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Currently, there are nearly 7,000 languages being spoken worldwide. However, due to aging populations and globalization’s English-only emphasis, a language dies out every 14 days. At this rate, nearly half the world’s languages will vanish in 100 years. Very often, these languages are lost without any record: no clues about pronunciation, let alone grammar or vocabulary.
In this report, Gregory D.S. Anderson, director of Living Tongues, explains why the world’s languages need to be preserved. Also, Margaret Noori, director of the comprehensive studies program and lecturer in the Native American Studies Program at the University of Michigan, discusses the challenges of keeping languages alive.
Living Tongues unveiled eight talking dictionaries of languages that are currently facing extinction last week.
(Image: Living Tongues Global Languages record native speakers of a little-known language in a remote part of India. (Youtube))
(Source: thetakeaway.org)
