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>X +B<4C5(&8!IJKL!M#0*#$%#&!NLKK!! &32C)CH)4EG4)2<40)FCI)1<33)200)4E0)3G4024)B0U03C;V0H42)/'!G1-.51.#'!3-!71-.#&!<2)JCH4) 5C302)Z:4E) GHHA[>)3A[[X) (H) Y0H24@J0H4I5F) (4G3FN) 4E0) B0KG40) 5GL02) CH) ]) EC1) 4C) ;50@ - QC1)EGU0)G44<4IB02)4C)VGfC5<4F)3GHLIGL02)K00H)GR@ 205U0) 4E0) 3>X)T0)JCHL5G4I3G40)4E0)H2/+&!"! 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS 'E020)G50)fI24)2CV0)CR)4E0)gI024?@@!A50!B3/,7'!C,,$1,%&-! 4E<2)JCHR050HJ0N)1E! 3-!TMU! CR)3GHLIGL0)50U<4G3:::))%0U03C;)GIB)V<331*#'! ,GK5<03G) #.&)) .CI4E0G2405H) p>>A=))%CJIV0H4G4)&ILI24N)=:>>7)(H)JG20)CR)GJJ0;4GHJ0N)4E0)RI33);G;05) ,G5J:::))\5>7)DCHR050HJ0)) JE03)) - .0;40VK05)>:N)=:>>7)+cJI52?::)) ) )
2/+&!4 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS
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2/+&!Y! 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS R/9/,6./,+1/+&!K1KK&739!$,!H(.)!! *3(-)ZN:::)-GWC4G)2;0GW052)3'0GJE052)GHB)RGJ<3<4G4C52)1050)0HJCI5GL0B)4C)I20)4E0) !C5) G) VG;) GHB) 3<24'E0)R<3V)JCH4>X) 'E0) 4E<5B) 20G2CH) CR) !9@ %Y%2)1<4E)+HL3<2E)C5).;GH<2E)2IK4<4302)G50)GUG<3GK30)RC5) G)R58!144#''#>!(-! 3/E.('*3-(! GHB)$C54E)&V056A) 2I5U::)2;0GW052X)DI550H43F)qCGEH!()! <2)HC)C4E05)205<02)33J 2/+&!8 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS
JGH)G32C)U<01)0cJ05;42)G4)CI5)_CI'IK0)JEGHH037) ) 'CBGF) 4E0) GK<3<4F) 4C) 2;0GW) :9)5I0)Y<330H0IU0)"XN)/CH450G3N)^D))Q=')=*[) !<3V) !0246@=?S@9Z:?) $&$&) *0LN:::) ;0C;30N) 3022CHX)^GgG2GI5GgX)$CIHX)'E0)VCB05H)(HI;NZ::) R3I0H4) 2;0GW052) CR) (HI;SSSX) 2GHB2) CR) 1C5B2) GHB) ;E5G202) R5CV) +HL3<2E) 4C) 4E0) $C54E) MF) =::6N) *C2044G) .4CH0) EGB) 204) I;) GH) 0HBGHL050B@ .3C;0)(HI;:X 1CI3B) 32/+&!`! 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS ~/C24)4F;Z:)G4)p>SZ)) &2) CR) =::AN) 4E0) ;5Cf0J4) 1G2) 0c;0J40B) 4C) JC24) VC50) 4EGH) 0GJEN)E0)2G6) ;05J0H4) CR) 502Z) 2/+&!10 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS
R&a(%/,!<,-(/,!0/,+1/+&!CKK&/3'! \C43G;3*#>! )&($!G1*3-! E$#&341-! ]#&1B>! X&3%J -GHLIGL02)VG:)J0H2I2)JCV;3040B)KF)4E0)$G4)V<33N[::)R004b)G;G54X) ) ) 'E0)9)6>)HG43*#>!)&($!*+#!3->3.#-(5'0#(0B#3''5#'D4($!?#%J'3*#8!KL!W#%J HDG24<3SS=) KF) 20U05G3) ;052CHG3<4<02) R5CV) 4E0) JI34I5G3) GHB) ;C@ 3<4:)V<33'C)K0)024GK3<2E0B)GR405)4E<2)3G1)<2)4E0)$G43.#-(5'!X?##*'/!%B(.'0(*8!?+34+!#-4(5&1.#'!*+#!5'#! ()!'$1BB!B1-.51.#'!(-!X?3**#&D!C-!n!E0&3B!NLKK!*+#!%B(.J 3GHLIGL02)#>!'($#!-#?!$3B#'*(-#'&32C) 4C) K0) RCIHB0B) <2) 4E0) &JGB0V?)H01)3GHLIGL02)4C)4E0)2<40)2) 2I;;C540B) 3GHLIGL02) ~DI3V2/+&!12 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS
- -ILGHBG)) from the historical chronicles of the following period that the Ve- netian language was widely used in the Austrian naval fleet (which - /G;IBIHLIH)) was called "Austro-Venezianische Marine" till the 1848 revolution in - $G1G4a\<;<3)) Venice and the Veneto). In fact, the Venetian language was spoken at - "JJ<4GH)) every level of the naval hierarchy from the humblest mariner to the - \G3GIGH)) admiral in person, as is attested for Admiral Tegetthoff, whose guid- ance and ability brought the proud Venetian marine force to its last - \iI5Ez;0JEG)) glorious victory in 1866. Please note that the enemy fleet brilliantly - *CVGH<)) defeated by this Austro-Venetian naval fleet –whose mariners came - ^G4eEthnologue) and two other self astonished when coming to know that political pressures by Ital- critically endangered languages: Ainu (~15 speakers in Japan), and ian party directions put our regional politicians in check, as they do Nawat (~20 speakers, all older). Thanks to Alan R. King who pro- informally use Venetian language in administration, but they don't vided training data for Nawat and who is responsible for the first think to ask strongly for the formalization of this de facto linguistic couple of tweets in that language. situation because of the veto expressed by the national directions of the parties, because in Italy they hold a very strong power of political We also have a number of new translations. The first round of "life or death" sentence on local candidates. This practice is widely