UNIVERSIDADE NOVA DE LISBOA

FACULDADE DE CIÊNCIAS SOCIAIS E HUMANAS

ADVANCED ENGLISH AND LANGUAGE ANALYSIS I

VANESSA BOUTEFOU

Language death
Why should we care?

Marta Cunha Ferreira

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 Language Death: why should we care?

Introduction

Ever since we were little children, our parents, grandparents, uncles and aunts, teachers
and members of our community told us of the importance of saving diversity,
specifically biodiversity. We were told that animals and plants were God’s creatures
and, as so, we should protect them. In school, we were taught that everything in life is
connected. From the river that springs from the mountains top to the smallest insect in
the other side of the world, everything is linked together, and when one thread of this
mesh is broken we all lose something precious, a world treasure. For an environment to
be rich and strong, diversity is crucial. Thus, when I was just a little girl I knew that
endangered species were a serious issue. The loss of any animal or plant species would
mean diversity loss and therefore the weakening of the environment where I lived in.

Curiously enough, I don’t recall anyone ever mentioning the problem of endangered
languages and language death. Telling people that a language somewhere in Africa has
just died does not have the same impact as saying that the giant pandas are extinct. In
the last case people would probably be moved and sad. They would gather around a
field of bamboo (if there was still any) and light up candles in memory of the poor
animals. In the first case, however, they would probably continue their daily lives as if
nothing had changed (actually, that is exactly what they do).

In this essay, I will show how important it is to protect language diversity, as it is to

safeguard biodiversity, and why a monolingual world would not be a better place to live
in. Taking into account the most recent researches on this subject, I will attempt to
answer, as clear and precise as possible, these questions: “What is language death?”;
“How many languages exist in the world and how many of them are endangered?”;
“How can we know if a language is endangered?”; “Why do languages die?”; “Why
should we care?” and “What can we do to prevent it?”.

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 Language Death: why should we care?

What is “language death”?

The obvious answer would be that a language is dead when there is no one speaking it
anymore. In Crystal’s words, “A language dies only when the last person who speaks it
dies. One day it is there; the next it is gone.” (Crystal 1999b:56). In order to fully
understand this notion of “one day is there; the next is gone”, here is a passage of Bruce
Connell’s report on his fieldwork in the Mambila region of Cameroon’s Adamawa
province in 1994-95:

(…) I came across a number of moribund languages. (…) For one of these languages,
Kasabe (…), only one remaining speaker, Bogon, was found. (He himself knew of no
others). In November 1996 I returned to the Mambila region, with part of my agenda
being to collect further data on Kasabe. Bogon, however, died on 5th Nov. 1995, taking
Kasabe with him.

However, it can be argued that a language is already dead even if there is still one living
speaker. If the only left speaker of a language, like Bogon, has no one to talk to, then
the language has no use at all. In 2000, in “Language Death”, Crystal explains this same
idea: “For a language is really alive only as long as there is someone to speak it to.
When you are the only one left, your knowledge of your language is like a repository, or
archive, of your people’s spoken linguistic past (…) the moment the last speaker of an
unwritten or unrecorded language dies, the archive disappears for ever.”(Crystal
2000:2). Bogon was the living archive of Kasabe. However, since his language was
never studied and recorded, the archive was lost when he died. Thus, it would be fair to
say that, in a way, language death is or can be (as we will see later when dealing with
the reasons for language death) concomitant to human death.

How many languages exist in the world and how many of them are endangered?

It is really hard to give a precise number of languages that are now spoken all over the
world because, firstly, not all languages have already been discovered, every now and
then a new language is inserted in the Ethnologue 1, and secondly, there’s the problem of
what do we mean by language, as opposed to dialect. (Crystal 2001:6) Linguists have
come up with many numbers ranging from 3,000 to 10,000 languages. The number
most agreed on is 6,000 languages (Crystal 2000:4; Krauss 1992:5; Trudgill 2000:191).

1
Ethnologue: Languages of the World is a web and print publication which is the most comprehensive
and accessible existing language catalog published by SIL (Summer Institute of Linguistics) International.

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However, in the last edition of the Ethnologue (2009), SIL estimated that there are
6,909 languages in the world.

