trapnell and Zavala 2013), from international organizations to group and individual initiatives; with multiple interests and wills to revalue, promote and revitalize the whole range of languages and cultures. However, given the risk of losing the legacies passed on with each native language, it becomes more urgent to revitalize, from both planning and policies, as well as from the commitment of each speaker.

It is not easy to get involved, to take the first step, to believe in yourself and to assume a fair position. For this reason, I define “dreams” as the accomplishment of a shared desire, which can be achieved through the intermingling of personal will and collective destiny. After all, a dream can take many paths, but it always comes back to the starting point — which, in my case, is my own identity, the way in which I am part of a whole and everything is part of me.

2 My path to accomplish a dream

On October 15, 2019 I had the satisfaction of seeing my dream come true – a dream of many young Peruvians: having access to and completing higher education studies. Personally, I did it with a doctoral thesis, written in Runasimi. The press, both Peruvian and foreign, highlighted that it was the first thesis defended and written in Quechua in 468 years of university education in Peru. They also emphasized the offering to my Apus^[7] and the fact that I received the highest distinction. For almost 3 h, my defense was livestreamed. Nobody mentioned that theses used to be bound using a technique called “empastado” [hardcover and engraving in gold leaf], though not anymore. I got mine bound in hardcover with gold leaf engraving, because my wish was to place my mother tongue at the top.^[8]

I thank my parents, Manuel Quispe Quico and Albarada Collantes Delgado, my siblings, Juliana, Joselo, and Jeff, my professors, students and friends, my relatives, and acquaintances. On the day of my dissertation defense, I felt I was speaking for those who entrusted me with their stories and words, so I could take them with me and share them on their behalf. Therefore, this dream of mine is also their dream of theirs, and mainly, the dream of my beloved ancestors. I am deeply and wholeheartedly grateful to them.

I am a warmiruna^[9] from Acomayo, one of the thirteen provinces of Cusco. A few days after I was born, my family took me to Ch’osecani, a farming community located at the foot of the Inka fortress of Wakra Pukara. It was in the ayllu^[10] where I spoke my first words, which were in Runasimi, for we are all Quechua-speakers there. From my mother’s womb, surrounded by my loved ones, I felt motivated to learn and love my mother tongue. My affection grew and strengthened over the years, amidst the difficulties, achievements and setbacks that every family experiences.

Looking back now, I retrace my steps, to reconnect with the motivations that led me to pursue a dream that reconciles my cultural legacies and academic knowledge. Because my dream was created with the words and knowledge of my ancestors, writing my thesis in my mother tongue meant rediscovering some of that strength which, with joy and hope, allows us to resist in the face of adversity.

As many Andean women, I maintain my ties with my land – Ch’osecani – alive, cultivating the customs, traditions and everyday activities of my community. In my town of Acomayo, I also maintain the tradition of our Qhapaq Saqra dance, a dance troupe created by my family over 20 years ago. Saqras are mischievous and colorful beings of the Andean imaginary that take multiple shapes. Through danced literature, we tell stories with our costumes, masks and movements. And our Runasimi coalesces the whole cultural mosaic. It is the landscape that covers us and fills us with strength to dance and recreate our customs.

As a school-age child, my parents sent me to a school in Ch’osecani, then in Acomayo, and later decided that I should continue my education in Cusco. In all three places I was discriminated against. It was precisely in Cusco, the ancient capital of Tahuantinsuyo, where they made fun of me in and out of the classrooms, because of my Spanish, which I had learned with a mixture of Quechua. In school, I had no Quechua writing teachers. Only in university did I have one, but he was not from Cusco nor did he respect our variety.

Cusco is a cosmopolitan city, where we almost naturally learn some English. We are always told that speaking English opens doors to the world. One day, I was discriminated against by Cusco tour guides themselves. I was on a tour with a friend, and the guides offered the tourists to speak to them in their native languages. So, I requested that they speak to me in Quechua. But they got annoyed and replied that there was no way. And, from that moment on, they treated us unkindly during the whole tour. They wanted to differentiate themselves from us, because we were the same as them, given that all Cusqueños are bilingual. And by refusing to speak Quechua, they denied a part of themselves: their own voice.

