Preserving Endangered Languages As An Art Form
The article “Why Do Language Die?” by Noah Tesch reminds me a conversation that I had with a Cherokee when I visited a Cherokee Preservation festival at the Cherokee National Park several years ago. When I asked if they are speaking their native languages, he replied to me that the government requires their younger generations to learn whatever are in the culture of Cherokee, including learning the Cherokee language because their languages are near extinction. Languages are not only a way to communicate, they also represent different culture identity and the extent of human diversity. Different languages contain diverse ideas, therefore, it is an important factor in maintaining a country independent …show more content…
Think about the immigrant children. Although most of them can speak a few of their native languages, their ability is far more below compared to their parents. No more than two generations, their extent on language speaking skill will be as small as that the only sentences they know will be as simple as "hello" and "how are you". This is because they are not surrounded by that particular language environment. Languages exist while they are being used for communications between people, therefore, preserving languages by simply making effort to speak and learn is nearly impossible. Britannica showed a statistic of "about 2,000 of those languages have fewer than 1,000 speakers” among “roughly 6,500 spoken languages” total. I have been traveling with languages other than English and I have also seen children who try to maintain their native languages abroad. Not to mention that I and the others I have seen are trying to maintain widely spoken languages like Chinese, Japanese and Korean. With this few speaker that Britannica mentions, maintaining a language is strongly difficult. Therefore with that being said, preserving languages as an art form would stop a language from disappearing …show more content…
To children, “so speaking that language is key to accessing jobs, education and opportunities.” As Rachel Nuwer mentions in the BBC News, languages are important to parents considering the future of their children. Not only in the developing countries, even industrialized nations like China naturally think learning English builds the road to an international and more successful future. Is it right to stop children from seeking their dream? Wouldn’t it be better to open those languages to public and make it accessible to people all around the world? With such advanced technologies these days, saving words and voices should not be a problem at all. In that way, people from all around the world, no matter how much time it had passed from now, are able to view and learn these
The article “Why Do Language Die?” by Noah Tesch reminds me a conversation that I had with a Cherokee when I visited a Cherokee Preservation festival at the Cherokee National Park several years ago. When I asked if they are speaking their native languages, he replied to me that the government requires their younger generations to learn whatever are in the culture of Cherokee, including learning the Cherokee language because their languages are near extinction. Languages are not only a way to communicate, they also represent different culture identity and the extent of human diversity. Different languages contain diverse ideas, therefore, it is an important factor in maintaining a country independent …show more content…
Think about the immigrant children. Although most of them can speak a few of their native languages, their ability is far more below compared to their parents. No more than two generations, their extent on language speaking skill will be as small as that the only sentences they know will be as simple as "hello" and "how are you". This is because they are not surrounded by that particular language environment. Languages exist while they are being used for communications between people, therefore, preserving languages by simply making effort to speak and learn is nearly impossible. Britannica showed a statistic of "about 2,000 of those languages have fewer than 1,000 speakers” among “roughly 6,500 spoken languages” total. I have been traveling with languages other than English and I have also seen children who try to maintain their native languages abroad. Not to mention that I and the others I have seen are trying to maintain widely spoken languages like Chinese, Japanese and Korean. With this few speaker that Britannica mentions, maintaining a language is strongly difficult. Therefore with that being said, preserving languages as an art form would stop a language from disappearing …show more content…
To children, “so speaking that language is key to accessing jobs, education and opportunities.” As Rachel Nuwer mentions in the BBC News, languages are important to parents considering the future of their children. Not only in the developing countries, even industrialized nations like China naturally think learning English builds the road to an international and more successful future. Is it right to stop children from seeking their dream? Wouldn’t it be better to open those languages to public and make it accessible to people all around the world? With such advanced technologies these days, saving words and voices should not be a problem at all. In that way, people from all around the world, no matter how much time it had passed from now, are able to view and learn these