The number of endangered languages is also quite debatable. Besides being problematic
to pinpoint an exact number of languages in the world, there is also the difficulty of
assessing with certainty their viability. Most linguists say that half of the world’s
languages will be dead by 2100 (Crystal 2000; Krauss 1992). Less optimistic experts
say that 90% will be extinct in the next century. If we take into consideration the
number of languages in the world as being 6,000, and agree with the idea of 50% of
them being in danger of dying by 2100, we are talking about 3,000 languages which
will probably be lost in the next century. In David Crystal’s words:

According to the best estimates, there are some 6,000 languages in the world at the
moment. And of these, about half – some say more, some say les – are going to die out in
the course of the next century. The relevant deduction is sobering: 3,000 languages, in
1200 months. That means, on average, there is a language dying out somewhere in the
world every two weeks or so. (Crystal 1999a)

How can we know a language is endangered?

Logic tells us that a language with a small number of speakers is due to be in trouble but
that is not always the case, for it depends, for example, on the isolation of the
community or on the pressure felt by other dominant languages near it. Crystal
(2000:11) argues that “population figures without context are useless” However, most
of us wold agree that a language that has less that 100 speakers is in a quite precarious
condition. But how can we be sure that a language with many speakers is safe either?
Crystal gives the example of Yoruba, a language spoken in West Africa, that though
being spoken by 20 million speakers “has been called ‘deprived’ because of the way it
has come to be dominated by English in higher education” (Crystal 2000:13).
Therefore, in a world were 4% of the world languages are spoken by 96% of the world’s
population (Crystal 1999a), is any language really safe?

Crystal established that, though it is practically impossible to understand if a language is

safe or not, it is still necessary to try to establish levels of danger in order to prioritise
our attention and efforts. He establishes three levels of endangerment, based on a few
factors such as rate of acquisition by the children, the community’s attitude to it and the
level of impact of other dominant languages that may be threatening it. A language can
be safe, endangered or extinct. To these three levels, Krauss adds a fourth level -

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moribund: which is a language that is no longer being taught as mother-tongue to

children and, therefore, is “already doomed to extinction” (Krauss 1992). Another
notion linked to language endangerment is “deprived” (Crystal 2000:21), which is a
language that has lost its place in educational, political and other public situations
because of the use of more dominant languages as lingua francas, as it happens with
many indigenous languages in Africa. Crystal (2000:20-21) also mentions that there are
at least three more classifications by three other linguists: Kincade (1991), Wurm
(1998) and Bauman (1980) 2.

Having all these varied notions and taxonomies with different definitions 3 can be quite
problematic when it is necessary to create a framework of reference for endangered
languages in order to distinguish between a language that is already doomed to fade
away and one that is still viable. (Crystal 2000:93)

All being said, the best way to recognize if a language is safe, endangered, moribund or
already extinct is by understanding the factors that lead to the death of a language.

Why do languages die?

Usually, language death is a very slow and uneven process. Mufwene (2004:204)
defines it as a “protracted change of state” meaning that it is a process of community
loss of competence in language which “does not affect all speakers at the same time nor
to the same extent”.

Crystal stated, in an interview for New Routes in 2001, that there are mainly three
reasons why a language dies: physical damage to the speakers, hostility against
individual languages and globalisation/assimilation.

The first reason which has to do with physical damage to the community of speakers
can be triggered by many problems. Disease is the most known cause for the
extermination of a lot of indigenous tribes in the colonial period. Natural disasters, such
as earthquakes and tsunamis, or even famine and drought, can also lead to the extinction
of a community. Language death by genocide can be another cause though it is quite
2
For further information on these classifications see: Kindale, M. (1991) The decline of native languages
in Canada. Robins and Uhlenbeck (eds), 157-76; Wurm, S. 1998, Methods of language maintenance and
revival, with selected cases of language endangerment in the world. Matsumura (ed.), 191-211; Bauman,
J. (1980) A guide to issues in Indian language retention, Washington: Center for Applied Linguistics
3
The same term can be found with various definitions in different research papers. There is no
agreement on the terminology yet.

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rare. (Mufwene 2004:204) All these problems deal with the disappearance of the
community which inevitably means the loss of their language and culture.

Nevertheless, a language can die even if their speakers are still alive. The two other
problems pointed out previously by Crystal - hostility and globalization/assimilation -
can be grouped under this issue. The “active antipathy to individual languages and
cultures” (Crystal 2001) can be seen, for example, in the ethnic rivalry in Africa. This
hostility against a language can lead to language shift, forced or voluntarily, and can be
promoted, for example, by government laws prohibiting the use of that language.

