Elsie Alvarado de Ricord

Elsie Alvarado de Ricord (David, Panama, March 23, 1928 - Panama, Panama, May 18, 2005), was a Panamanian writer, prominent linguist, winner of the Ricardo Miró Award in three times, member of number and first female director of the Panamanian Academy of Language.

Biography

Headquarters of the Panamanian Academy of Language, where Elsie Alvarado was a member of number and first female director.

Elsie Alvarado Moreno was born in David, Chiriquí province, on March 23, 1928. She was the fifth of 12 children born to Emma Moreno Quiel and Manuel B. Alvarado Palacios. She studied at the Juan Demóstenes Arosemena Normal School, in Santiago de Veraguas (Panama), and after obtaining her primary education teacher diploma in 1946, she moved to Panama City to continue university studies. In that year she married the Panamanian lawyer and professor Humberto Ricord, at which time she adopted the name Elsie Alvarado de Ricord, he was the father of her only daughter.

In 1951 she obtained the title of Professor of Spanish at the University of Panama. Ten years later she received a doctorate in Romance Philology at the Central University of Madrid and in 1963 she obtained the degree of Linguistic Researcher at the School of Linguistic Research in Madrid. She was President of the Círculo Lingüístico de Panamá Her doctoral thesis entitled The Poetic Work of Dámaso Alonso earned her first prize in Hispanic American doctoral theses in 1963.

She was a professor of general linguistics, literary theory, phonetics and Spanish historical grammar; she was also a member of the Association of Linguistics and Philology of Latin America and the Inter-American Program of Linguistics and Language Teaching.

She was a full member and director of the Panamanian Academy of Language. On June 15, 1973, the chair occupied by the poet Octavio Fábrega was left empty and Elsie Alvarado de Ricord became the third woman to form part of the institution, after the appointments of fellow poets María Olimpia de Obaldía and Stella Sierra. Academician Ricardo J. Bermúdez gave the welcome speech at a ceremony held on November 26, 1975. Elsie Alvarado's induction speech was about her predecessor, the poet Octavio Fábrega. In 1991 she became the first woman to hold the position of director of the Academy, a position she held until 2002. She was honorary director of the Academy from 2004 until her death. She was a corresponding member of the Royal Spanish Academy, the National Academy of Letters of Uruguay and the Academy North American of the Spanish Language.

Elsie Alvarado was a great admirer of the work of Panamanian poets Esther María Osses, María Olimpia de Obaldía and Amelia Denis de Icaza.

Contributions to the study of language

Elsie Alvarado was an authority and point of reference in the study of the Spanish language. Within the Panamanian Academy of Language, she mediated in linguistic disputes and made recommendations on the use of certain words and expressions in the Spanish language.

He was in favor of the use of the adverb enantes, widely used in everyday Panamanian language, but rejected by many people, considering it archaic. His argument was that the word enantes has never fallen into disuse in Panama, therefore it should not be considered an archaism, nor should its use be censored.

He presented his opposition to the suppression of the letters ch and ll from the Spanish alphabet, a position he defended at the XI Congress of the Language in San José, Costa Rica and in Madrid in 1994. He defended the need to maintain the independence of both letters in the alphabet and in the alphabetical ordering of dictionaries. Despite his studied allegations, he did not win the battle and both letters were excluded from the alphabet at the X Congress of the Association of Spanish Language Academies, in 1994.

He carried out a complete linguistic diagnosis in his work Spanish in Panama: a phonetic and phonological study for which he interviewed 100 people (50 men and 50 women) aged between 18 and 65 years, with the purpose of analyzing both educated and informal speech. In his study, he concludes the scarce indigenous presence in the Panamanian lexicon and demonstrates the incorporation of other linguistic words. This work is, in the opinion of Rodolfo de Gracia, a former student of Elsie Alvarado and current academic secretary of the Panamanian Academy of Language, a reference in the linguistics of Panama.