In cases like this, shame has run deep and leads to a double standard, with people who are both proud and ashamed of their roots at the same time. On another level of injustice, although the Peruvian Constitution considers all native languages official in those territories where they are predominant, although the Languages Act No. 29735 is in force since 2011, and even though some advertising campaigns are promoted with some words in Quechua, services are not usually provided in Quechua.

Next, I pursued graduate studies in Lima at Universidad Nacional Mayor de San Marcos [National University of San Marcos], where I was part of the research group EILA: Discourses, Representations and Intercultural Studies, which brings together writers and researchers of Andean and Amazonian traditions. In addition, at Universidad Peruana Cayetano Heredia [Cayetano Heredia Peruvian University], I taught and organized public roundtables to discuss Quechua and the future of our native languages, as well as the annual Atipanakuy.^[11] As a product of my teaching experience, I published a bilingual article in the university bulletin. Thanks to these events, the Universidad Nacional de Ingeniería [National University of Engineering] invited me to give talks during their annual book fair, called Qhatuni. Lastly, I decided to dedicate all my time and savings to finish my research and conclude the writing of my thesis.

3 Academic writing and reconnecting with my roots

As a warmiruna, I am proud of the legacy that the Inkas left us, out of the love for Qosqo that all of us Qosqorunas^[12] have. However, if our ancestors have built wonders like Machu Picchu, why don’t we Quechua speakers continue to amaze the world? They did not need another language to do so. That is why I feel privileged to have the treasure I inherited: my native language, because of its Incan heritage and because of its warmth, it is a language that conveys a very intimate and special kind of love. I remember that during my childhood, when my family dried barley, we used to sleep in the fields. And before falling asleep, we would share stories, anecdotes, and ancestral wisdom, just as each runa^[13] does, from generation to generation.

Until now, we were led to believe that Runasimi is a language with no written form, that it is useless and has no future. However, Runasimi has always had a written form in textiles, tokapus^[14] and khipus.^[15] Runakuna can read nature in coca leaves and by contemplating the sky. We are taught that Spaniards brought writing. But it is alphabetic writing. There are traditions of written production in Quechua (Bendezú 1986). As I encountered them at the university, I was able to question the idea of Quechua as a language without a written form. Moreover, children are less and less motivated to cultivate their mother tongue, much less to write it. Therefore, when I entered university, I was surprised that there was an old discussion about the writing of Quechua and a division between three-vowels and five-vowels Quechua writing.

To bring my mother tongue into the academic world, I searched for literary works in Quechua, but found none in the library of my first alma mater – Universidad Nacional de San Antonio Abad del Cusco [San Antonio Abad National University of Cusco]. In astonishment, I spoke to the librarian and begged for his support. Days later, he found a collection of poems, Yawar Para, by Andrés Alencastre Gutiérrez, who published his poetry as Kilku Warak’a. Later on, when I began my doctoral studies, I wanted to recover oral-tradition literature – i. e., stories, tales, and narrative forms in which we communicate in Runasimi in our communities. I contended that we speak a language of the word, where the whole body is involved. My thesis adviser, Dr. Gonzalo Espino Relucé, recommended me to focus on poetry. I then remembered Kilku Warak’a and decided to delve into his work. Thus, my dream finally took root and blossomed with Yawar Para.

My doctoral research began in 2012. It took me seven years to conclude it, and I believe I have not finished it yet. I have never wanted to make writing in Quechua appear difficult. But academically, it is. Doing a thesis is difficult, because of the paperwork and the time it requires, since research requires resources and dedication. I have always worked and paid for my studies, but there came a time when I had to exclusively work on my thesis to complete it. Writing my thesis in Quechua added difficulties to my task, and many recommended me to write it only in Spanish.

I had my doubts. I opted to recover my linguistic variety, Cusco-Collao Quechua, considering Antonio Cusihuamán’s grammar (2001) and Steve Parker’s phonological inventory (2007). I wrote in this variety because it is my mother tongue, it is the language in which Kilku Warak’a published (with three and five vowels), and I believe it best represents everyday Cusco-Collao speech. I also adapted my writing to the academic format required by the university. When I started my thesis, I followed the MLA style, but editorial standards changed in 2019 and I had to adopt the APA style.

