CULTURE AND IDENTITY VIEWS IN THE DICTIONARY OF AMERICANISMS OF THE ASSOCIATION OF ACADEMIES OF THE SPANISH LANGUAGE (DA-AASL)

Abstract

The aim of this work is to determine the existence of sociolectal ethnographic marks in some lexical units present in the Dictionary of Americanisms of the AASL. The methodology chosen is framed within the qualitative approach; the method is ethno-lexicographic; the research level was descriptive and the type of analysis applied was hermeneutic. A corpus was collected from the aforementioned work with the purpose of verifying or refuting the existence of units with this kind of marks, in which the presence of ideological elements that establish the use of these lexical units could be determined. In this sense, several lexical units —whose marking is of a sociolectal type and whose purpose is to indicate the pertinence of use in certain contexts—were found; however, it was frequently found that the derogatory mark was used in processes of acculturation of aborigines. Additionally this type of mark was preferred to signal people with aboriginal features or customs, which makes this study relevant as it seeks to determine how the views presented in the Dictionary of Americanisms of the AASL on culture and identity are like.