Welcome to episode 5 of Language Stories. This time we’re in Mérida, Mexico and we’re talking all things Maya, Yucatec Maya to be precise.

"Is Maya dead?" "Are the Mayans gone?" The answer is no. Mayans still live in Mexico and Central America. In this episode of Language Stories, we meet speakers of Yucatec Maya. Click through to listen + watch!

Why Yucatec Maya?

Ok, time to be totally honest here. Before we started researching for this video, I thought that Maya was one language. Turns out, Maya is actually it’s own branch of languages with around 30 different languages. Yup, the shame.

But, it’s not really my fault! You see, I’d been given a book by Kate (who you’ll remember I thanked a gazillion times in the Montreal episode) called ‘Spoken Maya’ and everytime someone had spoken about the language to me in Spanish so far, they’d called it ‘Maya’.

Confusing, huh? We’ll talk more about this in the episode…

But why an episode about Yucatec Maya?

After changing our plans for Mexico we were spending a lot of time in Mérida, Mexico. One of the more prominent languages besides Spanish in the region is Yucatec Maya.

As soon as we saw the odd trilingual street sign here and there in the centre of the city, we knew we’d found the next episode of Language Stories, and what happened as we began to explore and find people to speak with? Wow!

What we learnt from making this episode really opened my eyes.

Take a listen and a watch to see why Maya isn’t dead.

The Video

The Podcast

Further Reading + Resources

Photos of the Yuya nests Mirna mentions – take a look and see how the description fits the language.

National Geographic – The more in-depth explanation for the supposed “end-of-the-world” preditctions in 2012

Vicente Canche Moo – take a look at all the projects Vicente has worked on/is working on on his website.

Ko’one’ex kanik maaya – the project in the region teaching Yucatec Maya in schools.

Xiimbal Kaaj – my favourite Pat Boy song featuring Yazmín Novelo, who also volunteers with Radio Yuuyum.

ADN MAYA – Pat Boy’s record label YouTube channel.

Vice/Noisey – an interview with Pat Boy (in Spanish)

Radio Yuuyum – check their official website to see everything going on!

Global Voices – an article about Radio Yuuyum

Support The Show

The best thing you can do right now to support the project is threefold, and if you’ve ever listened to any podcast before, I’m sure you’ll be familiar with what I’m about to say!

1. Subscribe – by subscribing to the Language Stories podcast in your favourite place and YouTube for the sister videos, you’re going to keep up with all future episodes. Woop!

2. Review – when it comes to the tech stuff, reviews are pretty important. Reviews help to tell iTunes that people like the podcast, and that helps to raise the profile so that new people can find it easily. Yay!

3. Tell a friend – word of mouth still wins! If you know someone who would love Language Stories, tell them about it. And if they’re new to podcasts, walk them through the process to subscribe them. Woohoo!

To make it as easy as possible to share the podcast, click here to tweet about episode.

Share Your Story

If you have a Language Story you’d love to share, or if you know someone that does, get in touch.

I always love to hear from you! Your feedback helps to shape future episodes so thank you.