Katana VentraIP

Endangered language

An endangered language or moribund language is a language that is at risk of disappearing as its speakers die out or shift to speaking other languages.[1] Language loss occurs when the language has no more native speakers and becomes a "dead language". If no one can speak the language at all, it becomes an "extinct language". A dead language may still be studied through recordings or writings, but it is still dead or extinct unless there are fluent speakers.[2] Although languages have always become extinct throughout human history, they are currently dying at an accelerated rate because of globalization, mass migration, cultural replacement, imperialism, neocolonialism[3] and linguicide (language killing).[4]

Language shift most commonly occurs when speakers switch to a language associated with social or economic power or one spoken more widely, leading to the gradual decline and eventual death of the endangered language. The process of language shift is often influenced by factors such as globalisation, economic authorities, and the perceived prestige of certain languages. The ultimate result is the loss of linguistic diversity and cultural heritage within affected communities. The general consensus is that there are between 6,000[5] and 7,000 languages currently spoken. Some linguists estimate that between 50% and 90% of them will be severely endangered or dead by the year 2100.[3] The 20 most common languages, each with more than 50 million speakers, are spoken by 50% of the world's population, but most languages are spoken by fewer than 10,000 people.[3]


The first step towards language death is potential endangerment. This is when a language faces strong external pressure, but there are still communities of speakers who pass the language to their children. The second stage is endangerment. Once a language has reached the endangerment stage, there are only a few speakers left and children are, for the most part, not learning the language. The third stage of language extinction is seriously endangered. During this stage, a language is unlikely to survive another generation and will soon be extinct. The fourth stage is moribund, followed by the fifth stage extinction.


Many projects are under way aimed at preventing or slowing language loss by revitalizing endangered languages and promoting education and literacy in minority languages, often involving joint projects between language communities and linguists.[6] Across the world, many countries have enacted specific legislation aimed at protecting and stabilizing the language of indigenous speech communities. Recognizing that most of the world's endangered languages are unlikely to be revitalized, many linguists are also working on documenting the thousands of languages of the world about which little or nothing is known.

Response[edit]

Linguists, members of endangered language communities, governments, nongovernmental organizations, and international organizations such as UNESCO and the European Union are actively working to save and stabilize endangered languages.[3] Once a language is determined to be endangered, there are three steps that can be taken in order to stabilize or rescue the language. The first is language documentation, the second is language revitalization and the third is language maintenance.[3]


Language documentation is the documentation in writing and audio-visual recording of grammar, vocabulary, and oral traditions (e.g. stories, songs, religious texts) of endangered languages. It entails producing descriptive grammars, collections of texts and dictionaries of the languages, and it requires the establishment of a secure archive where the material can be stored once it is produced so that it can be accessed by future generations of speakers or scientists.[3]


Language revitalization is the process by which a language community through political, community, and educational means attempts to increase the number of active speakers of the endangered language.[3] This process is also sometimes referred to as language revival or reversing language shift.[3] For case studies of this process, see Anderson (2014).[52] Applied linguistics and education are helpful in revitalizing endangered languages.[53] Vocabulary and courses are available online for a number of endangered languages.[54]


Language maintenance refers to the support given to languages that need for their survival to be protected from outsiders who can ultimately affect the number of speakers of a language.[3] UNESCO seeks to prevent language extinction by promoting and supporting the language in education, culture, communication and information, and science.[55]


Another option is "post-vernacular maintenance": the teaching of some words and concepts of the lost language, rather than revival proper.[56]


As of June 2012 the United States has a "J-1 specialist visa, which allows indigenous language experts who do not have academic training to enter the U.S. as experts aiming to share their knowledge and expand their skills".[57]

Lists of endangered languages

Language ideology

Language death

(peer-reviewed open-access academic journal)

Language Documentation & Conservation

Language policy

Language revitalization

− a libre online tool used to record words and phrases of any language (thousands of recordings have already been done in endangered languages like Atikamekw, Occitan, Basque, Catalan, and are all available on Wikimedia Commons)

Lingua Libre

List of endangered languages with mobile apps

Lists of extinct languages

List of revived languages

Minority language

Native American Languages Act of 1990

Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger

(documentary film)

The Linguists

Indigenous language

Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights

World Poetry Day

Ahlers, Jocelyn C. (September 2012). . Gender and Language. 6 (2). Equinox. doi:10.1558/genl.v6i2.259. S2CID 241030162.

"Special issue: gender and endangered languages"

Abley, Mark (2003). Spoken Here: Travels Among Threatened Languages. London: Heinemann.

Crystal, David (2000). Language Death. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.  978-0521012713.

ISBN

Evans, Nicholas (2001). "The Last Speaker is Dead – Long Live the Last Speaker!". In Newman, Paul; Ratliff, Martha (eds.). Linguistic Field Work. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. pp. 250–281..

Hale, Kenneth; Krauss, Michael; Watahomigie, Lucille J.; Yamamoto, Akira Y.; Craig, Colette; Jeanne, LaVerne M. et al. 1992. Endangered Languages. Language, 68 (1), 1–42.

Harrison, K. David. 2007. When Languages Die: The Extinction of the World's Languages and the Erosion of Human Knowledge. New York and London: Oxford University Press.  0-19-518192-1.

ISBN

McConvell, Patrick; Thieberger, Nicholas (2006). "Keeping Track of Language Endangerment in Australia". In Cunningham, Denis; Ingram, David; Sumbuk, Kenneth (eds.). Language Diversity in the Pacific: Endangerment and Survival. Clevedon, UK: Multilingual Matters. pp. 54–84.  1853598674.

