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The extinction of languages

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Hi Mynglers,

We want to share with you this alarming article (its in Dutch) about certain languages becoming extinct. I made a rough translation for all of you, who don’t speak Dutch.

Did you know that almost 80 % of the world’s population altogether speaks only 83 languages? What is even more disturbing, is that half of the 6700 languages that exist worldwide are only spoken by 0.2 % of the population and are in danger of extinction.

On February 21, the international day of the native language,The UN organization UNESCO draws the attention to the importance of diversity of cultures and language.

According to UNESCO. language is essential to express yourself and to pass on knowledge and culture and therefore has to be protected.

Endangered languages can be found in all parts of the world. In France for example, there are 26 languages that are on the UNESCO list of endangered languages. In Papua New Guinea, the country which has the largest variety of languages with 800 different ones, about 88 languages might be extinct by the end of this century.

For some languages there is only one person left who speaks it. For instance, at the beginning of February the last living woman from the ancient Bo people living in an Archipelago in India died, who was able to speak the Bo language.

Other languages, like for example German, are still spoken by millions, but even in those languages more and more words are replaced by words from foreign languages, which potentially endangers them as well.

We hope that Myngle and all the Mynglers will contribute to enhance the diversity of languages and by that work against the extinction!

Aenn

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