“Globalisation and assimilation of one culture within a more dominant culture” (Crystal
2001) is assigned by many other linguists including Krauss (1992) Hale (1992), Trudgill
(1995:192-193) and Mufwene (2004), as the main reason why languages are dying.
Languages like English, Chinese, Spanish and Arabic are pointed out by Crystal (2001)
as rising languages that pressure other minority or minorée 4 languages (Mufwene 2004),
crushing them with their dominant status.

Crystal (2000:78-80) established three stages that lead to the assimilation of a dominant
language by a community of a minority or minorée language:

− The first stage is when the dominant language pressures the community in all areas:
economic, political and social, with the help of the media and mainly through television,
which Krauss (1992:6) has brilliantly labelled as “cultural nerve gas”. Other ways of
pressuring the community to adopt the dominant language is done in form of
“incentives, recommendations, or laws introduced by a government or national body”
(Crystal 2000:78) but it can also be done through peer pressure and trends.
− The second stage is when the community adopts the dominant language as a second
language – “a period of emerging bilingualism” (Crystal 2000:79). People can speak
both languages well but, in time, the old language gives way to the new one, taking this
process to the third stage.
− The third stage is when the community has fully adopted the dominant language,
leading to an assimilated monolingual community.

4
“(…) important distinction made by French Linguists between langue minoritaire (minority language)
and langue minorée (undervalued and/or marginalized language)-. The latter need not be spoken by a
minority population” (Mufwene 2004:206)

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The first stage, Crystal (2000:79-80) states, is hard to prevent, and when the community
gets to the third stage nothing can hardly be done. So the problem is in the second stage,
when the community is still bilingual, which means that people are proficient not only
in their mother tongue but also in the dominant language. What happens during this
period is what leads to the third and quite irreversible stage.

The community adopts the dominant language because with that language they can have
more and better opportunities to thrive in this all new global world. Negative feelings
against their mother tongue start to emerge especially within the younger generations,
such as shame of their origins and lack of self-confidence when using their native
language. The new language is more attractive. It gives them the idea of belonging and
helps them fit in better and feel less marginalized. Thus, they start to believe that the
new language and culture they are adopting has the prestige that theirs hadn’t. Basically,
it all comes down to stereotyping, where minority and minorée languages are seen as
“ignorant, backward, deformed, inadequate, or even (…) a creation of the devil”
(Crystal 2000:84) by the dominant cultures that instil these same ideas onto the
dominated ones. As Trudgill (2000:193) states, “people abandon the language which is
the repository of their culture and history and which has been the language of their
community for generations because they feel ashamed of it”. In the end, the dominant
culture is completely assimilated by the community and their language is less and less
used until there is just one remaining speaker, like Bogon. In that moment that language
reaches the point of no return and the archive is doomed to be lost forever.

Why should we care?

There is nothing abnormal about a language dying out. Languages have been dying
throughout history. (Crytal 2010:21; Hale 1992:1; Mufwene 2004:212) They have come
and gone. The problem is that right now there are just too many languages going and a
lot less coming. “What is different about the modern situation, however, is the speed
and the extent of language shift which (…) is leading to complete language death, the
total disappearance of languages from the world” (Trudgill 2000:192) We have already
seen that 50% of the world’s languages are due to be dead by 2100, which means that a
language is dying every two weeks. These numbers are quite alarming. Even so, there
are people that would argue that a monolingual world would be actually better. These
advocates of the monoglot millennium base their opinion in the idea that

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multilingualism was a curse brought down by God 5 and they believe that a monolingual
world would mean peace and less misunderstandings.

Crystal argues that this view is quite wrong if we take into account that many
monolingual countries have had their share of civil wars, such as Cambodia, Vietnam,
Rwanda and Burundi. As Crystal stated in his interview to New Routes, “If people want
to kill each other they’ll do so regardless of the number of languages they speak”. Peace
is not possible through a unique world language but through mutual respect.

“If you want a peaceful world, one of the first things you have to do is pay attention to
people’s rights within society, and to their identities as communities – and the chief
emblem, or badge of a community is its language. A sensitive policy of multilingualism,
and a concern for minority languages [and here I would also include minorée
languages 6] – there are much more likely to lay the foundation for peaceful and mutually
beneficial coexistence.” (Crystal 1999a: 3-4)

But then again, which arguments support a multilingual world, as opposed to a

monolingual one? Referring again to Language Death by David Crystal (2000), there
are five main reasons why we should care if a language dies.

