Collective and urgent duty to safeguard mother languages (Part 2)

As discussed in the earlier part, language endangerment occurs when a native/indigenous language faces a critical decline in real-life usage, native speakers, and intergenerational transmission. Aside from the loss of cultural richness wrapped in the linguistic corpus, when a language dies, or in the worst case, goes extinct, the global society permanently loses valuable resources in its richness of linguistic diversity.

In this article, we will explore, from credible research, possibilities of safeguarding and recovering systematically endangered, dead, moribund, revived, and sleeping languages, and where possible, lost and extinct languages (for archival purposes).

For clarity, dead languages are fully functioning languages, but they lack native speakers and remain only confined for purposes deeply rooted in histories. Examples here are Latin, an important language in the Christian tradition and academia, and Sanskrit, used by the Hindus specifically for worship and scholarly work.

Moribund languages are those that still have native speakers but are not passed on to the younger generations. There are definitely a few of these in our country! Revived languages are languages that were once dead but are brought back to full use as spoken languages. This is possible only when the language died while properly documented! Sleeping languages are those languages that are in use and are being preserved as much as possible but have no fully fluent native speakers.

When a language declines to the point where it has no speakers or documentation and is no longer passed down through generations, it dies and disappears, qualifying it as an extinct language. An extinct language can still have remnants left behind. Extinct languages cannot be easily revived, as the surviving remnants do not suffice for a proper deepening and rebuilding of the corpus of that language in its entirety. This makes documentation an indispensable step for language preservation.

Studies by David Harmon and Jonathan Loh, as they developed a new interdisciplinary quantitative measure of trends in linguistic diversity (based analogously on methods used in ecology), found that at least 20% of global linguistic diversity was lost between 1970 and 2005. This includes a 21% decline in indigenous languages, a 60% decline in the Americas, a 30% decline in the Pacific, including Australia, and almost a 20% decline in Africa. (David Harmon and Jonathan Loh, The Index of Linguistic Diversity, in Language Documentation and Conservation Journal, Vol. 1, 2010, p. 97).

Evidently, with documentation, languages live longer. But documentation needs to be methodically done, and especially in our times, for the purpose of preserving the wealth and treasures of this language. In most cases, each language has its own treasures which are hardly found in the same way in other languages: the depth of meaning, the personal touch, etc.

Putting together the thoughts of different researchers, in documenting a language methodically, it is important to extensively explore technicalities of the language in question: in phonetics and phonology (sound, pronunciation, intonation), orthography and writing (scripts, varying spellings for homophones), grammar and syntax (especially on sentence structures and word formation), and vocabulary (highlighting roots/origins of those words and noting imported or borrowed words).

At the same time, studies need to be done on the relational and social nature of the language: for example, sociolinguistics and pragmatics (formal and informal speech rules, politeness, appropriate body language, and crucial cultural expressions), dialects, semantics and meanings (especially how words are used with changing conditions and contexts), idioms, figures of speech, and figurative expressions (which are often rooted in traditional wisdom, beliefs, values, and philosophy), and the available wealth of oral traditions, folktales, songs, and myths.

Studying trends, predictors (global and local), and patterns in context and alongside the above adds value to the better ways to preserve our languages. A crucial resource here is the comprehensive anthropological study of global predictors of language endangerment done by Lindel Brohman et al. in Nature Ecology & Evolution Journal, Vol. 6: 2022).

“Language shift” is an important remedy for a language, as it is meant to restore the use of language in the social setting. This can be done, according to studies, by devising ways that engage the whole community. (Gary Simons and Paul Lewis, “The World Language in Crisis,” in: Responses to Language Endangerment no. 142, pages 3–19), p. 4.

Though this is a very demanding task, each linguistic community needs to be made aware of the danger of their language disappearing with time and what that entails with regard to their holistic socio-cultural and historical reality. They, as well, need to be given direction on how to help preserve their language in a systematic way as something precious, beyond passing it orally to their younger members.

A positive ideology behind a language is important for its life and survival. When this positive ideology is communicated, the love, passion, and sense of ownership are deepened, especially among young people.

Researchers who studied reverse language shift say positive ideology and positive beliefs associated with speaking the language together with strong cultural support are the two factors that most influence positive language growth among youth. “Positive ideology correlates with positive recovery while negative ideology correlates with continued language loss.” (Amelia Shettle, "Influences on Native Language Revitalisation in the U.S.: Ideology and Culture" (2015). Thesis 1203, p. 15-16).

The future is bright for our country’s multifaceted linguistic wealth, which lies in the long-term collaborative effort from the government, the education sector, interested stakeholders, and regular citizens, without leaving behind young people.

Shimbo Pastory is an advocate for positive social transformation and a student of Loyola School of Theology, Ateneo de Manila University—Philippines. Website: www.shimbopastory.com