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Vasilisa Lozovskaya

Academic Writing, Advanced English

November 1, 2023

Major Assignment 1 Prospectus

Why preserve language diversity?

The relationship between different languages has always been a vital characteristic of the

history of humanity. The concept of language diversification may be traced back to none other

than the Old Testament. Genesis 11:1-9 narrates about The Tower of Babel, construction of

which was aimed to reach the heavens and glorify its builders. The Lord frowned upon such

impudence and suppressed any further initiative of the people by confusing their language, so

they could not understand one another, resulting in people being scattered around the earth. This

Biblical story of Babel might be suggestive of the idea that proliferation of languages in the

world was a punishment imposed on humanity. However, some may believe that this was not a

penalty at all, but the greatest blessing, since it led to the emergence of diverse, rich, vibrant

cultures.

The actual statistics regarding the number of existing languages and the number of their

speakers reveal that the current situation in the linguistic world happens to be confirming God’s

original plan for a single language for all people. Nowadays, as some linguists estimate, the

observable pattern is that half of the world's population is prone to speaking one of the twenty

most prevalent languages, each with over 50 million speakers, however, most languages are

spoken by less than 10,000 individuals. Ethnolinguistic diversity, according to Michael Krauss,

used to be represented by 12,000 languages as the average estimate for the largest number of

languages in the world at any time in human history, but today only approximately 6,000
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languages exist (Krauss, 1992, par.5). Linguists say with confidence that in the following

decades between 50% and 90% of all world languages will go moribund (Austin, Sallabank,

2011, p.25). Evidently, a characteristic attribute of our time is the acceleration of the process of

extinction of languages, which is mainly associated with globalization. Globalization is

frequently regarded as an establishment of a homogeneous society. Is it a good thing, not only

from a religious, but also from a sociolinguistic point of view, that we're moving toward a future

in which everyone speaks one of a few large languages? Does not humanity lose something

important when it leaves behind minor languages and operates via those few large ones? The

disappearance of languages is not an exceptional feature of modern times. Languages have

always been born, developed, died, or changed into other linguistic forms. Some skeptical

thinkers might suggest that language loss, like species loss, happens to be an inevitable part of

life in a world that is constantly changing, thus preserving a language is rather unreasonable. Is

the impulse to "save" minor languages only a sentimental delusive idea promoted by academics

who want to immortalize the traits of isolated peoples who have not experienced the frantic push

toward globalization or also an essential part of government’s policy?

This linguistic controversy progressively becomes more acute with further disappearance

of languages, and it would be valuable to revise the opinions of various people contributing to

the polemic.

Some might argue that having one common language instead of the multitude of tongues

may be a way to improve international economic relations. As Alexandre Chemla, a student of

bilingual environmental studies program at the University of Ottawa, asserts, “The reality is that

in order to buy from or sell to a business partner from another country, you need to communicate

effectively and accurately. Thankfully, a global language eliminates the communication barrier,
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promoting greater international trade and opportunities for economic growth.” (Chemla, 2021,

par. 4.) He exemplifies his judgment with data collected on such an indicator as Language

Barrier Index, which gauges the divergence between the given language and the language of

trading partners, and concludes that bilateral trade is significantly hindered by linguistic

constraints, in particular, trade flow between two nations can drop by 7% to 10% for every 10%

increase in the Language Barrier Index (Chemla, 2021, par. 5). Relying on this evidence, the

author suggests that opting for one common language in the modern world is advantageous as it

levels up the playing field, in essence, creates an equal environment for people to find common

ground.

Chemla is responding to a general conversation whether language uniformity is beneficial

to society and is on one side of the spectrum with the belief that uniformity in language is

beneficial, but on the other side there is an example of how economic efficiency has been

achieved without compromising language diversity, which could add to Chemla’s viewpoint a

few new dimensions and provoke further debate. It is a government policy carried out by Lee

Kuan Yew, Singapore’s Prime Minister in 1959-1990, who by virtue of effective reforms

elevated the country from third-world to the first-world. In his book of the same name, he

recounts the history of the country during his time in office and explains how Singapore came to

use English rather than any other national language as a tool for integrating the country into the

world context, “When we [Singaporeans] formed the government in 1959 we decided on Malay

as the national language, to prepare the way for merger with Malaya. We realized English had to

be the language of the workplace and the common language. As an international trading

community, we would not make a living if we used Malay, Chinese, or Tamil. With English, no

race would have an advantage.” (Lee, 2000, p.146) However, Lee Kuan Yew admitted that
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immediate modifications could not be executed because the matter of switching languages was

too delicate for the multilingual society. It would have been devastating to declare that everyone

had to learn English at a time when each race living in Singapore was deeply and fervently

attached to its own mother tongue. Thus, they maintained the status quo of having English,

Chinese (Mandarin), Tamil, and Malay as the four official languages. Lee Kuan Yew and the

government recognized the significance of the mother tongues to each of the communities, in

essence, marked them as cultural and identity symbols of high value. This historical move

elucidates that linguistic diversity is an asset of a nation, which should be preserved for the sake

of people’s cultural and mental well-being.