1. “Diversity is essential”. As stated previously, an environment is stronger if it is

more diverse and though this would be a biological argument it can also be used to
argue for language diversity in a way that any ecosystem is “a network of
interrelationships” between all living creatures. Language is part of our human
ecosystem, as it is culture and art and any other social activity. Any damage to one of
these elements could result in “unforeseen consequences for the system as a whole”
(Crystal 2000:32-3);
2. “Languages express identity”. As the beautiful Welsh proverb that Crystal
enjoys so much says “A nation without a language is a nation without a heart”. And
this is quite true. It is impossible not to link our language to our national feelings of
patriotism. “Language is the primary index, or symbol, or register of identity”
(Crystal 2000:40) We tend to be quite passionate about our language because it
makes us feel as righteous members of a community.
3. “Languages are history treasures” or in Emerson’s (1844) words “language is
the archives of history”. Our culture can be captured through language not only
through our proverbs and idioms but also by the loan words and influences that can

5
The Babel tower: for further information read Genesis 11:1-9, Bible
6
This is my own comment on Crystal’s quote.

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be found from other languages, which tells much of our past history. Taking
Portuguese as an example, this language evolved from Latin, since Portugal was part
of the Roman Empire, but there are also some words that were added to its lexis after
the Arabic invasions. Other words were borrowed from French and English, with
whom Portugal established political and economic relations. This is just an example
of how history can be engraved in a language. Those who have their language written
down are lucky enough to be able to preserve their ancestry and history, but those
whose language has not yet been recorded have much to lose when it disappears.
“Languages contribute to human knowledge.” Hale (1992b:36) stated that “The
loss of local languages, and of the cultural systems that they express, has meant
irretrievable loss of diverse and interesting intellectual wealth, the priceless products
of human mental industry.” There is so much that can be learnt through other
languages. There is so much knowledge compressed in them. “To lose a language is
to lose a unique insight into the human condition. Each language presents a view of
the world that is shared by no other. (…) we can learn from the way in which
different languages structure reality, as has been demonstrated countless times in the
study of comparative literature.” (Crystal 1997:44) The world’s heritage can be
found in the multiplicity of cultures that language is able to decode. Crystal (1999a)
highlights the knowledge that we can take from other languages such as medical
treatments from indigenous medical practices or the different visions and perceptions
of the world that surrounds us. Understanding this multiplicity of perspectives,
through other peoples languages and cultures, is the key to worldwide tolerance and
peace.
4. “Languages are really fascinating in themselves.” This is obviously a good
argument for the linguistics community but there are many areas of human studies
that can benefit from the knowledge that language studies provide too. Language
studies enable us to comprehend how human language faculty develops and how our
brain works. Every language has their system of grammar, phonology and lexis.
Understanding how these systems work and how people learn them is essential for
the success of human studies. Thus, “with every language that dies, another precious
source of data about the nature of the human language faculty is lost” (Crystal
1999a:3).

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What can we do?

There are two main different actions that can, or rather, should be taken. One is
preservation and the other one is revitalization of the language.

The first can be achieved through recording, documenting and developing writing
systems in order to retain the language in texts or audio/video, which Mufwene
(2004:208) refers to as “museum artifacts”. Though it might not sound much,
sometimes preservation is the only thing that can be done for moribund languages, those
which are doomed to die. If Connell (1997) had been able to at least record and
document Kasabe before Bogon’s death, the language would still die with him but its
features would remain “fossilized” in Connell’s notes. Thus, even though Kasabe would
not be taught and learnt, it could still be studied and appreciated by linguists.

Revitalization is quite another story for it depends on other factors besides linguistics
fieldwork. It is not just recording and documenting the language, it means giving a new
life to that language, to revive it, make it healthier and, subsequently, safer. To achieve
revitalization, i.e. to actually save a language, Crystal (2001:7) indicates that there are
three main factors.

First of all, the community must be interested in revitalizing their language. (Crystal
2010:22) One would believe that they would all want this. However, most linguists have
encountered communities who are not interested at all. The dominant language is so
attractive and gives them more economic, social and political benefits that they don not
see why they should care about reviving their “backward” language. What can a linguist
do in such cases? Should they just leave it to them to decide: their language, their loss?
As seen above, it is not just a matter of losing a local language; it is about losing
cultural and intellectual diversity with every language that dies out. In this tough cases
Crystal (2001:6) suggests that linguists should try to show to the community the
importance of maintaining their language alive and let them know that multilingualism
is not something bad and they should not be ashamed of their origins.

