UNESCO: 147 Languages In Indonesia In Peril

Jakarta- The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) has reported that approximately 147 languages in Indonesia are in danger of becoming extinct or have recently disappeared.

India tops the list of countries with the greatest number of endangered languages, 196 in all, followed by the United States which stands to lose 192 and Indonesia comes third.

Globally, the UN body says, there are nearly 2,500 languages in peril out of a total of 6,000 world languages.

Prospects are a bit brighter for some 178 other languages, spoken by between 10 and 150 people. More than 200 languages have become extinct over the last three generations such as Ubykh that fell silent in 1992 when Tefvic Esenc passed on, Aasax in Tanzania, which disappeared in 1976, and Manx in 1974.

"Language endangerment is a universal phenomenon," said Christopher Moseley, an Australian linguist who edited the atlas‘ third edition, as quoted by AP.

The atlas says 200 languages have become extinct in the last three generations, and another 199 languages have fewer than 10 speakers left.

More than a fourth of the 192 languages once spoken in the United States have disappeared. Another 71 are severely endangered, according to the atlas.

There is Gros Ventre, spoken by fewer than 10 people in north-central Montana. All are elderly, and none is fully fluent. The last fully fluent speaker died in 1981.

Or Menomonee, spoken in northeast Wisconsin, with just 35 speakers left.

The digital version of the atlas invites users to contribute with updates and allows them to search according to country, degree of endangerment, name of languages or by number of speakers.

Type in Russia, and colour-coded flags appear ranging from white (unsafe) - denoting languages such as Lezgian, spoken in the Caucasus Mountains - to red (critically endangered), marking those such as the Tundra Enets, spoken in Arctic islands.

Not all is bleak, however. Some endangered languages, like Latvia‘s Livonian, are being revived by young people and through poetry.

Marleen Habard, editor of the atlas‘ Andean regions, said indigenous groups in South America have been at the forefront of preserving their regional tongues by pressuring governments to recognize indigenous rights.

Some languages have only recently been discovered. Andoan was not known until a journalist discovered a small group of its speakers on the border between Peru and Ecuador in 2000, Habard said.

Francoise Riviere, deputy director of culture at UNESCO, said raising awareness of the importance of mother tongues is a crucial goal of the project.

"We are trying to teach people that the language of the country from where we come is important, and what counts is being proud of one‘s own language," she said.

A paper version of the 2009 atlas - which was funded by Norway and involved a team of over 30 linguists - will be launched in May.

Source : TheJakartaPost.com (February 20^th, 2009)
Photo credit : http://www.google.com/

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