and the dodo......
According to the NY Times article “Languages Die, But Not Their Last Words”, there are about 7,000 languages spoken in the world today. Of these languages, nearly half will likely be extinct in the next 100 years. [Read this article before your answer these questions.]
In your blog response, I want you discuss one or more of the following questions:
Should we care about languages dying out? Why? Is language important to cultural identity? What is lost when we lose a language?
Please think of an original title for each of your posts. I will count comments on other people’s posts as your post for the week when your posts respond to something that the original poster stated in her/his blog response.
I’d really like this blog to help us to create a class discourse. Any extra activity on the blog can help to supplement your overall course participation grade. I encourage you to read other people's posts.
Also, I’ve started adding labels to people’s posts. I'll probably hand that duty over to you soon. Feel free to change labels if you don't like them. Some people have already added labels to their posts. I encourage you to do so since, I think, the labels will help to create ties between blogs.
Also, I’m not really an expert in adding multimedia to blogs, but if you’d like to add a video, song, story, a relevant story from the NY Times (for example), or something else that you think is relevant to the material that we’re covering in class and you know how to do so, then feel free to post it on the blog.
I repeat: any extra activity on the blog that shows that you are engaging with the course materials can supplement your course participation grade.
Also, remember that there’s going to be a quiz next week, so don’t be surprised.
1 comment:
Non-famous Last Words---
The New York Times presented a compelling case of why we should be concerned when a language dies from non-use. I, for some reason, cannot find it within me to worry about it.
Maybe it's because my first (and only) language is English. My ancestors were stripped of their language when they were stolen from their homeland and brought here. Yet, they adapted and even thrived, using the language they were forced to adopt.
What if humans, in a later stage of evolution, communicated ideas to each other through telepathy rather than talking? I feel that as long as the idea is conveyed then that should suffice. I understand that certain nuances inflections would be lost with the lost language, but new nuances and new inflections would take their place, just as they always had.
This whole observation is almost lost on me. People are not static, they are ever evolving, just like language and every other form of communication. What good is an item in your house that you're not using? Throw it out.
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