Nonetheless, if the community is struggling to survive, if their physical welfare is in

peril, they lack food, water, medicines and jobs or they are in the middle of military
conflicts, civil disturbances and political oppression; it is understandable that language
will not be their first priority. (Crystal 1999b:59) To give the language a new life we

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need a living community first. Maybe then, when the community is well-fed and
healthy, they ‘will want to look at the “quality” of their lives, not just its “quantity”. At
that point they will want to revive their cultural traditions and language” (Crystal
1999b:59) But if the language is dead by then, it may be too late. So, in these cases,
preservation should be the first step for the latter revitalization of the language.

Secondly, the government and national bodies need to be interested in the revival of
these endangered languages. “No language will survive unless there is sympathy from
on high – I mean national government in terms of the constitution, offering safeguards
to the community, local government interest, school structures, and so on and so forth.”
(Crystal 2001:7) Unfortunately, not all governments are committed to endangered
languages revitalization for fear that the minority groups will be given more power
through their campaigns and initiatives. However, occasionally “a responsible
government, responding to the legitimate demands of its indigenous and ethnic
populations, accepts as a proper part of its program the establishment of instruments and
institutions designed to promote the development and use of the local languages under
its authority.” (Hale 1992a:3)

The third thing needed is expertise. This is where not only linguists come in but also
teachers and other experts in the field of language studies. There is need for people to
study and document the language, analyse its systems, write grammars and dictionaries
and create materials so that the language can be taught to younger generations in order
to save it from dying out.

We should not only be documenting these [endangered] languages, but also working
educationally, culturally, and politically to increase their chances of survival. These
means working with members of the relevant communities to help produce pedagogical
materials and literature and to promote language development in the necessary domains,
including television. And it involves working with communities, agencies, and, where
possible, governments for supportive language planning. Where necessary (…) we must
learn from biologists ad conservationists the techniques of organization, monitoring and
lobbying, publicity and activism. This we must do on local, regional, national, and
international scales” (Krauss 1992:9)

There is a fourth factor Crystal talks about and this is probably the one that influences
most decisions on the matter of organization of campaigns and planning initiatives for
the revival of languages: money. Basically, it all comes down to it. Preserving and
reviving a language has its expensive costs. Crystal (2000) does the maths:

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[Taking into account the costs of ](…) A basic (A-level) grammar and dictionary,
assuming two years of work by one linguist., (…) a salary, fees for indigenous language
consultants, travel, equipment, accommodation, publication of the findings, and the
provision of basic facilities for revitalization (…) the development of an audio-visual
archive, and a wider range of publications and teaching materials (…) a figure of
£40,000 (c. $64,000) a year per language cannot be far from the truth. It we devoted that
aount of effort over three years for each of the 3,000 [languages that will die out by 2100
unless we do something] (…), we would be talking about some £360 million (c. $575
million). That may seem like a lot of money; but to put it in prespective, it is the
equivalent to just over one day’s OPEC [Organization of the Petroleum Exporting
Countries] oil revenues (in an average year). (p.95)

It is, thus, a priority to raise funds so that the revitalization of endangered languages is a
feasible achievement. The problem is that people are not aware of the importance of
preserving and reviving endangered languages. This lack of awareness can only be
fought back through “giving [endangered languages] a higher profile with the public,
which means making maximum use of the media, and devising appropriate publicity
campaigns.” (Crystal 2000:96) As endangered species are such a hot topic in the media,
so should endangered languages, in order to raise awareness to the problematic situation
we are living regarding language death. Here, foundations and organizations also have a
primordial role. Organisations such as the Foundation for Endangered Languages, the
Committee on Endangered Languages and their Preservation (CLEP), the Endangered
Languages Institution and the Summer Institute of Linguists, just to mention a few, are
working towards the preservation of moribund languages and the revitalization of those
which are endangered but still salvageable. Still, the work has just begun and there is
still much to be done in order to prevent these 3,000 languages from dying out.

A practical example: the Mirandese language

Mirandese is a Romance language, dating at least since the formation of Portugal in the
12th century. It is spoken in a small area in the northeast of Portugal; in Miranda do
Douro, Mogadouro and Vimioso municipalities. When first “discovered” by José Leite
de Vasconcelos, a Portuguese philologist, archaeologist and ethnographer in 1882,
Mirandese was treated as a dialect. In the Spanish and Portuguese 1930’s dictatorships
all minority languages and dialects were under pressured by this “one country, one
language” policy. (Terao 2010:13). Nevertheless, Mirandese survived, though spoken
only by a small number of speakers.

