Peru Languages

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Description[edit | edit source]

Official languages of Peru are [1] [2]

  • Spanish - or Peruvian Spanish. Spoken natively by 82.6% of the population. Used by the government, media, education systems, and commerce.
  • Quechuan - spoken by 13.9% of the population. Spoken by Amerindians living in the Andean highlands.
  • Aymara - spoken by 1.7% of the population.

There are four Peruvian dialects [3]

Some of the indigenous languages spoken in Peru include

Spanish is more predominant along the coast of Peru. The indigenous populations living east of the Andes speak various languages and dialects (estimated at 50).

Most materials used in Peruvian research are written in Spanish. However, you do not need to speak or read Spanish to do research in Peruvian records. You will need to know some keywords and phrases to understand the records, however. Because of Peru’s history, Roman Catholic records are the most common. You may find other languages in Peruvian records for areas with large populations of German, Italian, Japanese, and other immigrants. Spanish grammar affects the way names appear in genealogical records. For help in understanding name variations, see Peru Names, Personal.

Word List(s)[edit | edit source]

Alphabet and Pronunciation[edit | edit source]

Alphabet

Pronunciation

Language Aids and Dictionaries[edit | edit source]

Dictionaries

  • Gonzales, Odi, Christine Mladic Janney, and Emily F Thompson. Quechua-Spanish-English dictionary : a trilingual reference. New York: Hippocrene Books, Inc, 2018. Available at: WorldCat.
  • Stanford, Olivia, Anwesha Dutta, Shambhavi Thatte, and Shalini Agrawal. First Spanish dictionary. New York, New York: DK Publishing, 2018. Available at: WorldCat.
  • Jarman, Beatriz Galimberti, Roy Russell, Carol Styles Carvajal, and Nicholas Rollin. The Oxford Spanish dictionary : Spanish-English, English-Spanish. New York: Oxford University Press Inc, 2008. Available at: WorldCat.
  • Dutton, Brian, L. P. Harvey, and Roger M. Walker. Cassell's concise Spanish-English, English-Spanish dictionary. Macmillan, London, New York: Cassell, 1977. Available at: WorldCat.
  • Wold, Lillian Ramos. Compilation of colonial Spanish terms and document related phrases. Fullerton, California: Society of Hispanic Historical and Ancestral Research, 1996. Available at: WorldCat.

Online Dictionaries

Language Aids

  • García, Teresa Alvarez and Susie Beattie. Collins Spanish dictionary & grammar. Glasgow, Scotland: Collins, 2018. Available at: WorldCat.
  • Schmitt, Conrad J. Spanish grammar. New York: McGraw-Hill, 2014. Available at: WorldCat.
  • Zollo, Mike and Alan Wesson. Spanish grammar made easy. Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2018. Available at: WorldCat.

Additional Resources[edit | edit source]

References[edit | edit source]

  1. ↑ Wikipedia contributors, "Peru," in Wikipedia: the Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peru#:~:text=Peru's%20official%20languages, accessed 15 May 2023.
  2. ↑ Wikipedia contributors, "Languages of Peru," in Wikipedia: the Free Encyclopedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Peru, accessed 15 May 2023.
  3. ↑ Wikipedia contributors, "Peruvian Spanish," in Wikipedia: the Free Encyclopedia, four Peruvian dialects, accessed 15 May 2023.
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