translations came mostly from friends working on the Firefox locali- known, used and even accepted. zation teams. Many of these new translations are directly from members of supported language communities on Twitter: Rumantsch One could think talking of these facts to be off topic in a linguistic (Gion-Andri Cantieni,, Setswana (Sternly Simon,, K!laangi (Oliver argument as this aims to be, but we must bring them to the global Stegen,, Occitan (Maxime Caillon,), Kernewek/Cornish (John Gil- public opinion in order to let the general public realize the political lingham,), Brezhoneg/Breton (Ahmed Razoui, and Nawat/Pipil (Alan stalemate we are in, while our language is suffering. In other words, R. King), We also have a translation into Marshallese from Marco we'd like foreign observers to consider deeply how it could be diffi- Mora, but no tweets in that language yet! cult to request and obtain any substantial and continuing help from local politics in this schizophrenic political environment, which One additional milestone. The site is generated by using a program sometimes leads to contradictory decisions and statements given by that "crawls" Twitter users, grabbing the tweets on their timeline and politicians and also by some academicians who seem to be somehow performing statistical language recognition on those tweets (details to influenced by the general situation all around. come). Then, if a given user has more than a certain fraction of their tweets in the target language, that user's followers are added to a Why do we think it is a language? queue to be checked in the same way. In the last couple of days, the As one could easily imagine, we Veneti think that our language is a initial crawls for Basque and Welsh were completed, meaning all proper language because it is and has always been our mother tongue. languages, with the exception of Haitian Creole, are now complete. This means that we feel emotionally it to be a language, but the ma- Therefore the number of users currently listed for each language jority of Veneti are not given the chance to come to know effectively should represent a good initial estimate of the total user base on Twit- and widely the very reasons why it really is a language, not just a ter. Of course the program will continue to add new users as they are dialect of Italian as many keep saying, and even more keep not dis- discovered by the crawler (through random search queries for words puting. in each language) and as they are suggested via the form on each The Venetian language is the mother tongue of the majority of the language page on IndigenousTweets.com. population of Veneto Region, as it is the one which is learnt in the first place and through the familiar "traditio linguae", and it is thus Haitian Creole is a special case and will remain so. As noted in an the very first language perceived by the foetus in their last intra- earlier post, we expect there are at least 100,000 people tweeting in uterine months. In fact, as statistics report (Istat, 2007) in Veneto Creole and it is unlikely I can keep up with all of them given the Region only the 24% of people declares itself as speaking only Ital- limits imposed by Twitter, but I will do my best. ian in every situation. But it is a mother tongue also for our People collectively, meaning by #&,&7(/,!(,!K&3(.!! this that it has always been the language of Veneti – made, used and passed on to us – since the ‘vulgar’ linguistic era began in Europe. The Venetian language plays a very important role in the whole cul- By Alessandro Mocellin, 7th April 2011 tural identity of Veneti, who are one of the most ancient peoples in Europe, being called with the same name and inhabiting the same territory consecutively for three millennia now. Our language is a When we discuss whether Venetian is a language or not, we should – written testament of a cultural heritage that we have the burden and and most of the time we are used to – preliminarily define what a honour to preserve and continue. language is. The mostly known and referred definition of "language" compared to Switching