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It was only after the 1974 revolution and the entry of Portugal into the European
Community in 1986 that Mirandese started to be acknowledged as a language in its own
merit and on 17 September 1998, with the law 7/99 of 29 January 1999, the Parliament
of the Portuguese Republic finally legally recognized Mirandese as a co-official
language of Portugal. (Terao 2010:1) Mirandese was catalogued by the Council of
Europe as a ‘regional and minority language’, having into account its demographical
condition and its small number of speakers.

A 2007 article revealed that though 60% of adults were speaking Mirandese, only 2,8%
of young people used it. (Pinto 2007). In the same article, Aurélia Merlan, a researcher
at the University of Konstanz, in Germany, as cited by Pinto (2007), stated that
“Actualmente, o mirandês ainda tem uma certa vitalidade, mas nos últimos 20 anos,
deixou de ser transmitido como língua materna, correndo o perigo de desaparecer e ficar
apenas como uma língua estudada nas escolas”

As an endangered language, pressured by our modern life, television, Portuguese and

Spanish languages, a few measures were taken in order to protect it, such as teaching
Mirandese in elementary schools of the area, publishing books in and about Mirandese,
investing in the study of Mirandese in portuguese investigation centers and creating
online sites in Mirandese (eg: Biquipédia, Photoblog and Wordpress). Through these
measures, Mirandese not only grew in number of speakers (according to UNESCO
(Moseley, 2010), there are now a few thousand speakers of Mirandese) but also drew
attention to its importance, which means more investments for studying, teaching,
developing and nurturing it as a language of Portugal, part of Portuguese cultural
richness.

A diversidade linguística e cultural é uma riqueza para Portugal, integrante da nossa

identidade. (…)Pela língua se exprimem culturas, tradições, saberes e modos de viver
que são essenciais ao equilíbrio das sociedades e ao bem estar dos cidadãos. (…) Se o
mirandês desaparecer ninguém ganha nada com isso, mas Portugal, os portugueses e,
dentre estes, os mirandeses ficam mais pobres.(…) o mirandês e a cultura mirandesa
assumem-se também como um importante valor económico, que importa ter em conta
numa região que está em profunda depressão económica e em acelerado processo de
desertificação. Pelo facto de falarem outra língua, os mirandeses não são menos
portugueses que os outros, como o demonstra a sua história, nem nunca quiseram ser
outra coisa senão portugueses. Hoje os mirandeses continuam a ser bilingues e a sua
afirmação do mirandês não implica a negação do português. Defender, promover e
desenvolver a língua mirandesa é um dever de cidadania que se impõe, nomeadamente a
todos os mirandeses. (Ferreira 2006)

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Conclusion

Aryon Dall'Igna Rodrigues, as cited in Crystal (2000:45), states that “The world is a
mosaic of visions. With each language that disappears, a piece of that mosaic is lost.”
This is a very deep observation that makes me wonder: what if my language was
endangered, doomed to be lost in oblivion with all its knowledge and beauty? Would an
English or French or Portuguese speaker feel indifferent to the loss of their language,
the loss of their piece of the mosaic? Wouldn’t they argue that their language was
important in order to understand our world and appreciate its multiplicity? If our
languages are part of a mosaic, each and every piece of it is equally important in order
to create the beautiful patterns of cultural and intellectual diversity.

All being said, it is quite clear that we should care about language death as much as we
care about the death of animal and plant species. The loss of any of these reduces our
planet’s diversity and wealth, being it biological, cultural or intellectual. (Crystal
1999b:58; Hale 1992a:1; Krauss 1992:8; Trudgill 2000:192). Therefore, it is our duty as
human beings to work towards a better and healthier world, so that the future
generations will not accuse us of “Neronically fiddling while Rome burned.” (Krauss
1992:8)

To conclude with Crystal’s (2010) wise words:

“(…)predicting the future of a language is difficult, for it is to predict the political and
economic future of the planet. The only safe policy is: be prepared – which means
valuing and fostering a multilingual ethos. The more languages we know, the more
powerful we will be on the world stage.” (p.22)

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 Language Death: why should we care?

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