Reflections on language in the lexicographical works of Ricardo Palma: criticisms of the academic register of Quechua words

The chapter examines the criticisms that the Peruvian writer Ricardo Palma makes to the Royal Spanish Academy regarding its lexicographical register of words of Quechua origin. After offering some general scopes on the lexicographic work of this author, the corrective comments and the errors that Palma attributes to the Academy in its work are analyzed. The perspective concentrated on the analysis of the errors pointed out allows us to investigate, in addition to the interest in the discussion of each specific word, certain ideas of Palma about the language, in particular, in the normative criteria he uses for Quechua words and in a paradoxical dimension of his conception and description of the American usages.