Ecology of knowledges and languages in Latin American academic production^*

Ecologia de saberes e línguas na produção acadêmica latino-americana

Ecología de saberes y lenguas en la producción académica latinoamericana

Abstract

The Latin American academic production is analyzed relating to its visibility, internationalization, and the ecology of knowledges and languages. Bibliometric tools were used to form a corpus of 2,939 studies in the Scopus database between 2010-2019, analyzed in two dimensions: the output/editorial dimension, and the input/epistemological dimension, focusing on three aspects: (1) evolution per year and per country; (2) most used languages and journals; and (3) international collaborations. The results of the epistemological dimension showed a greater collaboration with authors from the Global North, especially with Spain, the United States and England (in the case of Mexico and Chile) and Portugal (in the case of Brazil). Regarding the quantitative evolution, a steady growth was observed in Latin America, with Brazil occupying the first position. Spanish predominated as the language of publication, although a trend towards English was observed in the second five-year period analyzed, surpassing Portuguese. Taken together, the results of the study suggest that the patterns of academic production in Latin America do not show an ecology of knowledges and languages.

Academic Production; Internationalization of Higher Education; Latin America; Spanish; Portuguese; English