Endangered Languages

Endangered Languages

 On the other hand, very few people are being made aware that some of the
world’s languages are facing a similar threat at an ever- increasing rate.
 More than six hundreds languages have fewer than one hundred speakers,and
more than 1,700 languages have 1,000 speakers at most.
 The status of the world’s language using etnologue’s expanded graded
intergenerational disruption scale (EGIDS)
 An “international” language like english gets a 0. Languages use “nationally” and
“provicially” are 1 and 2. Languages at least used in “education” are 4. And so
on, down to “nearly extinct” or “extinct”
 Of the 7,000 languages used in the world toda, only about fifteen are higher than
“threatened”, and probably only six hundred can be considered safe.
Why do language die?
 The most common reason during the twentieth century was the economic and
cultural influence of large nation- states that encompass small tribal societies
within their borders.
 Quite frequently there is a phase of bilingualism during which members of the
small society have command of both languages; but this phase usually does not
last long because the next generation becomes monolingual in the language of the
larger society.
 This happened with many of the native American languages spoken in the United
States .
Language Death

Why should we care if a language dies?

This query was asked by noted linguist David crystal.
He devoted a fun chapter of his popular book (2000:
27-67) to discussing five reasons we should care.
1. Because we need diversity in order to preserve our traditional cultural wealth;
2. Because a language Constitutes the primary symbol of ethnic identity;
3. Because languages, whether written or unwritten, are repositories of history;
4. Because languages contribute to the sum of human knowledge;
5. Because languages are fascinating in themselves .
“when you lose a language, it’s like
dropping a bomb on a museum “
Language maintenance and reinforcement : an
arapaho example

 Since the mid- 1960s, increasing efforts by linguists and native American tribal
leaders have been devoted to language maintenance and reinforcement in
communities where the traditional transmission of oral skills from parents to
children is no longer functioning effectively. Although perhaps as many as two
hundred native American languages are still spoken at least to some extent in the
United States and Canada, ever-increasing numbers of them are in danger of
being completely replaced by English.
 For the Northern Arapaho of the wind river reservation in Wyoming,
who are eager to maintain, and even reinforc, their ethnic identity and
cultural heritage, the present situation is nothing short of critical,
Several factors contribute to the gloomy outlook:
1. With few exceptions, the only individuals who have full command of Arapaho- even if they no
longer use it habitually and even if english has to come to influence it- are members of the oldest
generation.
2. Parents are no longer teach Arapaho to their children in the home.
3. The numbers of active speakers and of those who have at least some passive knowledge of
Arapaho arw declining rapidly.
4. The bulk of the population is for all pratical purposes monolingual; English is preferred in
essentially all situations, including even some traditional ceremonial contexts.
5. Arapaho is losing its communicative viability- its capability to adapt succesfully to new
situations.
Summary and conclusions

 Speech is only one of several means by which humans communicate,

but it is the most common and efficient one. Besides the acoustic
channel employed in speaking,people make use of other channels,
especially the optical one; they do so whenever they make gestures or
facial expressions and of course,when they write.
 Communication is common among animals of all species and in some cases is
surprisingly elaborate. To a considerable extent, Animals are genetically endowed
with communicative behavior, that is, they do not have to learn it. Although the
capacity for speech is also a part of human genetic makeup, the particular
language or languages an individual happens to speak must be learned. Among
the design features that distinguish speech from the communicative behavior of
other animals, the most striking are productivity, displacement, and reflexiveness.