Elsie Alvarado expressed her solidarity with the feminist struggle. However, he was against the approach of egalitarian language and the solution of using the same word in masculine and feminine, such as “boys and girls” to avoid the use of the masculine (“children”) that groups both genders..

We owe Elsie Alvardo de Ricord the inclusion of the words “abuelazón” and “membership” in the 1992 academic dictionary.

Works

Elsie Alvarado de Ricord was a prolific author in literary criticism, linguistics, and poetry. In Panama she enjoyed great intellectual and academic authority, especially from literary studies through stylistic criticism, and from the language aspect. She prefaced several books of poetry and published numerous studies on literary and linguistic topics.

Literary criticism

• Notes on the Poetry of Demetrio Herrera Sevillano (1951).
• Contemporary Panamanian writers (1962). This anthological study was incorporated in the same year of its publication to the Latin American Literature Dictionary, published by the then Pan American Union, today the Organization of American States (OAS), in Washington D.C. (USA).
• The poetic work of Dámaso Alonso (1968), doctoral thesis with which he obtained the outstanding qualification, published by the publisher Gredos de Madrid with a prologue by Ricardo J. Alfaro.
• Approach to the poetry of Ricardo Miró (1973), with which he won his second prize Ricardo Miró, published by the National Institute of Culture
• Rubén Darío and his poetic work (1978), works under the stamp of the National Library of Montevideo and with a prologue of the Uruguayan critic and academic Arturo Sergio Visca.

Linguistics

• Spanish in Panama, phonetic and phenological study (1971).
• Relations of the Spanish orthographic alphabet with the phenological (Defensa de la ch y la ll) (1989), published by the University Printer of the University of Panama and by the Bulletin of the Panamanian Academy of Language.
• Uses of current Spanish (1966), text of a normative nature.

Poetry

Elsie Alvarado de Ricord found in poetry a means to express her sensitivity. Her poetic work has been translated into several languages, including English, Polish, Russian and Swedish. The Panamanian literary critic Víctor Fernández Cañizalez defined Elsie Alvarado de Ricord as a poetess of love, the name by which she is known and associates in Panama. His poems appear published in the following works:

• Pink Holocaust (1953).
• Between matter and sleep (1966).
• Passengers in transit (1973), with a later prologue of the Panamanian poet Ester María Osses.
• It's real and it's from this world. (1978).
• Always love: Complete poetry (2002), promoted by the also academic Bern of Burrell This was his fifth poem and last book published.

Awards and distinctions

• Ricardo Miró Award, Essay section, on three occasions, for his books Style and Density in the Poetry of Ricardo J. Bermudez (1957), The Poetry of Rubén Darío (1967) and Approach to the poetry of Ricardo Miró (1972).
• First prize of the Poetry Contest of the Lottery Review (1972).
• University Award, University of Panama, in the Art and Literature section (1996).
• Premio Atenea de las Letras (1996), awarded by the Inter-American Club of Professional and Business Women of Panama.

• In 1980, as a tribute to his literary work, the Spanish Department of the University of Panama dedicated to him the Third Week of Panamanian Literature.

Honors

Rogelio Sinán Award

For her merits, she was awarded the Rogelio Sinán Award in 2002. She has been the first person to receive this award, which was instituted by Law No.14 of February 7, 2001. The award consists of a medal of honor, a scroll, and a cash prize of ten thousand dollars. She was given to him by President Mireya Moscoso at a ceremony held at the National Theater. Dimas Lidio Pitty, President of the National Writers Council declared during the ceremony that Elsie Alvarado was the most complete woman of letters in Panamanian cultural history.

Manuel Amador Guerrero Order

In 2005, Elsie Alvarado de Ricord received the Manuel Amador Guerrero Order from the National Government on International Women's Day. On this occasion, Elsie Alvarado defined poetry as "the art of words, the one that uses the most exquisite language".