Background

Although the General Law on the Linguistic Rights of Indigenous Peoples (LGDLPI) in our country states that “Indigenous languages will be valid, just like Spanish, for any public matter or procedure, as well as to fully access management, services, and public information,” there is a lack of human and technological resources to ensure its compliance despite the significant efforts that various levels of government (federal, state, and municipal) have implemented to achieve the proposed goals. This is due to the great complexity involved in translating and implementing service strategies in languages as diverse and different from Spanish as indigenous languages.

In Mexico, according to census data from 2021, 1,725,000 people speak Nahuatl and 213,380 speak Totonaco. Nahuatl is the most important indigenous language in the country, with its speakers primarily concentrated in 10 federal entities. The Totonacos inhabit the coastal region of Veracruz and northern Puebla, in the Totonacapan region.

In some municipalities of Puebla, such as Ahuacatlán and Tuzamapan de Galeana, there are speakers of both languages. In the municipality of Ahuacatlán, 47.6% of the indigenous population is Totonaco, and the rest speak Nahuatl. In Tuzamapan de Galeana, 32% of the indigenous population speaks Totonaco.

In the valley of the Necaxa River in Puebla, both Nahuatl and some Totonaco variants, such as the Totonaco of the Necaxa River, are spoken. This is the native language of Chicontla and Patla.

Taking the aforementioned information into account, we have organized a team with full knowledge of the reality of implementing the LGDLPI in our state. Our team comprises an anthropologist, a linguist, a sociologist, and a pedagogue specializing in the Sierra Nororiental region of the State of Puebla. We have also included previous experience in the implementation and effectiveness of technological tools in the Totonaco language (TotoOffice: Localization of the LibreOffice Suite to the Totonaco language). We have integrated high-level academic speakers of the indigenous languages of the Sierra Nororiental of the State of Puebla (Totonaco and Nahuatl) and specialists in data science, machine learning, and artificial neural networks applied to natural language understanding and training. This collaboration aims to contribute to the state regulation that establishes, “The Law will protect and promote the development of their languages, cultures, customs, resources, and specific forms of social organization, and will guarantee its members effective access to the jurisdiction of the State.”

Our interdisciplinary and interinstitutional team brings together the necessary human capital for implementing AI tools applied to serve the most vulnerable in our state: the indigenous peoples of the Sierra Nororiental.