UNESCO’s International Mother Language Day will be celebrated on 21st February with the theme of 2019 as “The International Year of Indigenous Languages”. But why are rare and local languages so important? Why should we work so hard to keep these languages alive?
Fighting to keep these languages alive helps to preserve a community’s culture and traditions. Many tribes and communities were formerly identified by the language they spoke. The issue these languages face is that many of them are solely spoken languages, so it is difficult to find written records of these languages, except possibly songs and stories. Preventing these indigenous languages from becoming extinct will hold onto the history of these areas and the speakers’ own sense of identity. By promoting these languages, they can grow and begin to be learnt formally.
Furthermore, the existence of local languages helps other languages to evolve and expands our vocabulary over time, for example, we have borrowed numerous words from North American indigenous languages such as “Moccasin”, “Moose” “Pecan” and “Skunk”.
To hold onto these languages, we need to change the world’s opinion of rare languages. Rather than them being seen as pointless, they need to be seen as an asset. Many people may believe it is more worthwhile and more than enough to speak a global language such as English, but being bi-lingual has proven benefits, such as increased mental ability and concentration, enhanced communication skills and the prevention of brain-related illnesses etc. By turning our backs on local languages, we risk moving towards a monolingual world.
References
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_English_words_from_indigenous_languages_of_the_Americas
