Eh, doesn't that just mean more and more people are learning English? I'd imagine not knowing English in this day and age would put people at a disadvantage in various ways (especially in the job market), so I don't think this is necessarily a bad thing.

Cultures are built around people not languages, so I don't think if everyone starts speaking English rather than their historical languages then their cultures would somehow disappear.

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Martha’s Vineyard? I thought that was a small island filled w tourists.

Martha's Vineyard Sign Language has been extinct since 1952.

Language is a part of culture it’s not independent, language loss is a sign of cultural erasure. American Indians most definitely have been harmed and their language loss is, in some cases, a direct result of that harm. In a vacuum you’re right but in the context of American Indians it’s a bad thing

Good point. I'd still say that the benefits of knowing English outweigh the drawbacks for most Americans. But for people like the American Indians who have cultures which are vastly different than most Americans, yeah they wouldn't benefit from cultural adaptation.

I thought Hawaiian was making a resurgence. Its certainly being used and incorporated in cultural events more than ever, for example at surf contests.

You don't have to speak only one language (^^)

It's still very much endangered, though, and will be so until there's a sufficient population learning it as kids and going on to use it with their own kids.

(I think the title is about Hawai'i Sign Language, though, not Hawai'ian the spoken language.)

True. But I can understand why parents with different cultural backgrounds would prioritize their children learning English over their more obscure native languages. Excellent English skills are a requirement for most jobs in America.

It's an extremely common misconception, though, among parents from linguistic minorities that trying to teach both their own language and a more socially connected language will somehow disadvantage their child, and they should focus exclusively on the prestigious language and leave the other one behind entirely. This is of course entirely false, though, and is often rooted in their own internalised prejudice towards their language and culture. You can quite effectively teach kids two languages, especially when they have clearly segmented domains of use.

Yeah, the brains of children are much better able to handle learning multiple languages than adult brains.

I'm not actually sure that's true - I suspect it's much more that 1) adults are usually much less comfortable just Trying Things Out and want an explanation rather than a demonstration they have to mimic, and 2) adults are very, very much less frequently in situations where they absolutely cannot communicate in a language they already know and tend to intentionally avoid such situations. If you're willing to put yourself in much the same situation as a kid learning their first language, you'll be able to learn pretty much as well.

Hmm, you may be on to something. What you said would explain why immersion is considered the best way to learn a new language.

Oh, you're right my bad

Martha's Vineyard Sign Language is the language referenced here, not sure why that was left off. It's pretty cool, apparently influenced the development of ASL, though I don't know much on the topic.

With almost 8,000 languages, it's horrifying knowing almost half are about to be dormant in the coming decades.

thank you.

Not to be a contrarian but what exactly is horrifying? Languages are like species they naturally evolve, grow, decline and become extinct.

I understand that language can be unifying within a culture, but the disappearance of a language seems to be a symptom of cultural homogenization not a cause.

Thanks for this. Development of a different language requires relatively prolonged linguistic isolation. With billions of people, broadcast media spreading everywhere, and economic integration around the globe, how is a population going to be relatively isolated? And when firefly isolated populations come in contact.... Well, you get the point

I'm not claiming language loss is the sole cause of cultural homogenization.

First of all, language is part of culture. The mass eradication of human minority cultures including languages is what's horrifying.

These languages are not being lost because their speakers are throwing them away, they're being lost because economic inequality between cultures, political, demographical, and sociolinguistic discrimination and repression, lack of institutional support, and ethnolinguistic genocide are preventing speakers of these languages from maintaining their ability to choose whether their cultures survive into the next generation. The survival of a culture should always be an option for its members, yet it isn't in many cases.

Not to mention, every language represents a breadth of culturally specific knowledge, information, and stories, that die with it.

Not to mention that understanding human language in general, which is extremely important, requires research on the breadth of human languages.

There are thousands of reasons to protect linguistic diversity, and the only reason to want to decrease it is support of ethnolinguistic genocide.

Language loss isn't just a factor of connection, it's economic disparity, political, cultural, and linguistic discrimination and oppression, lack of institutional support, and ethnolinguistic genocide. People aren't just tossing their cultures to the side because they have neighbors.

I can resurrect Martha's Vineyard

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Did you throw the fackin lobstahpot off the friggen ferry at Aquidneck agen?

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about halfway there

There is beauty in preserving language, but to suggest the 'only reason to want to decrease it is support of ethnolinguistic genocide' is quite silly and you damage your argument by dismissing them outright.

Taking it to it's extreme, there are major advantages to having one language. Near-universal communication is a very strong selling point. Having that same universal access to information and information-based platforms without having to traverse a second language would be a boon to many. Not having to spend the time in translation would increase information accessibility to many people.

