Language Endangerment Research Paper

1. Degree Of Language Endangerment

In terms of the degree of their viability, languages of the world constitute a continuum, with fully thriving ones at one end and extinct ones at the other. Various terms—both adjectival and nominal—have been proposed to characterize this continuum. Some of the terms may be arranged as in Fig. 1.

Consider Schmidt’s (1990, p. 54) terms and their characterizations.

(a) Healthy languages: all generations actively use the language in a wide range of activities.

(b) Weakening languages: usually spoken by old people, but not fully transmitted to the younger generation.

(c) Dying languages: only a few speakers remain. (d) Extinct languages: no speakers remain.

The use of the terms as proposed in Fig. 1 is as follows. Endangered languages comprise weakening/ailing and dying/moribund languages. Language decline and language obsolescence concern both groups of endangered languages, while language death and language loss refer to dead/extinct languages. The term ‘language endangerment’ is for the general subject.

2. Current State Of Language Endangerment

The gravity of the current state of language endangerment can be seen from the following reports of selected areas.

In Australia, of the 250 languages spoken at the time of the first British colonization in 1788, about 100 are alive, mainly spoken by old people, and only about 20 are being passed on to children (Dixon 1991, pp. 235–36). In the USA and Canada, there must have been many hundreds of languages at the beginning of the sixteenth century, but only 187 have survived, and 149 of 187 are moribund (Zepeda and Hill 1991, p. 135, Kinkade 1991, p. 158, Krauss 1992, p. 5). In Russia, 45 of 65 indigenous languages are moribund (Krauss 1992, p. 5). In Africa, nearly 200 languages are endangered (Sasse 1992, p. 7).

To sum up, Krauss (1998, p. 103) estimates that, of 6000 languages of the world, only 5–10 percent are ‘safe,’ and 40 percent up to 75 percent are weakening, and at least 20 percent to perhaps 50 percent are moribund. Krauss (1998, p. 105) then forecasts that, if current trends are not reversed, during the next 150 years the number of languages is likely to be reduced to as few as 300.

3. Two Approaches To Language Endangerment

One approach is to document endangered languages. This is the most important thing to be done about them, and it is the most urgent task of linguists. Ideally, such documentation should include grammars, vocabularies, and texts stories, employing audio and video recording. The other approach examines the process of language endangerment, in terms of (a) its causes, (b) its sociolinguistic aspects, and (c) structural changes (Sasse 1992). These three aspects of language endangerment will be considered in the following three sections.

4. Causes Of Language Endangerment

Language endangerment is caused by multiple factors, such as those listed below. They are all closely interrelated, and are often difficult to separate from one another.

(a) Dispossession of the land by invaders for settlement, farming, etc.

(b) Decline or loss of the population, caused by (i) natural catastrophes, e.g., volcanic eruption, earthquakes, (ii) diseases imported by invaders, e.g., venereal disease, smallpox, measles, influenza, and (iii) violent acts, e.g., massacres, genocide.

(c) Relocation of the people away from their traditional land.

(d) Socioeconomic oppression, by economic deprivation, discrimination, etc.

(e) Low status of the language, accompanied by ridicule, stigma, shame, etc.

(f ) Assimilation policy, language policy by the government, e.g., (i) ban on the use of the indigenous language at schools, and (ii) placing children in boarding schools, which separates the children from their home environment and interrupts the transmission of the language.

(g) Switch to modern life, e.g. (i) schooling where the dominant language is used to the exclusion of the minority language, (ii) introduction of mass media, such as TV, and (iii) improvement of transport.

(h) Religion. For example, with the spread of Islam, Arabic replaced many languages of the Middle East and north Africa.

(i) Mixture of speakers of different languages, e.g., in boarding schools and reservations, where people were often forced to speak the dominant language, such as English, as a lingua franca.

( j) Language attitude. For example, if old speakers consider their language as an invaluable treasure, they may prefer not to transmit it to the younger generation for fear that the latter, who have often been westernized and ‘modernized,’ may not treat it with due care and respect (Schmidt 1990, p. 20).

5. Sociolinguistic Aspects Of Language Endangerment

If a minority language and a dominant language coexist in one community, often they are used in different functional domains. Such functional differentiation is shown in Table 1. Needless to say, these domains are all closely inter-related; most of them are self-obvious. Consider the following examples.

(a) In Paraguay, Paraguayan Guarani and Spanish show a functional split, roughly as follows (Rubin 1972). If the location is rural, then Guarani will be used. If the location is nonrural, then Spanish will be used in a formal setting. In a nonformal setting, Spanish will be used if the speakers are not intimate. Between intimates, Guarani will be used if the discourse is not serious. If the discourse is serious, then the speaker may use, for instance, his her first language or the language the hearer is estimated to be the more proficient in. Paraguayan Guarani has secured its position in this stable bilingualism, and consequently it is not endangered. It is the only native language of South America that is not endangered (Adelaar 1991, p. 73).

