Endangered Languages
“Endangered languages should be saved”
Many languages are at the danger of disappearance. The reason of their extinction could be the decrease in a number of people speaking that language. A 85% of 6000 languages appear to be spoken in 25 countries (NOW 2000). Language extinction is caused by external and internal factors. Internal forces such as community’s negative behaviour to mother language, or simply decrease in the number of speakers are mainly derived from factors such as military, economic, religious and cultural issues (Brenzinger, Graaf). Many people claim that administration ought to support endangered languages by funding programmes that are dedicated to preserve these languages. But some argue that saving languages at extinction is only the loss of time and money. Further will be discussed whether endangered languages should be protected from extinction or endangered languages should be neglected and people should speak one common language.
First and the most influential argument of supporters of monolingual system are the high financial contributions to multilingual system in the country. If a country has diversity of languages within its borders country spends a lot of money to finance the different education projects, building separate schools, teachers. Because for the country to be prospering and transparent government should treat all the nationalities fairly. This concerns minority language users too. It is not a problem if the matter is five or seven different language. But when it comes to more than two hundred different languages situation becomes unbearable. It means more teachers, more materials, more spending on the same thing but in different language. Money wasted to support endangered languages and spent on the reasons discussed above could be invested other more important facilities in a particular country.
It would be more cost efficient if people within the country used only one language. Government could maintain standardised
Many languages are at the danger of disappearance. The reason of their extinction could be the decrease in a number of people speaking that language. A 85% of 6000 languages appear to be spoken in 25 countries (NOW 2000). Language extinction is caused by external and internal factors. Internal forces such as community’s negative behaviour to mother language, or simply decrease in the number of speakers are mainly derived from factors such as military, economic, religious and cultural issues (Brenzinger, Graaf). Many people claim that administration ought to support endangered languages by funding programmes that are dedicated to preserve these languages. But some argue that saving languages at extinction is only the loss of time and money. Further will be discussed whether endangered languages should be protected from extinction or endangered languages should be neglected and people should speak one common language.
First and the most influential argument of supporters of monolingual system are the high financial contributions to multilingual system in the country. If a country has diversity of languages within its borders country spends a lot of money to finance the different education projects, building separate schools, teachers. Because for the country to be prospering and transparent government should treat all the nationalities fairly. This concerns minority language users too. It is not a problem if the matter is five or seven different language. But when it comes to more than two hundred different languages situation becomes unbearable. It means more teachers, more materials, more spending on the same thing but in different language. Money wasted to support endangered languages and spent on the reasons discussed above could be invested other more important facilities in a particular country.
It would be more cost efficient if people within the country used only one language. Government could maintain standardised
References: NWO Advisory Committee. October 2000. Endangered Language Research an Overview Proposals.The Netherlands http://www.nwo.nl/files.nsf/pages/NWOP_62UJQP/$file/GW%20Programmatekst%20ELP%202004.pdf Tjeerd de Graaf, Matthias Brenzinger. DOCUMENTING ENDANGERED LANGUAGES AND MAINTAINING LANGUAGE DIVERSITY. Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (EOLSS) LINGUISTIC ANTHROPOLOGY http://www.eolss.net/Sample-Chapters/C04/E6-20B-10-03.pdf