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...
Concerning the campaign to save endangered and dying languages, can I inform you of the contribution, made by the World Esperanto Association, to UNESCO's campaign.
ReplyDeleteThe commitment was made, by the World Esperanto Association at the United Nations' Geneva HQ in September.
http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=eR7vD9kChBA&feature=related
Your readers may be interested in http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=_YHALnLV9XU Professor Piron was a translator with the United Nations in Geneva.
The argument for Esperanto can be seen at http://www.lernu.net
I think this is a really good response to the prompt.I enjoyed the juxtaposition you set up between what makes a language worth saving and what makes one not worth saving. I would encourage you to make your criteria more specific and to research facts that relate to the subject matter to solidify your argument. Finally, I think the Youtube attachment was a tasteful way of furthering your platform. This was a solid post.
ReplyDeleteGood point in mentioning the fact that not all languages are worth saving simply because the globe is losing culture. Languages with very few speakers do not seem very significant on a global level. One has to wonder how culturally significant these languages actually are if only a few people are still speaking them today.
ReplyDeleteI like your point that a language can be saved if the people speaking the language are willing to save it. I argued this point in my essay that it really depends on the people's motivation to preserve a language that can make the difference. Take sacred Hebrew for instance. The language was constantly repressed for many years, and without the motivation of many generations of Hebrew speakers to preserve the language, it is still alive (and even modernized) today.
ReplyDeletereally good post! you were very thorough and provided support and reasoning for all of your claims. the video at the bottom was a nice touch, too.
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