(b) Nahuatl of Mexico was used as an ‘inside’ language, and Spanish as an ‘outside’ language. This functional split has then developed into the ‘solidarity–power’ split: Nahuatl functioning as a marker of ethnicity and as a language of solidarity, as against Spanish, which is now a language of power, used to express ambition and mobility (Hill 1983, pp. 265–66).

(c) A minority language is often used as a secret language, for talking about something secret or private in the presence of outsiders.

Now, if the bilingualism in a given community is stable, with the two languages exhibiting a functional differentiation, then the minority language has a chance of survival, as is the case with Paraguayan Guarani. However, in most cases the functional range of the minority language diminishes, while that of the dominant language increases, with the result that the people shift from the minority language to the dominant language. (This phenomenon is called language shift.) When the language shift is completed, the minority language is extinct.

6. Structural Changes In Language Endangerment

6.1 Dyirbal Of Australia

As a language is endangered and nears its demise, it undergoes structural changes, in phonology, morphology, syntax, semantics, lexicon, and speech styles, among other features. See Language obsolescence. Most such changes appear to be in the nature of simplification and reduction. Opinions differ, however, as to whether it is possible to generalize about structural changes in language endangerment. In the following, just one case study will be presented, namely, Schmidt (1985) on Dyirbal of northeast Australia. Due to the space limitation, only a very small portion of Schmidt’s brilliant work can be cited. (TD refers to the traditional Dyirbal, and YD (young Dyirbal) refers to varieties of Dyirbal that deviate from the traditional norm.)

6.2 Phonology

One of the interesting changes concerns r-sounds. TD has an opposition of retroflex r and trill rr; consider the minimal pair of yara ‘man’ and yarra ‘fishing line.’ English has no such opposition. Now, in YD, this opposition is maintained, but it is maintained only in minimal pairs; elsewhere this opposition is not adhered to consistently, and speakers are not certain whether to use r or rr.

6.3 Morphology

One of the issues Schmidt examines is the ergative case, and it will be useful to provide a brief introduction to the phenomenon of ergativity.

Ergativity is a phenomenon in which the intransitive subject (S) and the transitive object (O), are treated alike, in distinction from the transitive subject (A). This pattern is called an ergative–absolutive pattern. It contrasts with, for example, a nominative–accusative pattern, in which the S and the A are grouped together, separately from the O. Ergativity may be manifested at various levels in grammar, e.g., morphology and syntax.

In TD, in terms of case-marking morphology, nouns, adjectives, etc. have an ergative–absolutive pattern, with the S and the O in the absolutive case and the A in the ergative case, e.g., (a), (b), while firstand second-person pronouns have a nominative– accusative pattern, see Table 2. (The ergative case does not occur in ‘familiar’ languages, such as English.)

 (a)      nguma-Ø         banaga-nyu.

father-ABS(S)            return-NONFUT

‘Father (S) returned.’

(b)       nguma-Ø         yabu-nggu                  bura-n.

father-ABS (O)           mother-ERG (A)                    see-NONFUT

‘Mother (A) saw Father (O).’

In TD, the ergative suffix has six allomorphs, including -nggu for disyllabic vowel-final stems, e.g., yabu-nggu ‘mother-ERG,’ cf. (b); -gu for trisyllabic or longer vowel-final stems, e.g., girimu-gu ‘snake-ERG’; -ju for y-final and ny-final stems, e.g., walguy-ju ‘taipan (snake species)-ERG’ and binyjirriny-ju ‘lizard-ERG’; and, -du for n-final stems, e.g., midin-du ‘possum-ERG.’

Schmidt shows that, among YD speakers, this morphological complexity was gradually reduced as a given speaker’s proficiency in TD diminished, to the point where one single suffix, -gu, was used for all stems, irrespective of their stem-final phoneme. There were even less proficient speakers, who did not use an ergative suffix at all, and instead relied on word order, more specifically, on the English-type word order in a nominative–accusative pattern, in which the S and the A occur before the verb, and the O after the verb. (In TD, word order is free; syntactic function is indicated by case affixes of NPs.)

(c)       gugar   buga-bi-n.

goanna            dead-INTR.VERBALIZER NONFUT

S          V

‘The goanna is dead.’

(d)       gugar   baja-n              ban jugumbil.

goanna            bite-NONFUT                                    her woman

A         V                     O

‘The goanna bit the woman.’