While Lee Kuan Yew refers to language multiplicity as a principle of cultural wholeness

in the national context, there is another prism, through which this multiplicity might be viewed

that was well enunciated by Rachel Nuwer in the article “Languages: Why we must save dying

tongues”. In particular, she regards it as in the scope of the accumulated volume of knowledge,

both cultural and scientific, which can be passed on to the future generations if documented

thoroughly. Nuwer affirms that “languages are conduits of human heritage…language itself is

often the only way to convey a community’s songs, stories and poems.” The author asserts that

languages exist in the realm of their speakers, therefore they mirror every object, phenomenon,

action, practice, ritual, tradition, and folklore piece. Nuwer appeals to Peter Austin, a professor

of field linguistics at the University of London, who inquires on the matter, “How many other

traditions are out there in the world that we’ll never know about because no one recorded them

before the language disappeared?” (Nuwer, 2014, p#12) This question reminds us that the more

languages disappear, the more bits of information are missing to complement people’s

perception of the world. Moreover, deepening this thesis, Nuwer refers to the co-founder of
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nonprofit Living Tongues Institute for Endangered Languages and chairman of Swarthmore

College's linguistics department, David Harrison, who claims, “No culture has a monopoly on

human genius, and we never know where the next brilliant idea may come from.” (Nuwer, 2014,

p#15) Harrison, by that metaphor, might imply that every language has a distinctive mission of

conveying special clues to the overall picture. Author’s reasoning comes down to the conclusion

that preservation of linguistic diversity is crucial for a greater understanding of the world as each

language has a lot to offer.

Following this logic with missing languages equating to missing bits of information,

Anastasia Riehl in her article “Why Are Languages Worth Preserving?” explains another nuance

of a language's disappearance that extends beyond the loss of specific facts, or ideas and

perspectives expressed in language structures and vocabulary that are unique to one language.

(Riehl, 2019, par. 20.) She states that language is a component of the puzzle that helps us

identify how language functions in the mind. This knowledge, according to Riehl, advances

language teaching techniques and therapies for communication disorders. Language production,

comprehension, and recall tasks in psycholinguistic experiments provide insights into the way

the mind arranges information. Furthermore, the author points out that language exploration

stimulates technological innovation, in particular, enhancement of artificial intelligence. (Riehl,

2019, par. 26.) Comprehension of different languages “gives us a window into cognition”, in

other words, every language might be considered as evidence of a complex brain work that is to

be studied. The author navigates readers to the conclusion that language diversity motivates these

future studies, which will contribute to the academic world.

The polemic around the impact of language diversity shrinkage is a prerogative not only

of economists, politicians and scholars, ordinary people also appear to take an interest in it,
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which leads to a conclusion that the issue is rather omnipresent. In addressing the outcomes of

switching to the global language, people on social media have pointed out such a possibility as

language exams like IELTS and TOEFL becoming redundant (Srinivasan, 2019). The author

implies that with the oblivion of numerous languages, obstacles for entering a new language

environment become diminished as everyone is raised in this setting and the need for verifying

your level of language fades away since everyone becomes competent at speaking the global

language, thus maintaining the linguistic diversity is rather odd.

References

Austin, Peter K., and Julia Sallabank, “Endangered Languages,” Part. In The Cambridge

Handbook of Endangered Languages, 25. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,

2011. doi:10.1017/CBO9780511975981.

Chemla, Alexandre. “The Advantages and Disadvantages of a Global Language,”

Government of Canada, July 26, 2021. https://www.noslangues-

ourlanguages.gc.ca/en/blogue-blog/langue-internationale-global-language-eng#.

Genesis 11:1-9 New Revised Standard Version, Anglicised.

Krauss, Michael. "The World's Languages in Crisis," Language 68, no. 1 (1992): 4-10.

https://doi.org/10.1353/lan.1992.0075.

Lee, Kuan Yew. “Many Tongues, One Language,” In From Third World to First: The

Singapore Story - 1965-2000, 145-146. New York: HarperCollins, 2000.

Nuwer, Rachel. 2014. “Languages: Why We Must Save Dying Tongues,” BBC. June 6,

2014. https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20140606-why-we-must-save-dying-

languages.
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Riehl, Anastasia. “Why Are Languages Worth Preserving?” Sapiens. November 8, 2019.

https://www.sapiens.org/language/endangered-languages/.

Srinivasan, Vishnupriya (@Vishnupriya Srinivasan). ““What Are the Advantages and

Disadvantages of Having a Single Human Language? Will the World Be Better If

We Have a Single Language?”...No more TOFEL or IELTS exam…” Quora, 2019.

https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-advantages-and-disadvantages-of-having-a-

single-human-language-Will-the-world-be-better-if-we-have-a-single-language/

answer/Vishnupriya-Srinivasan-2.