Being conversant in a native language is the key to accessing the codes of a culture, its worldview and ancestral legacies. For this reason, I constantly traveled to the highland provinces of Cusco, following in the footsteps of Kilku Warak’a. Although his poetry is unique, he rescues toponyms and local knowledge, the understanding of which requires an adequate knowledge of the province of Canas and the culture of the K’anaruna.^[16] For example, his pen name evokes the slingshot. Likewise, he refers to local Apus, such as Yawarqota and Kinsachata, as well as plants of the puna, in the poems Rusil t’ika and P’atakishka.

Once my thesis was finished, I had to obtain permission to defend it in Runasimi. My premise is that any writing or translation involving a native language must be scrupulous. There were some issues with the first call for my defense, since they tried to use another variety of Quechua. Furthermore, Yawar Para was misinterpreted as “Blood Crying”, but it is literally “Rain of Blood.” Nevertheless, the most difficult task may be to finalize a research project. The more you delve into a subject, the more you realize that you need to further explore it. This brings me back to the subject of dreams, to the dream of revitalizing native languages and knowledges, and, also, to have a good destiny of our own, one which is also good for the whole world.

4 Reflections on the past and the fate of our native languages

Dreams are not always explicable, but sometimes they can come true. To do so, we need to verbalize them. If our dream is to improve something, we must say it in our mother tongues, with words that come from our heart, because therein lies our link with our past and our roots. I consider it very important to be aware of the great value of all languages, starting from the love of one’s own language.

It is necessary to make Runasimi shine again in the world, so that people everywhere become interested in learning a beautiful language that, like all native languages, is a living heritage of humanity. To go deeper into them, it is necessary to converse with the speakers in their own languages. We must learn to know, value and give each native language the space it deserves. Today everything is interconnected, and native languages must be given the same opportunity to participate on an equal footing with all the languages of the world. In the face of ideological spaces that conceive languages as problems, rights or resources, speakers take a position and negotiate the revitalization of their languages in multiple implementational spaces (Kvietok Dueñas 2015). As for the alphabetic writing of Quechua, its revitalization involves rethinking the status, the corpus and the planning of acquisitions, considering writing always and everywhere as the first priority, instead of a strict regulation that prevents its use (Hornberger and Coronel-Molina 2004).

In Peru, Cusco Runasimi is vulnerable, because of the break in intergenerational transmission, but also because children do not have teachers who speak their Runasimi variety, or because they find it difficult to write their mother tongue with few vowels. There seems to be no agreement on the writing of Quechua, nor on its appropriate number of vowels. Policies tend to standardize varieties, and linguists are often not impartial. As Cerrón-Palomino once said, it will depend on who writes more, but also on who you are writing to. I wrote my thesis with Cusco and monolingual communities in mind, since I come from one. But my readership is potentially anyone.

Revitalizing native languages is, therefore, a commitment that requires us not to give up. It is vital that we speakers defend our own identity. We must teach how to take care of writing, taking into account the diversity within each linguistic family, highlighting the existence of multiliteracies, taking care that translation respects the local and cultural meanings given by each language. Likewise, we must approach academic and communications media, bridging the gap between both worlds, in order to better impact the collective appreciation of each language. There are individual advances in this sense, and increasingly more and more young Quechua people will reclaim their roots, as already evidenced by Krögel (2021) and Zavala (2019).

But restoring the place of native languages in a world that is steadily losing diversity is more difficult. Nevertheless, I am convinced that Quechua is and will be part of the new world that will be reborn after this pandemic. The interest generated by a dream made in Runasimi encourages me to believe that we are entering a new era for all native languages. Looking towards the future and performing daily actions aimed at ensuring that ancestral legacies outlive ourselves requires us to keep our eyes on the road we have traveled, on our past, which still has repercussions in the present. Perhaps, the greatest lesson of these days is that as humans we are fragile, and that life is a gift to appreciate, always in harmony with all living beings. This is what, in Andean culture, we know as reciprocity – which is expressed with affection and respect to our deities, and especially to our sacred Mother Earth, the Pachamama.

Finally, I believe that the academic use of our languages must become necessary, beyond barriers and national borders. We must contribute decisively to the development of scientific knowledge without losing our roots, in connection with our land, with our deities and with the spirit of our ancestors. Making this simple wish of a warmiruna a collective need is a challenge that may not be impossible, because all good things start with a dream.