<i>Xkoltyayaj</i>, “The One Who Helps”

In this piece, I recount my experiences interpreting a five-week-long criminal jury trial during the summer of 2024 from English into Ch’ol, believed to be the first time a jury trial was interpreted into Ch’ol in the United States. Ch’ol is a Mayan language spoken by a quarter million people in the southern Mexican states of Chiapas, Tabasco, and Campeche and in diasporic communities in the United States. It is also the language I specialize in as a linguist. The piece speaks to the challenges I dealt with, becoming a fast-tracked-by-circumstance court interpreter, having to develop Ch’ol translations for legal terms and concepts, and the obstacles faced when using existing resources, such as the Ch’ol-Spanish dictionary written by evangelical missionaries, first published in 1978. I seek to raise awareness of some challenges of interpreting into Indigenous languages, the diversity of languages spoken by immigrants from Latin America, and the right to an interpreter that is guaranteed in the United States. The following article contains descriptions of sexual assault of minors.