Abstract
Despite many studies that address relations between the two major ethnic groups—Indigenous and Ladino—in Guatemala, there are no scales devised specifically to measure ethnic attitudes. Participants (196 university students) indicated agreement or disagreement on a four-point scale with a large pool of items expressing positive and negative attitudes towards the two groups, and, on a line from pure Indigenous to pure Ladino, their own ethnic identification (the label they use to describe their ethnicity). Reliable scales measuring Attitudes toward Indigenous (AIG) and Attitudes toward Ladinos (ALG) were constructed, and 35% of the participants claimed mixed ethnic identification. Ethnic identification was related to attitudes, with groups demonstrating in-group favoritism; that is, participants expressed more positive attitudes toward their own ethnic group. The results imply that the dichotomous categories of Ladino and Indigenous are inadequate for measuring ethnicity in Guatemala. The newly developed attitude scales may be used to advance knowledge about ethnic relations in Guatemala and to test the generality of findings relating to relations between dominant and subordinate groups.
Highlights
Ethnic relations have a long and conflict-ridden history in Guatemala
The 29 items relating to attitudes toward Indigenous persons were subjected to an iterative process of examining the item-scale correlation and eliminating negatively or poorly correlating items, and arriving at a scale of 23 items with a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.84
The newly developed scales, the Attitudes toward Indigenous (AIG) and the Attitudes toward Ladino Persons of Guatemala (ALG), will be useful for investigating issues regarding ethnicity in Guatemala, including the development of ethnic attitudes among youth, the effects of context on ethnic identity and ethnic attitudes, the relation of ethnic attitudes to particular experiences of contact or discrimination, and the instantiation of attitudes in daily life. They might be used to address such questions as: “What is the role of physical attributes such as skin color in ethnic discrimination? “Are there situational or daily fluctuations in ethnic attitudes and ethnic identification? “Is a modern ethnocentrism emerging in Guatemala?” Future studies should tease out the relative effects of socio-economic status and ethnicity
Summary
Ethnic relations have a long and conflict-ridden history in Guatemala. Numerous scholars, especially anthropologists and historians, have examined ethnicity and its consequences in both the pueblos and urban areas of Guatemala [2,3,4,5,6,7]. An excellent summary of the history of ethnic relations in Guatemala is provided by the two volume series Ethnicity, state, and nation in Guatemala [10,11] and by its sequel Ethnic relations in Guatemala, 1944-2000 [12] Those three volumes document ethnic divisions, attempts to “civilize” and “Ladinize” Indigenous persons, and continued ethnic disparities within Guatemala. Most Indigenous in Guatemala are of Mayan heritage, speak one of the 22 different Mayan languages, and often identify themselves by the language they speak Among those the most numerous are the K’iche’, who represent over one million persons, and the Kaqchikel and the Q’eqchi’, who are slightly less numerous with about 800,000 speakers each [16]. The GINI ratio (a measure of economic disparity) of Guatemala is one of the highest in the world, at 0.57 in comparison to the United States at 0.41 and Japan at 0.25 [16]
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