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News...
The world is losing it's linguistic color
by
Payal Sampat
There are 6,800 languages spoken around the world today, but more
than half of those languages could be lost in this century, according to the
Worldwatch Institute. Languages disappear when another tongue is enforced by
governments. Many languages also die along with their people during wars, or
natural disasters. But the greatest threat today is simply disuse along with the
global loss of cultural diversity.
Americas: There are 1,013 languages. In North America there are
260 native languages. Eighty percent are no longer being learned by
younger generations.
Europe: There are 230 languages. Thirty percent could be lost
this century.
Pacific and Australia: 1,311 languages. Australia itself has 268
languages. Ninety percent of aboriginal languages in Australia are near
extinction.
Africa: 2,058 languages. 54 are believed dead and 116 are near
extinction.
Asia: 2,197 languages. More than half of the languages are
considered at risk.
Papua New Guinea: 832 languages. Only a dozen or so have been
studied.
Eight countries account for more than half of all languages. They
are, in order, Papua New Guinea, Indonesia, Nigeria, India, Mexico, Cameroon,
Australia and Brazil.
The death of languages is nothing new. The distinguishing thing
is that it is happening at such an alarming rate right now was the concern of
the Linguistic Society of America's endangered language committee.
Hebrew evolved in the last century from a written language into
Israel's national language spoken by over 5 million people. Other initiatives
aim to revive Welsh, Navajo, New Zealand's Maori and several languages native to
Botswana.
Governments can help by removing bans on languages, and children
should be encouraged to speak languages in addition to their native tongues,
said Worldwatch's Sampat.
Payal Sampat is a Research Associate with the
Worldwatch Institute, and International
Campaign Director at the Mineral Policy Center in Washington, DC. Payal's
research interests include materials use and mining, fresh water, and cultural
and linguistic diversity.
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