6.4 Syntax

TD exhibits a rare phenomenon called syntactic ergativity. Due to the space limitation, a highly simplified account will be given below (for details, see Dixon 1994, pp. 160–72). Consider:

(e)       nguma-Ø         yabu-nggu

father-ABS (O) mother-ERG (A)

bura-n banaga-nyu.

see-NONFUT return-NONFUT

‘Mother (A) saw Father (O) and [Father (S), not Mother] returned.’

It is important to stress that (e) does NOT have the meaning of the English sentence (f ):

(f ) Mother (A) saw Father (O) and [Mother (S), not Father] returned.

That is, in English, the understood S refers to the A and not the O; the S and the A are treated alike, in distinction from the O. In contrast, in Dyirbal, the understood S refers to the O and not the A. That is, in Dyirbal, the S and the O are grouped together, separately from the A, in complex sentences as well. This phenomenon—the grouping of the S and the O, separately from the A, in complex sentences—is called syntactic ergativity. It is rare among the world’s languages.

Now, Schmidt shows that the use of syntactic ergativity, too, was on the decline among YD speakers.

6.5 Lexicon

Schmidt’s study indicates that certain areas of the vocabulary were prone to loss. They include (a) types of animals and trees, e.g., ‘ironbark,’ ‘bottlebrush,’ (b) culture-specific items, e.g., ‘yamstick,’ ‘fighting ground,’ and (c) kinship terms for which there is no corresponding term in English. However, there were also areas of the vocabulary that were resistant to borrowing, such as (d) human body, e.g., ‘hair,’ ‘tooth,’ ‘eye,’ (e) human classification, e.g., ‘man,’ ‘woman,’ ‘child,’ and (f) well-known animates, e.g., ‘carpet snake,’ ‘black bream.’

7. Language Maintenance And Revival

There are many attempts to maintain or even revive languages (see Fishman 1991). The types of these programs include the following.

(a) Language classes. For example, more than a dozen Ainu language classes for Ainu people are conducted in Japan.

(b) Bilingual education. In Australia, for instance, a number of schools are conducted using the local Aboriginal language and English.

(c) Language immersion program. An environment, e.g., preschool, is provided in which children will only hear and speak the language. The most successful and best-known is ‘the language nest’ program for the Maori language of New Zealand.

(d) ‘Neighborhood method.’ A most drastic example is a group of eleven families in Belfast, who—in order to create a cohesive community— bought houses in the same neighborhood in the middle of an English-speaking community in Belfast, and raised their children as bilinguals (in Irish and English) (Maguire 1991).

Factors that contribute to the success of a language maintenance program include the following. (i) Determination and often even sacrifice on the part of the community (cf. (d)). (ii) Government support, e.g., funding. (iii) Good documentation of the language. (iv) Availability of human resources, e.g., teachers, and advice from experts. (v) Land/area where the people concerned can live together (cf. (d)), preferably away from speakers of the dominant language. (vi) Existence of just one language for maintenance, as is the case with Maori of New Zealand. In contrast, language maintenance is much more difficult in Australian Aboriginal communities, where often several languages are spoken. (vii) Existence of a sufficiently large number of speakers. (viii) Inclusion of cultural activities, e.g., music, dance, handcraft. (ix) Tolerance of language change, as against linguistic purism. Attempts to preserve a ‘pure’ language may hinder the language’s maintenance by discouraging non fluent speakers from speaking it.

8. Value Of Linguistic Heritage

As seen above, a large number of people are making efforts, with dedication and determination, to revitalize languages in danger. Why is it important to do so? What appear to be three representative and interrelated views are cited below.

(a) ‘Community view’: ethnic identity. In this view, language is one of the most central components of a given group’s culture. Their language is the symbol of their ethnic identity, expressing their culture in terms of worldview, ceremonies, songs, kinship terms, etc.

(b) ‘Global view’: linguistic diversity. This view maintains that linguistic diversity is important to human intellectual life. Minority languages often exhibit phenomena quite unimaginable if our attention were limited to, say, English. An example is syntactic ergativity of Dyirbal. With the death of minority languages, these aspects of rich cultural heritage of mankind die.

(c) Language rights. In June 1996, the draft of the Universal Declaration of Linguistic Rights was proclaimed at the World Conference on Linguistic Rights in Barcelona. The declaration is based on the principle of the equality of all peoples and all languages, and considers the following, among others, to be an inalienable human right:

(i) the right to use one’s own language, and

(ii) the right for one’s own language and culture to be taught.

The concept of language rights is no doubt one factor that motivates the community view, cited above, although the members of the community may not always be conscious of it.

9. Organizations

There is now an increasing number of organizations devoted to endangered languages, e.g., Endangered Language Fund; Foundation for Endangered Languages; Society for Endangered Languages; and Terralingua.

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