The Abenaki Language

Abenaki is an endangered language originally spoken from Massachusetts to the St. Lawrence River valley (present-day New England and parts of Quebec).  It is split into two varieties: Eastern Abenaki and Western Abenaki.  The Eastern variant, spoken in parts of Maine and Quebec, only has one surviving group on Indian Island.  While the last fluent speaker died in 1993, this dialect is thoroughly documented.  On the other hand, Western Abenaki is used in New Hampshire, Vermont, and parts of Quebec.  There is a large group in Quebec, composed of many elderly, fluent speakers.  

This language, founded in the 16th century, however, has become endangered.  The Abenaki's struggle to preserve their language and culture began when the French and English colonized North America.  Soon after, they were forbidden to use their language--a ruling that remained until the 1950s.  Furthermore, during the Eugenics movement, the Abenakis (as well as other minorities) would risk sterilization or institutionalization for keeping hold of their culture and language.  

These days, the Abenaki speakers and advocates have been working hard to keep the language alive.  Several adult classes are being held and dictionaries have been printed.  There are great efforts taking place because this language is full of cultural history and significance.  

Click Here for Abenaki's Role in Culture and Traditions

or

Click Here for the Future of the Abenaki Language

  

To Save or Not to Save?

With so many endangered languages and only a limited amount of resources, linguists and government agencies must find a way to determine which languages are worth saving and which ones are not worth the money or effort.  Personally, I have several conditions that make a language worth saving.  First of all, there must be a solid, decently large population (maybe 500+ individuals) of fluent speakers.  It is also helpful that many of these people are of the younger generations so that the language doesn't die with the elders.  Another condition is that the fluent speakers have a positive attitude toward the survival of this language and that they are willing to help and cooperate with the linguists.  If there is no desire or enthusiasm among the fluent speakers, then it would be extremely difficult for the government and linguists to help revitalize the language.  Lastly, I believe that the language should already have a written form and include modern/technological vocabulary.  It would be far too difficult and costly to invent a written form.  Also, the language would be essentially useless in today's world if it did not include modern words.  

On the other hand, there are several conditions where saving a language is not worth it.  Similar to what I mentioned in the previous paragraph, it is not worth it to save languages where there are only one or two speakers.  If a language only has a few fluent speakers, then past generations clearly did not care to keep the language going.  If there is this negative attitude and no compliance, then there is no reason to save the language.  

Still, I admire the efforts of linguists around the world who are trying their best to save as many languages as they can.  Here is a video from YOUTUBE describing the Rosetta Project--a project geared at saving languages...

Language, Society, Culture and Critical Thinking

Our Linguistics 115 class may not predominantly focus on critical thinking and uncertainty, but it sure does incorporate these ideas.  Thus far, our teacher has mainly thrown at us hundreds of facts about languages, dialects, and varieties, and how these have evolved.  However, I do think that there is some degree of critical thinking that goes on when our teacher talks about how new languages come into existence and why people have their own, unique ways of talking.  Because languages do not come into being overnight, there is a long process that it must go through in order to be properly established.  Because of the uncertainty that this language may not become as widespread as wanted, government leaders and public figures must thoroughly critically think about the social and political pros and cons of that language.  Furthermore, after learning about these processes and languages, I find myself thinking critically about the languages that we've learned about.  For instance, when learning about the dialect continuum, I thought about how there are so many different dialects, but yet, if you go from one to the other, you can easily learn and understand either one.   This made me think why they even call it different dialects, or even different languages.  I realized that there is not a "right" answer to this dilemma, and policy makers just had to make the best decision they could, while knowing that other people might disagree.

The Pope and the Nazis!

In his article "A German Lesson: The Fallacy of One True Path," Goldhagen draws a comparison between Pope Benedict's way of thinking and the state of Germany before WWII to show the pope's and the Nazi's narrow-mindedness.  Under the belief that Jews and other races were unimportant and lowly, Hitler and his followers engaged in " all-consuming racism, brutal conquest of other peoples and mass murder" in order to establish their supremacy.  Similar to the Nazi's belief that they were superior to all, Pope Benedict believed that the Catholic Church was superior to all other denominations and religions.  Although he did not resort to drastic measures like Hitler, Benedict called for a " world imperial church  " and " [denigrated] other religions as not being true religions or paths to salvation ."  I believe that Goldhagen highlights on these two groups of people to show that thinking you are the supreme over everyone else and trying to establish your religion or race as the "best," does not solve any problems.  Instead, it creates bigger problems, leading to less peace and resolution in the world.