to more rational reasons, first of all, on a linguistic cate- "dialect" is the famous statement "A language is a dialect with an gory basis, we should observe that the Venetian language is far older army and a navy". That is to say that the difference between a so than Italian. And also, subsequently, we can rationalize that Italian called "dialect" and a "proper language" is just a political one. For language is an artificial one. When the great Dante talked about the our part, we cannot overlook that if this definition is seriously con- Italic ‘vulgars’ in his "De vulgari eloquentia", he recognized the need sidered to every xtent, no one should doubt the Venetian language to to have a common language for all the speakers of a "volgare del sì". be a proper language. Venetian was the language used by everyone in When he defined it as a language to be "illustre, cardinale, aulico, each situation during the long splendour of the Most Serene Republic curiale" with these four adjectives, he did so in a prescriptive – not of Venice, till 1797 (just a couple of centuries ago). We also learn descriptive – way. Dante is widely considered as the father of the 2/+&!@"! 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS Italian language, and he in person gives us the evidence both that the refers to Latin a lot more than Venetian does): words like "carèga", Italian language is artificial and that it is younger than historical Italic "pirón", "sùsta", "catàr", "baùco", find a correpondence in Greek, but languages (such as Venetian, Sicilian, Neapolitan, etc...). not in Italian or Latin (Italian: "sèdia", "forchétta", "mòlla", "trovàre", "stùpido"; English: "seat/chair", "fork", "(metal) spring", "find", This last temporal consideration turns a different light on the concept "stupid"). of "dialect": if the Venetian language (and then also Neapolitan, Si- cilian, Tuscan, Piedmontese, Friulian, etc...) existed before Italian Finally, the lexicon should be separated from the linguistic heritage was spoken, how on earth can it be a local derivation of the of Europe as a whole (so called "Europisms", i.e. those words which "national" Italian? have been created on the basis of Latin and Greek stem-words since Humanism in every field of scientific research: for example: tachy- One could say that Dante wrote at the very beginning of the four- cardia, accelerate, constitution, restoration, nostalgia, atom, &c.). But teenth century, and that it was an early time also in the life and de- the main reason why this exposed theory proves to be not scientific is velopment of Italic ‘vulgars’. But we cannot forget that the first dic- that it leads to adverse results. If you want to reduce Venetian to a tionary of the Italian language of 1612 (printed in Venice, by the simple dialect of the Italian language with this "lexicon theory", way) was itself not a descriptive one, but rather prescriptive: it was a you'll come to the absurd result that even Spanish (Castilian) is a collection of terms and expression of how the Tuscan Accademia dialect of Italian, or that Venetian could be a dialect of Catalan, or della Crusca intended the Italian language should have been written even that Portuguese and Occitan are dialects of Venetian. and spoken: that was not how the Italian language was used. The second argument against language status for Venetian shows a It is important, then, to have a thought about the number of Italian- little more consistency in terms of scientific value. speaking people in the past. The only solid statistic we have is that at the first stages of the Italian political unification (1861-1870), Italian They say that the Venetian language is too varied, as you can find speaking people were 2.5% of the total population (De Mauro): that different words to express the same meaning. In their reasoning, this is no more than 650 thousands in 26 million people. By the way, as would lead to confusion and even to the degradation of the Venetian all Veneti (2.5 million people) spoke Venetian in that period, we language to a dialect, because of its alleged lack of a solid