Santiago del Estero Quichua

Santiago del Estero Quichua or Santiagueño Quechua (Santiagen Quichua)(ISO 639-3: qus) is a vulnerable dialect of Southern Quechua spoken by 60,000-100,000 people (estimates vary widely) in Argentina. It is spoken in the province of Santiago del Estero. The estimated coordinates are 27°47′S 64°16′W. Long-standing migration has also resulted in the presence of the language in other provinces of northeastern Argentina and in Buenos Aires.

It is 81% similar to other Quechuan languages. There are radio programs in this languages and also a dictionary. There is some cultivation of the language as it is taught in some schools. It uses the Roman alphabet. Its speakers are Native Americans and they mostly work in agriculture. It is the seventh-most widely spoken language in Argentina behind Spanish, Italian, Levantine Arabic, South Bolivian Quechua, Standard German, and Mapudungun. It is the third most widely spoken indigenous language.

There was once another dialect of Southern Quechua in Argentina, that of Catamarca and La Rioja, but it has gone extinct. All were introduced during the Spanish colonial period, as Quechua speakers were transplanted to various parts of the Spanish realm (continuing a practice of the Inca), and Quechua was an official language of Santiago, Catamarca, and La Rioja during the colonial era.

Quechuan, Peripheral Quechua, Chinchay

The indigenous people of Santiago del Estero were referred to as the "tonocoté". They faced much criticism from the rest of the Argentinian population which led to the diminishing of their language and culture as a whole. The government even went so far as to release flyers describing what these indigenous people looked like, including red skin and the use of feathers in their clothing. For this reason, they were singled out among the rest of the Hispanic population. Instead of learning their maternal language of Santiagueño Quechua at school, indigenous children were looked over and forced to learn the official Spanish language, which is a contributing factor as to why this language became endangered.

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