In this book Mary Holbrock reviews the practices and meanings of Mayan literacy at the beginning of the twenty-first century. It provides a sensitive and thoughtful description of the complex relationship between Mayan culture, language and literacy and national Spanish-speaking society in Guatemala after the end of the civil war in 1996. The research was conducted mainly via qualitative interviews and classical ethnographic methods and focuses on two Mayan villages in the Guatemalan highlands – Santa Eulalia, Huehuetenango (Q'anjob'al) and San Pedro La Laguna, Sololá (Tz'utujiil). Overall, the author highlights the broader cultural meaning of literacy in Mayan communities and the importance of ideology and sustainability in the success of Mayan literacy revitalisation programmes, including the crucial role of active local participation.

The book contextualises Mayan literacy reinvention within the post-civil war Mayan cultural revitalisation movement (also known as the Pan-Maya movement). The ostensibly apolitical character of this movement enabled it to grow relatively free from state-sponsored repression from the late 1980s. Efforts to increase the prestige of Mayan languages, support and affirm the identity of its speakers, and increase the domains of language use centred on literacy, the standardisation and codification of Mayan languages and the promotion of bilingual education. However, the political implications of such endeavours emerged in disagreements over orthography between the official Academia de Lenguas Mayas de Guatemala (Guatemalan Academy of Mayan Languages, ALMG) and the Evangelical Christian Summer Institute of Linguistics. These reflected deeper divisions over the ideological relationship between literacy in Mayan languages and Mayan cultural revival versus assimilation into national Spanish-speaking society. Such tensions have contributed to the multiple language ideologies that accelerated or counteracted language shift in this period.

As the book discusses, rates of literacy among the Maya were very low until the late 1980s and 1990s, but by the 2000s most children and adults in the towns studied had access to some bilingual education. There was a notable change in attitudes and practices as education became increasingly seen as a Mayan cultural space. This shift was aided by growing numbers of Mayan teachers, the revision of the cultural content of the curriculum and the standardisation of languages. However, the lack of funding, training, institutional support and teaching materials and patchy provision undermined its reach and effectiveness. Similarly, although the number of Mayan language texts had grown in the 2000s, readers faced problems of accessibility, usability, availability and sustainability. The dependence on outside funds and agencies and problems of distribution and commercialisation undermined sustainability and the effectiveness of literacy and education efforts, plus the influence of Spanish and foreign language and culture weakened interest amongst the young. Thus, despite advances, literacy remained predominantly associated with learning to speak and read in Spanish, younger people were increasingly less likely than their elders to speak a Mayan language, and neologisms and code-switching became more common, particularly amongst bilingual educated Maya. The sense of rapid generational change reported by informants was partly associated with the continuing shame felt by many at being Maya and the association of Spanish with success, prosperity and Western modernity.

However, the author found that at the same time the use of symbols and glyphs as well as alphabetic writing in ‘environmental print’ on billboards, businesses and adverts elicited cultural pride that contributed to language ideologies favouring the use of Mayan languages. Indeed, she argues that the association between history, tradition, cultural symbols and language and literacy is such that traditional Mayan clothing represents a kind of literacy: it can be read via symbols given meaning by shared convention. Therefore, the loss of those symbols, by, for example, the use of Western clothing, are perceived by many Maya as closely related to language shift. However, as well as ‘loss’, the author sees signs of hybridity and reinvention as Mayan symbols continue to be used and reproduced in novel ways and through new kinds of media.

Consequently, the author concludes that language shift and the reinvention of Mayan literacy are ambivalent and complex processes, influenced by multiple ideologies, which make it difficult to determine the overall direction of change. Bilingual education, despite its limitations, has had a positive effect, but in terms of personal language use and the sustainability of print culture, the impact of changes has been limited. This is due to the different goals and motives behind language and literacy policies, the complexity of actors and ideologies at play, and the lack of resources. Intervention is needed, though, if language shift is to be definitively reversed.

The book shows a good knowledge of the appropriate literature and awareness of the issues and arguments involved, and begins to speak to the complexity of Mayan literacy in Guatemala. The author also puts forward some interesting ideas of her own. However, those ideas merited further development and the implications of the empirical findings required greater analysis in order to develop a clearer argument regarding Mayan literacy reinvention in Guatemala and its broader political and theoretical significance.