basis of should notice that this means there were roughly four Venetian common terms among the population of speakers. This is true to the speakers to every one Italian speaker in the middle of the 19th cen- extent of direct comprehensibility of the single term, as sometimes tury. there could be completely different terms to name the same thing (e.g. for "snail", "escargot" in French, you could find Ve- The Venetian mentality is mainly practical, rather then theoretical, netian"scióso" or "bogón"). First of all, one should consider this as a and many of us like to stress the fact that Venetian migrants in past proper difference in lexicon only when it involves a complete change times kept their original language (our language) till nowadays. In in the stemword, while classifying other differences to be just pho- Southern Brazil, for instance, there are large communities who speak netic (respectively "sciós" and "bovón"). It is amusing to think that Venetian, some millions of speakers, as some statistics report (it is these are exactly the terms that many Veneti use to name the snail- the so called "Taliàn", which would mean "Italian", but shows evi- like "@" (commercial at) symbol, which was created –as you maybe dent phonetic phenomena which are typical of Venetian: unstressed know – by Venetian merchants as a commercial symbol meaning vowel apheresis and apocope). This overseas vitality is confirmed by "this/these (number) amphora/ae at (money value)". the fact that immigrants in our Veneto (returned rich, as it has always been, with the last economic boom of 40 years ago) still need and Now that the fact that this second argument is partly true as an em- want to learn Venetian even before Italian. pirical observation has been explained, we must ask ourselves whether its alleged consequence is correct. Being more explicit, we Why do they say it is a dialect? find the presence of various terms for the same (or very similar) Maybe the only point where both positions agree on is that the Ve- thing, but does this imply that Venetian is not a language, but a dia- netian language is not the same as Italian. Those who express their lect? First of all we must frankly declare that this doesn't mean that contrast to the idea of Venetian being a language usually ground their Venetian becomes thus a dialect of the Italian language at all (e.g. thesis on the fact that Venetian is not so different from Italian. They why not of Spanish?). Secondly, we should ask ourselves if this lexi- usually consider Venetian to be a dialect of the Italian language be- cal variability is as dangerous as it is said to be. When we study Ital- cause of the large part of the lexicon they have in common. ian and are asked to write a piece, all teachers remind us not to be repetitive while using the lexicon: the Italian language is very rich in Others indicate reasons for Venetian being a dialect in its quite high vocabulary and manners of expression. Every classroom is given a frequency of dyatopic linguistic variation. This would lead, in their vocabulary of synonyms and antonyms. The question you maybe consideration, Venetian not to be a language, but to be "many lan- have in mind is this: "Why does lexical variability represent richness guages" or "many dialects". for Italian while allegedly implying confusion and incomprehensi- Some others, finally, express their reasons in terms of lack of pres- bility for Venetian?" tige, literature or even structure, mainly referring to an alleged ab- For example, the Italian dictionary compiled by the Accademia della sence of literature, solid grammar or proper linguistic tradition. Crusca and printed in 1612 –which was a prescriptive one, as we Why do we say it is a language? have said – listed four terms for the word "rifle": archibugio, fucile, schioppo, stioppo. These four terms are made up from three different The first typical thesis against Venetian (i.e. "it has too much in stem-words, as "schioppo" and "stioppo" are just phonetic variations common with Italian in terms of lexicon") should be labelled as sci- of the same term (please notice