Tag Archives: language loss

Module 3: Post 1: Inuktitut Language Decline

This website is an article written by the Toronto Star regarding Nunavut’s hopes to preserve language and culture. Inuktitut, the Inuit language is the most widely spoken Aboriginal language spoken in Canada. It is protected by the Official Language Act, allowing it to be taught in the schools. However, despite this title according to Statistics Canada Inuktitut language is in decline. There are less people who speak Inuktitut as a mother tongue and less people who can speak Inuktitut in a conversation from just two years ago.

After the watching the video, A Step Forward, students express their feelings and worries about language loss. These are some common themes in regards to language decline in the article and from the interviews:

– Inuktitut is not taught after primary grades.

-It is not commonly spoken between friends.

-There are not many teachers available who can speak Inuktitut fluently.

-Many students can understand grandparents speak but feel too shy to respond back in speaking.

In order to preserve this language and culture, there are many changes that need to happen so that young students continue speaking Inuktitut until adulthood in everyday conversations.

http://www.thestar.com/news/canada/2013/09/02/nunavuts_battle_to_preserve_inuit_languages.html

Module 2:5 – Terralingua

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http://www.terralingua.org

Terralingua is a group of academics and activists who study biocultural diversity – diversity of plants, animals, and nature as well as cultures and languages – and work towards building awareness of the importance of maintaining it. The Downloads section under the Publications tab has interesting articles such as “Biocultural Diversity & Sustainability”, and “Indigenous and Traditional Peoples of the World & Ecoregion Conservation Booklet.” There is also a link to a book co-published by the WWF, UNESCO, and Terralingua called Sharing a World of Difference: The Earth’s Linguistic, Cultural and Biological Diversity (2003). Their work is focused on educational initiatives, policy development, and documenting biocultural diversity.

Module 2:4 – Murder that is a threat to survival

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http://www.theguardian.com/education/2001/mar/22/tefl3

In looking for something to post about ethnobotany or linguistic genocide, I came across this short and simple Guardian newspaper article by Tove Skuttnab-Kangas. To quote from the article:

“threatened languages store the knowledge about how to maintain and use sustainably some of the most vulnerable and most biologically diverse environments in the world. It has taken centuries for people to learn about their environments and to name the complex ecological relationships that are decisive for maintenance of biodiversity. When indigenous peoples lose their languages, much of this knowledge also disappears: the dominant languages do not have the ethno-biological and ethno-medical vocabulary, and the stories will not be translated.”

Skuttnab-Kangas says that just as the loss of biodiversity is a threat to our survival, so is the loss of linguistic diversity—monocultures are vulnerable. The author claims that the biggest weapon we have against linguistic genocide is to enshrine rights to education in the mother tongue much more strongly throughout the world than is currently practiced, and also to raise awareness about the great risks of language loss.