Now, whether or not it's a net good, or what kind of time line that would turn into a net good is a more interesting discussion, but suggestion that there are no reasons to support the idea of a common language is a pretty dishonest argument.

It's still recovering from a time when it was banned in schools. My Hawaiian speaking tour guide said it's spoken more by the younger generation.

So is pretty much every single Indigenous Australian language, of which I think there are near or over 200 surviving

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Who cares

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Actually, your wrong.

I'm literally and objectively correct little buddy.

Lol! The factors you cited tend to isolate populations, thus promoting language separation. Using the phrase "literally and objectively" indicates...you are pulling this out of your butt. Have a good day, little buddy-ette!

I guess the entire field of linguistics is wrong about linguistic change, because this reddcel says so.

>only reason to want to decrease it is support of ethnolinguistic genocide

Uh, you do know that was a thing though and still is in some places?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Indian_boarding_schools

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/12/15/algerias-berbers-protest-for-tamazight-language-rights

I say the new current trend of the Russians stealing Ukrainian children and reeducating them is a good modern example of language and cultural genocide.

>but suggestion that there are no reasons to support the idea of a common language is a pretty dishonest argument.

How much knowledge was lost because people decided to force their version of one true common language on people? What stories, legends and medical knowledge are gone because people didn't want to bother to learn another language?

I'm old enough to remember kids getting in trouble for speaking French in school. I barely speak any at all. :-(

Also the languages aren’t “lost” if we have an extensive record of their vocabulary and grammar and examples of people speaking those languages. Usually the reason people stop speaking those languages has more to do with convenience than oppression

Yep. Although some islands like Ni’iahu have a small but almost exclusively Hawaiian speaking population.

PISL is a Native Language. It developed as a trade dialect to be used alongside speech, as well as for the deaf communities.

Languages are not ciphers. It's not just the same info arranged differently. Languages are capsules of philosophy and culture. Cultures evolve and go extinct, but when you are talking about the results of genocide the extinction of at least these Languages has to be reckoned as a crime against humanity perpetrated by the US and other powers.

I totally understand what do you mean but some languages go extinct for natural reasons you explained but sometimes it is definitely not natural and pretty much being intentionally destroyed.

This is a GOOD thing. One of the requirements for a unified planet and thus a utopia is a common language. Too bad the "winning" language is english, one of the hardest and bastardized languages ever to come into being.

I heard a group of young girls speaking it in Hana. It'll be around for at least a little while longer.

Source

I'm not suggesting there aren't downsides. I'm suggesting that there are also benefits and that suggesting that there are only evil motives is dishonest. I'm suggesting that the conversation is heavily nuanced, and that there is a balance of harms here that must be considered.

Part of being persuasive and having people take an argument seriously is actually acknowledging all the pieces at play. Otherwise, you will find yourself forever preaching to the choir.

Yeah it essentially evolved into ASL

source for what? the factors for global unification are common language, currency, socio-political goals, education and technology. technology has enhanced education and socio-political unity a great deal, but what we need is a concerted effort by every government to work towards a common socio-political commonality. When our laws and socio-economics are universal, we can be free to go anywhere and know we are under the same legal and moral constraints and freedoms. When we are a unified peoples, THEN we can attack any problem or challenge and overcome it, from space colonization to eradicating disease, poverty, etc..

source for where you made up these factors lol

>I'm suggesting that the conversation is heavily nuanced, and that there is a balance of harms here that must be considered.

People had to fight to preserve their language because someone said it's not worth preserving or why waste tax dollars on teaching a dying language that no one speaks when we could use it to teach something else.

There's no balance of harm to be considered when some countries like the US did it to wipe out cultures and their religion as a form of genocide. Some countries are still doing this because they view their language and cultural traditions as the only proper way of doing things.

I didn't make them up. These are what philosophers and social studies experts say. Me, I'd advocate killing off everyone to have a peaceful society. No humans. They ruin everything

so we go back to where i asked for source

very tempted to just say I am the sourced, even though i read it in many sci-fi novels and other sources throughout my life, just so you would engage with the ISSUE, not the source. ITs about IDEAS, not veracity. what criteria do YOu think we need to unify the world, is what I am getting at.

However, I did manage to find one source that addresses some of these and adds more. https://opentext.wsu.edu/marketing/chapter/2-2-the-international-marketing-environment-3/

IT seems thee are so many companies and organizations using "world unity" as a theme or goal, the criteria I mentioned have become obscured by them. So, the question is, do you have any IDEAS on what the criteria are for world unity, or not? there isn't any criteria set in concrete, and are considered FACT. This is a discussion about IDEAS. I look for factual sources where appropriate too, but this is not an instance where that is appropriate .