that "stioppo" was used only in some entifically inconsistent, or even not scientific at all. parts of Tuscany, but its prescribed use must be framed in the Aca- demic will to keep Italian as “Tuscan" as possible). First of all, the bare comparison of lexicon operates a dangerous re- duction of the linguistic phenomenon to words (or, better, to stem- So, which is the real criterion in perceiving lexical variation in Italian words). A language is certainly made up by stem-words, but it also differently from Venetian or Sicilian or Neapolitan? We may observe needs proper phonetics, morphology and syntax to be considered a that it's just a matter of schooling. We are naturally Venetian speak- complete linguistic code, being able to express complex meanings ers and scholarly Italian speakers, because we have invested (will- and communicate thoughts. ingly or not) tens of thousands of hours sitting on a chair and listen- But even accepting this canon as a valid criterion, in the case of Ve- ing or reading at school or for school (thus learning new words) in netian we find it in contrast with the widely known linguistic rela- the Italian language. For example, a Venetian speaker would say in tionship between vulgar Greek and vulgar Venetian. Some Venetian Venetian "strucàr" for "press", but the same person would use words do come from Greek, rather than from Latin (while Italian "prèmere" while speaking Italian. It will take a series of readings and 2/+&!14 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS listenings for the Venetian speaker to come to use the Italian (Tus- these two contradictory arguments in order to attack the language can) synonym "pigiàre", and the competence in its use would prob- status of Venetian! ably be just passive (i.e. understood when reading and listening), without entering in the daily use of the Veneto who speaks Italian, Finally, the third argument is that of an alleged lack of prestige and who feels that term as lexically alien to its linguistic domain in Ital- literature. This is plainly false as you just think about Venice and the ian. Most Serene Republic, which is remembered and evoked as the long- est republic ever (exactly 1100 continuous years): there are several Also in this case, though indirectly, a reductive vision of the nature of publications collecting and describing the use of Venetian in thou- language is present. sands of pieces of law, politics, trials and diplomacy. Regarding lit- erature you could only think about Ruzante, Goldoni, Baffo, Ca- Those who refer to this second argument keep considering language sanova, Boaretti, Fontana, Noventa, Zanzotto, Meneghello, and many as just a series of words. If this was true, linguistic competence could many others... Then, we should think that the prestige of a language rely on the memorization of a dictionary, rather than on direct speech also comes from important persons who were Venetian speakers: it'll of mother tongue speakers. be enough just to name Marco Polo, Caboto, Pigafetta, Bellini, Ti- But even accepting this argument, one should remember that oppo- tian, Giorgione, Tintoretto, Veronese, Canaletto, Bassano, Tiepolo, nents previously said Venetian is easily understood by Italians in Guardi, Canova, Palladio, and many many others. Well, we have to general, but this is not empirically justified in terms of lexicon, as the say that if ever they existed, Romeo and Juliet would also have Italian noun for "scióso" is "chiocciola", so it is completely different spoken Venetian. and etymologically not comparable: Italian speakers won't under- Given that this alleged absence of prestige and literature is false, we stand it easily. should think about why these additional factors are required for Ve- In reality, when we extend our view to the linguistic experience ne- netian but they were not when in 1999 the Italian Parliament recog- cessarily as a whole, we can find some characteristics of Venetian nized as proper languages some "former dialects" of Italic origin: that strongly differ from Italian in phonetics and syntax particularly, Friulian, Sardinian