ISBN

McConvell, Patrick and Thieberger, Nicholas. 2001. , Australia State of the Environment Second Technical Paper Series (Natural and Cultural Heritage), Department of the Environment and Heritage, Canberra.

State of Indigenous Languages in Australia – 2001 (PDF)

Nettle, Daniel and Romaine, Suzanne. 2000. Vanishing Voices: The Extinction of the World's Languages. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

(2000). Linguistic Genocide in Education or Worldwide Diversity and Human Rights?. Mahwah, New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. ISBN 0-8058-3468-0.

Skutnabb-Kangas, Tove

and Walsh, Michael. 2011. 'Stop, Revive, Survive: Lessons from the Hebrew Revival Applicable to the Reclamation, Maintenance and Empowerment of Aboriginal Languages and Cultures', Australian Journal of Linguistics Vol. 31, No. 1, pp. 111–127.

Zuckermann, Ghil'ad

; Sallabank, Julia, eds. (2011). Cambridge Handbook of Endangered Languages. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-88215-6.

Austin, Peter K

Fishman, Joshua. 1991. Reversing Language Shift. Clevendon: Multilingual Matters.

Ehala, Martin. 2009. An Evaluation Matrix for Ethnolinguistic Vitality. In Susanna Pertot, Tom Priestly & Colin Williams (eds.), Rights, Promotion and Integration Issues for Minority Languages in Europe, 123–137. Houndmills: PalgraveMacmillan.

Landweer, M. Lynne. 2011. Methods of Language Endangerment Research: a Perspective from Melanesia. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 212: 153–178.

Lewis, M. Paul & Gary F. Simons. 2010. Assessing Endangerment: Expanding Fishman's GIDS. Revue Roumaine de linguistique 55(2). 103–120.

Online version of the article.

Hinton, Leanne and Ken Hale (eds.) 2001. The Green Book of Language Revitalization in Practice. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.

Gippert, Jost; Himmelmann, Nikolaus P. and Mosel, Ulrike (eds.) 2006. Essentials of Language Documentation (Trends in Linguistics: Studies and Monographs 178). Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.

Fishman, Joshua. 2001a. Can Threatened Languages be Saved? Reversing Language Shift, Revisited: A 21st Century Perspective. Clevedon: Multilingual Matters.

Dorian, Nancy. 1981. Language Death: The Life Cycle of a Scottish Gaelic Dialect. Philadelphia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press.

Campbell, Lyle and Muntzel, Martha C.. 1989. The Structural Consequences of Language Death. In Dorian, Nancy C. (ed.), Investigating Obsolescence: Studies in Language Contraction and Death, 181–96. Cambridge University Press.

Boas, Franz. 1911. Introduction. In Boas, Franz (ed.) Handbook of American Indian Languages Part I (Smithsonian Institution Bureau of American Ethnology Bulletin 40), 1–83. Washington, DC: Government Printing Office.

Austin, Peter K. (ed.). 2009. One Thousand Languages: Living, Endangered, and Lost. London: Thames and Hudson and Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

"One Thousand Languages: Living, Endangered and Lost", edited by Peter K. Austin. University of California Press (2008) .

http://www.economist.com/node/12483451

Whalen, D. H., & Simons, G. F. (2012). Endangered language families. Language, 88(1), 155–173.

. Archived from the original on September 9, 2016.

"Endangered Languages at the UNESCO Official Website"

. the Guardian. 15 April 2011. Static list and spreadsheet of UNESCO Data.

"Endangered languages: the full list"

.

"Endangered Language Resources at the LSA"

Resource Network for Linguistic Diversity

Endangered Languages Project

Akasaka, Rio; Machael Shin; Aaron Stein (2008). . Endangered-Languages.com. Archived from the original on 24 November 2018. Retrieved 12 April 2009.

"Endangered Languages: Information and Resources on Dying Languages"

. Yinka Déné Language Institute (YDLI). 2006. Retrieved 12 April 2009.

"Bibliography of Materials on Endangered Languages"

Constantine, Peter (2010). . The Quarterly Conversation. Archived from the original on 2010-06-24. Retrieved 2010-06-29.

"Is There Hope for Europe's Endangered Native Tongues?"

. SIL International. 2009. Retrieved 12 April 2009.

"Endangered languages"

Headland, Thomas N. (2003). (PDF). Dallas, Texas: Summer Institute of Linguistics.

"Thirty Endangered Languages in the Philippines"

Horne, Adele; Peter Ladefoged; Rosemary Beam de Azcona (2006). . Arlington, Virginia: Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). Archived from the original on 7 February 2009. Retrieved 26 April 2009.

"Interviews on Endangered Languages"

Malone, Elizabeth; Nicole Rager Fuller (2008). . National Science Foundation. Archived from the original on 9 March 2010. Retrieved 26 April 2009.

"A Special Report: Endangered Languages"

. Electronic Metadata for Endangered Languages Data (E-MELD). 2001–2008. Archived from the original on 2011-07-26. Retrieved 2009-04-25.

"Nearly Extinct Languages"

Salminen, Tapani (1998). . In Ostler, Nicholas (ed.). Endangered Languages: What Role for the Specialist? Proceedings of the Second FEL Conference (new ed.). Edinburgh: Foundation for Endangered Languages & Helsinki University. pp. 58–63.

"Minority Languages in a Society in Turmoil: The Case of the Northern Languages of the Russian Federation"

. Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages. 1997–2007. Retrieved 25 April 2009.

"Selected Descriptive, Theoretical and Typological Papers (index)"

. The UpTake. 2012-03-29. Archived from the original on 2015-08-07. Retrieved 2012-08-08.

"Winona LaDuke Speaks on Biocultural Diversity, Language and Environmental Endangerment"