It’s estimated that there are around 7,000 languages spoken around this vast world we live in—even though most people could only name a few dozen languages. The reality is that the majority of languages are endangered or minority languages, unknown to most of the global population. Unfortunately, that’s the case with Poqomam—most people have never heard of this endangered Mayan language spoken in Guatemala.
At TranslationServices.com, the international fame of a language isn’t how we determine which languages we translate. Poqomam’s status as an endangered language doesn’t make it less valuable to its speakers, who proudly continue speaking the language their ancestors spoken widely prior to European colonization. Indigenous languages help ethnic groups cement their ethnic and cultural identity and are therefore vital to their wellbeing, and we recognize this—which is why we’re so proud to announce that we offer Poqomam translation services.
How about requesting a quote for our Poqomam translation services? Quotes are free, and you can see how affordable our rates are.
Diving into Poqomam’s fascinating features
The number of Poqomam speakers is estimated at between 11,000 and 50,000, spread out across the southern Guatemalan departments of Guatemala, Jalapa, and Escuintla. The language is closely related to Poqomchi’, spoken further north. Poqomam, along with the other 20 Mayan languages spoken in Guatemala, has benefited from the efforts of the Academia de Lenguas Mayas de Guatemala, which works to revitalize and foster the country’s Mayan languages.
Poqomam, like all Mayan languages, uses ergativity to build sentences. This contrasts with the nominative–accusative system used in European languages. Essentially, where nominative–accusative languages focus on who or what is doing an action, ergative–absolutive languages like Poqomam focus on who or what is affected by an action. For example, in “he fell” and “he dropped it,” he is falling in the first sentence, but it is falling in the second sentence. Poqomam and other ergative languages accordingly mark intransitive subjects and transitive objects identically. In Poqomam, these markers appear on the verb and not on the nouns themselves.
Ergative languages are tricky for English speakers, since they employ an entirely different thought process. Our Poqomam translators are experts in Poqomam, so they can easily overcome this difficulty.
Hire our translators to translate to and from Poqomam
Our Poqomam translations are something we invest a great deal of pride in—after all, most translation agencies won’t even work with languages like Poqomam. To ensure maximal client satisfaction, we provide translation both to and from Poqomam for all types of content. So, perhaps you have historical documents, traditional stories or folklore, or personal notes in Poqomam that you’d like to translate into English—just leave it to our team. Or, maybe you have a questionnaire you need translated into Poqomam to carry out research—or maybe you want to share your book, app, game, website, or other creative content with the Poqomam people in their own language. Our Poqomam translators guarantee high-quality, accurate translation no matter the direction.
We’d love to work with you to translate to and from Poqomam, no matter what your individual needs are. Get in touch today to talk about your vision.
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