and Ladin. Ladin language, for example, didn't but also in morphology. and doesn't have any prestigious literature, nor the representation of a If the Italian schooling system is widely known as scarcely profes- State or any important person speaking it: in reality, it used to be only sional in terms of teaching languages (particularly foreign ones) it used orally, and the written tradition was near to zero; it is spoken by could be because of this general vision which considers ancient Latin some tens of thousands of people and varied as much as Venetian and Greek as "perfect languages". This leads the whole system in the varies diatopically (even more if we consider the very small number direction of theorically considering and practically teaching lan- of Ladin speakers). How on earth can it be that if Ladin is a formally guages as if they were like Latin and Greek, i.e. as if they were dead recognized language, then Venetian is not? languages. There is also another important factor to be analyzed in order to A deeper and more open-minded observation of Venetian makes us form a complete vision. Language is somehow the written testament aware that while finding those differences we noted from the Italian of a cultural heritage, as we said before. language, we have actually found those characteristics which are in common among all localized variants Venetian language (what is This means that an autonomous culture would be mirrored by a cor- correctly called "dialect", e.g. "Padoàn" is the dialect of Venetian respondently autonomous language. As we are interested in the au- language spoken in Padua and its neighbourhood). In fact, once we tonomy of language in this piece, we should point out some interest- have understood that what is different between Venetian and Italian ing peculiarities of Venetian that reflect an autonomous development is what nearly all variants of Venetian have in common, we have thus of Venetian society. proven, beyond any reasonable doubt, both that Venetian is different from Italian and that Venetian is one language, though naturally and For example, while nearly every European language names the days inevitably varied. of the week adding an enclitic "-day" in English, "-tag" in German, "- dì" in Italian (and so on), Venetian does not. Actually, we just find At this final stage, anyway, we must consider that those two argu- the name of the astrological planets from Monday to Friday, the ments against the Venetian language did not actually need to be con- Hebrew "Sabbath" for Saturday and the Christian day of the Lord trasted individually, as they are contradictory to each other. In fact, ("dominus" in Latin) for Sunday. So we do say: "lùni, màrti, mèrcore, while it is firstly said that Venetian is not so different from Italian zóba, vènare, sàbo, doménega" (moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, (this is based on the alleged comprehensibility of Venetian by every Venus, Sabbath, Sominica; please note the Venetian -eg- form in Italian speaker), on the other side many use the second argument in "doménega" instead of -ic- form of Latin "domìnica" and Italian order to degrade Venetian to a dialect because of its diatopical vari- "doménica"). ation, which, they say, makes a Veronese speaker incomprehensible to a Belumàt (speaker from Belluno), a ‘Venicean’ to a Paduan, and so on (we can use the term "Venicean" to tell the difference between Another interesting cultural phenomenon is the feminine surname, as Venetian as spoken in Venice and Venetian as spoken in the Veneto in Russian. In fact, Venetian language and culture use the surname as collectively). an adjective: for example the surname "Sartór" (meaning "Taylor", a typical job surname like "Munàro" for Miller and "Fàvaro" for You have probably felt the incompatibility of those arguments: their Smith) can be declined as an adjective to define one woman as "la combined acceptance would lead to the nonsense of a Venetian Maria Sartora", one man as "Marco Sartor", two sisters as "le sorele speaker being easily understood by Italian speakers but not by other