Why Guaraní language preserves Paraguay’s roots and soul

When it came time to choose a wedding venue, Margarita Gayoso and her partner Christian Ojeda knew exactly where they wanted to go.

- LOMA GRANDE

Despite living in Spain, the couple travelled to their long-missed hometown in Paraguay for a ceremony officiated in their ancestors' language. “Everyone was crying because everything feels so profound in Guarani,” Gayoso said. “It’s as if the pronunciation pours out of your soul.” Guarani is one of Paraguay's two official languages alongside Spanish. But linguists warn that fluency among younger generations is slipping, so nationwide preservation efforts are underway.

Many Paraguayans believe that Guarani carries a deep emotional significance. Yet because the language's use remains primarily oral, it rarely appears in official documents, government records and literary works. Even finding a Catholic priest who could preside over Gayoso's wedding ceremony in Guarani proved difficult. Still, it was worth the extra effort. Some guests told her that it was the first local wedding they had attended that was conducted entirely in their mother tongue.

Of the country’s 6.9 million people, about 1.6 million reported Guarani as their main language, according to Paraguay’s official 2024 data. Whereas, 1.5 million use Spanish, and 2.1 million identify as bilingual. Other Indigenous languages account for the rest. The Guarani spoken today differs from the version that Europeans first encountered during the Latin American conquests in the I50Os. Still, its survival in a region where most countries shifted to Spanish is remarkable. Why has it managed to remain dominant?

“In the Guarani culture, language is synonymous with soul,” said Arnaldo Casco, a researcher from Paraguay’s Department of Linguistics. “The word is what the Lord bestowed on men, so we believe that, for the Guarani people, losing their language was like losing their soul.”