Mercaderes de las lenguas: el comercio de gramáticas castellanas en el espacio tipográfico chileno (c. 1840-1890)

Abstract

This article examines the Spanish grammar books published and sold in Chile during the second half of the nineteenth century from the perspective of their status as published products, with the aim of demonstrating that the market for these textbooks provides a key to understand the functioning of the Chilean publishing landscape and the relationships established between the State and the printing industry. Drawing on an analysis of textbooks, administrative documents, periodicals and other printed sources, it reconstructs the dynamics that enabled their production, publication, circulation, and marketing, identifying the various actors involved in these processes—authors, printers, publishers, booksellers and public authorities—and the strategies they employed to position their works. The study argues that grammar books established themselves as one of the most stable and lucrative segments of the national printing industry, aided by the expansion of the public education system and by a sustained demand for school textbooks that stimulated competition to secure their official adoption. Consequently, the contest for linguistic authority was not driven solely by intellectual or pedagogical criteria, but was closely linked to the commercial and publishing interests that shaped an ever-expanding book market.