Sartore" and the family as a whole in masculine plural form "i Sar- Venetian speakers. How can it be that a Milanese can easily under- tori". stand the Venetian language (as the first theory states) while Paduan speakers of Venetian won't understand Veronese speakers of Ve- Finally, an orthographic note: the Venetian language has some typi- netian (as the second theory says)? cal characteristics that make the use of the Italian graphic system impractical and confusing: for at least seven centuries Venetian writ- This inconceivable contradiction seems to be in the range of the at- ers have been on a process to synthetize a way to write Venetian tempt of finding any possible allegation, with no rationalized idea of correctly and as phonemically as possible. That's why in Venetian the resulting messy argumentation. "This is what I need to say: please you could find a written "X" which is not to be read as /ks/, but as a find me out some reasons why I'm right if I think so". Please note that /z/, and in fact sometimes it is also written as a "Z". The verb "xe" (= it happened that the same person in different situations used both he/she/it "is") must be read /ze/ (and in fact some prefer writing it as "ze"). This "rule" is valid for every other word with that X or Z: ga- 2/+&!@L! 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS Zette; Zaleti (typical biscuits); Zustinian, Zonta, Xausa (surnames); E-6(-#!?3*+!`5#'*3(-'!1%(5*!W&3'31-!.&1$$1&!1->!*+#! doXe (Doge). 5'#!()!*+#!B1-.51.#!41-!#3R#!13>!)&($!*+#!G1-.51.#! Some detractors could then say: "as you see, there are different cos- 7#'2D!X+#!7#'2!1-'?#&'!`5#'*3(-'!1%(5*!'0#BB3-.8!0+&1'J tumes also in the way to write it". We should ask them to remember this suggestion of theirs when they say the Venetian language is not 3-.! (&! *#&$3-(B(.6! 1->! 41-! .3R#! 1>R34#! 4(-4#&-3-.! *+#! vital or that it is perceived as useless: a language which is a matter of 4($0('3*3(-!()!W&3'31-!*#Q*'D!X+#!G1-.51.#!7#'2!3'!'0#J strong contrast is by this only reason a vital language, just as well as 431B3[#>! 3-! *&1-'B1*3-.! *#Q*'! 4(-*13-3-.! *#4+-341B! *#&$'! only living people can have fever. 3-*(! W&3'31-! :#D.D! -(*1&31B! 14*'8! ())3431B! 1->! *#4+-341B! >(45$#-*'AD! O-)(&$1*3(-! 41-! %#! (%*13-#>! 1%(5*! 0B14#! o=>3*(&/'!-(*#8!)(.-!.#(.&10+34!-1$#'8!4($05*#&! *#&$3-(B(.68! *#&$3-(B(.6! 3-! '0#431B! 1'8! '54+! 1'! )(&! C1'73/.(/]!(,-(+&,$1'!./,+1/+&! 3-B1->!'+3003-.8!4*3(-!()!-#?!?(&>'8!#*4D!! 3&G(G/.!(,![\b!'%8$$.'!! ! X+#! E)r2! 3'! :$13-B6A! )5->#>! %6! *+#! &#.3(-1B! .(R#&-J $#-*D! O*! +1'! '#R#&1B! 4($$#&431B! 4(5-*#&01&*'8! )(&! 3-J 'E0)d-! 3-! *&1-'B1*3(-! 1->! B3-.53'*34! &#'#1&4+! 3)/G5JE)=:>>)CH)4E0)!7EX!X#2'*%5ž!'0#J 3G5GGF) 3GHLIGL0) 40GJE! 3-! 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2/+&!16 30 April 2011 Newsletter of Foundation for Endangered Languages OGMIOS
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! F%0#).!'&(#L&=&'!1/!&08#(!N#$!CGHO!'&*8;(2!)I2#)$P! Currency and total sum ! F%0#).!'&(#L&=&'!1/!I).2! o I enclose a cheque in £ sterling payable to “Foundation for Endan- ! gered Languages”. BAustralia, New Zealand, South Africa, Japan, S. Korea, Hong Kong, Singapore, Taiwan, Israel, Saudi Arabia or Arab Emirates, Ice- land, Norway, Switzerland or European Union. ! 3 “Voluntary body” includes university departments and charity organisa- tions, “Official body” includes government departments. !
!+-)/GHAt this point in human history, most human languages are spoken by exceed- 1.3. The Need for an Organization ingly few people. And that majority, the majority of languages, is about to vanish. We cannot stem the global forces which are at the root of language decline and loss. The most authoritative source on the languages of the world (Ethnologue, Gordon 2005) lists just over 6,900 living languages. Population figures are But we can work to lessen the ignorance which sees language loss as inevi- available for just over 6,600 of them (or 94.5%). Of these 6,600, it may be table when it is not, and does not properly value all that will go when a lan- noted that: guage itself vanishes.
