Language Extinction: The Importance Of Keeping The Language Intact

Throughout history, there have been a great variety of languages, generating a unique identity in each society; allowing the establishment of a relevant difference between the cultures, customs and traditions of each population. Establishing a language permits the development of a community, accessing the different benefits that can be generated through communication. “Language is considered a system of phonetic and written symbols that allow expressing ideas, feelings and different situations among diverse people worldwide.” This communication system is the essence of life in society, since it establishes a unique ideology that represents people or a population anywhere; but unfortunately many of these languages in small communities will disappear over time, due to many internal and external factors that do not allow the continuation of a language from generation to generation. From examining the different situations facing languages in extinction, it is stated that verbal expression is an important tool in the development of a society, but due to many causes its durability is not possible; however, there are some solutions that allow sustainability or even the recovery of extinct languages.

Language is a fundamental means that permits interaction with other people, through the expression of feelings and opinions. “It is a natural code of humanity, which generates effective communication with others, forming social bonds and adequate team life.” Verbal expression is of vital importance in the development of people because it allows expressing the essence and identify of each individual. “The dialect shapes thoughts and emotions, determining the perception of reality.” Language is like a history museum, because it lets to identify unique features of each culture, the way in which a population lives and the diverse traditions of ancient generations, which through dialectal can continue to exist for a long time; obtaining the opportunity to express all the knowledge acquired and disseminate it to future communities.

Another of the great importance of language is the ability to establish critical thoughts through the cognitive process of the human being. “Cognitive abilities are those in which the human mind allows the correct processing of information across memory, allowing constituting an understanding and analogy of language.” This process is possible, thanks to the variety of languages in the world, for the reason that it permits the acquisition of multiple knowledge in the people. “While there is a smaller variety of languages in the world, the lower the possibility of learning about the human mind.” This is why it is so important to support the diverse languages around the world, since they help the rapid development of a population.

Ancient legends, as in the case of “The Tower of Babel”, express that “in ancient times there was only one language in common among the various communities of the world, but, because of the arrogance and hostility of humanity in lack of belief in a true God, the population was punished with the confusion of dialects.” This is a belief of the ancient residents, where the first possible cause of the diversity of languages around the world is expressed. But today, many of these idioms have been disappearing, due to external and internal causes of a society. “When humanity loses a verbal expression, it also loses the opportunity to find greater potential in diversity of art, music, literature and traditions, which make a unique community from a different one.” Many of the small populations are more vulnerable to losing their linguistic authenticity, due to the pressure they experience when a large or more powerful group is presented with a completely different language and culture. A clear example of this situation is in “Greenland, where its official idiom was “Kalaallisut”, but due to the increase in immigrants, this population is forced to abandon their linguistic, ethnic identify and culture.” However it is not only the pressure of the civilization that generates this situation, but also the government, as in the case of turkey, who are prohibited by law from speaking or formally teaching their native language “Kurdish”. This situation means that the support of many languages is not possible and their disappearing is quick.

However, there are some solutions that generate the recovery of a language endangered or already extinct. This is the case of “Kiowa”, a language that disappeared in Oklahoma in the 1970s, but that for reasons of technological research and collection of old data, linguistic recovery was achieved thanks to the support of the students of the University of Miami in Ohio. Another solution is the evolution of a native language over time; an example is “Ancient Greek”, which slowly evolved into “Modern Greek”; allowing the support of the idiom for other generations.

In conclusion, the conservation of a language is of vital importance for the development of a country, since it allows establishing different perceptions of humanity, enhancing the knowledge of each person. In addition, the different native languages, agree that a population has the ability to learn diverse cultures from the old communities, generating in the human being, a global opinion of the importance of respect for people and the learning capacity that would be had with a greater cultural diversity. The preservation of a language in a community permits the enrichment of awareness in each person, generating the sharing of diverse opinions, cultures, beliefs and traditions from generation to generation.

Bibliography

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• Strochlic, Nina. “The Race to Save the World’s Disappearing Languages” Last modified April 16, 2018, http://www.nationalgeographic.com/news/2018/04/saving-dying-disappearing-languages-wikitongues-culture/
• Woodbury, Anthony. “What Is an Endangered Language?” Last modified, 2019, http://www.linguisticsociety.org/content/what-endangered-language