56% are spoken by fewer than 10,000 people; 28% by fewer than 1,000; and We can work to see technological developments, such as computing and 83% are restricted to single countries, and so are particularly exposed to the telecommunications, used to support small communities and their traditions policies of a single government. At the other end of the scale, 10 major lan- rather than to supplant them. And we can work to lessen the damage: guages, each spoken by over 100 million people, are the mother tongues of almost half (49%) of the world’s population. • by recording as much as possible of the languages of communities which seem to be in terminal decline; More important than this snapshot of proportions and populations is the out- • by emphasizing particular benefits of the diversity still remaining; look for survival of the languages we have. Hard comparable data here are and scarce or absent, often because of the sheer variety of the human condition: a • by promoting literacy and language maintenance programmes, to small community, isolated or bilingual, may continue for centuries to speak a increase the strength and morale of the users of languages in dan- unique language, while in another place a populous language may for social ger. or political reasons die out in little more than a generation. Another reason is that the period in which records have been kept is too short to document a trend: e.g. the Ethnologue has been issued only since 1951. However, it is In order to further these aims, there is a need for an autonomous international difficult to imagine many communities sustaining serious daily use of a lan- organization which is not constrained or influenced by matters of race, poli- guage for even a generation with fewer than 100 speakers: yet at least 10% of tics, gender or religion. This organization will recognise in language issues the world’s living languages are now in this position. the principles of self-determination, and group and individual rights. It will pay due regard to economic, social, cultural, community and humanitarian considerations. Although it may work with any international, regional or local Some of the forces which make for language loss are clear: the impacts of Authority, it will retain its independence throughout. Membership will be urbanization, Westernization and global communications grow daily, all ser- open to those in all walks of life. ving to diminish the self-sufficiency and self-confidence of small and tradi- tional communities. Discriminatory policies, and population movements also take their toll of languages. 2. Aims and Objectives
In our era, the preponderance of tiny language communities means that the The Foundation for Endangered Languages exists to support, enable and assist majority of the world’s languages are vulnerable not just to decline but to the documentation, protection and promotion of endangered languages. In extinction. order to do this, it aims:
1.2. The Likely Prospect To raise awareness of endangered languages, both inside and outside the communities where they are spoken, through all media; There is agreement among linguists who have considered the situation that over half of the world’s languages are moribund, i.e. not effectively being To support the use of endangered languages in all contexts: at home, in educa- passed on to the next generation. We and our children, then, are living at the tion, in the media, and in social, cultural and economic life; point in human history where, within perhaps two generations, most lan- guages in the world will die out. To monitor linguistic policies and practices, and to seek to influence the ap- propriate authorities where necessary; This mass extinction of languages may not appear immediately life- threatening. Some will feel that a reduction in numbers of languages will ease To support the documentation of endangered languages, by offering financial communication, and perhaps help build nations, even global solidarity. But it assistance, training, or facilities for the publication of results; has been well pointed out that the success of humanity in colonizing the planet has been due to our ability to develop cultures suited for survival in a variety of environments. These cultures have everywhere been transmitted by To collect together and make available information of use in the preservation languages, in oral traditions and latterly in written literatures. So when lan- of endangered languages; guage transmission itself breaks down, especially before the advent of literacy in a culture, there is always a large loss of inherited knowledge. To disseminate information on all of the above activities as widely as pos- sible. Valued or not, that knowledge is lost, and humanity is the poorer. Along with it may go a large part of the pride and self-identity of the community of for- mer speakers. And there is another kind of loss, of a different type of know- ledge. As each language dies, science, in linguistics, anthropology, prehistory and psychology, loses one more precious source of data, one more of the diverse and unique ways that the human mind can express itself through a language’s structure and vocabulary.
We cannot now assess the full effect of the massive simplification of the world’s linguistic diversity now occurring. But language loss, when it occurs, is sheer loss, irreversible and not in itself creative. Speakers of an endangered language may well resist the extinction of their traditions, and of their lin- guistic identity. They have every right to do so. And we, as scientists, or con-
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