Preserving Minority Languages

Preserving Minority LanguagesOn the other hand, according to Anthony Ellis, it would be trifling to insist that extinction of terminology causes extinction of culture because wrangle is not whole culture simply just star part of it (Ellis, 2005). Nevertheless, according to David Harrison, linguist and professor of the Swarthmore College, terminologys oerhear been shaped by plenty to serve as repositories for cultural knowledge, efficiently packaged and readily transmittable across generations. (Harrison, 20077). In other words, it is whole-important(a) for human race to keep the conservation of nonage spoken address receivable to its cultural honors academic, cultural and social revalues.The first cultural value of nonage terminology is its academic value. Linguists especially have academic manic disorder for harboring and researching minority languages. They should study many different languages to restore their all functions and structures of endangered languag es. It must also be noted that linguists need to hold back many youngsters at school to transmit their native languages to next generations. More over, one(a) of most important causal agent why it is essential to keep minority languages researching is that academically new and attractive facts atomic number 18 always discovered in minority languages.Ubykh, one of minority language of the North-western Caucasian group verbalise by the Ubykh masses until the early 1990s, was regarded as a language which has a large number of consonants (Romaine, 2007). Recent researches, however, show that some African language have more consonants than Ubykhs. Furthermore, linguists found an African language called Hixkaryana, which has about 350 speakers. The reason why this language and its adjacent languages have an attention is that they are cases of language which place their object first when they run into a sentence. For an instance, if the slope sentence, I love you, is made, the sen tence in Hixkaryana should be you love I rather of I love you. In the case of Korean and Japanese, they have the prototypical structural order, Subject + Object + Verb(SOV). They say I you love whilst incline speakers say I love you. It is clear that contemporary English has self-evident sentence order, Subject + Verb + Object(SVO). However, Irish puts its verb first. Unfortunately, linguists predict that object-initial languages such as Hixkaryana allow for vanish in the next century. (Nettle Romaine, 200011)At this point, it should be academically asked that why object-initial languages are hard to survive in the modern era. This is the academic uncertainty which needs to be examined by researching minority languages. There get out be a number of these kinds of academic questions from minority languages. This academic knowledge will be a massive legacy for human race. This is why we write minority languages.The second cultural value of minority language is the value abou t its ethnic individualism operator. One of the most important factors of ethnic identity is language. In the time of globalisation, identity of populate is defined by the language that they speak and write rather than the region that people live. For an example, although every people in London speak common language, English, it is unsure that all of them are English people because some of them have their native languages. It doer that people can find their ethnic identity when they speak their native languages.The immensity of ethnic identity acquired by using native languages is closely link with national pinnacle of each country. For example, one of the urgent issues of Ukraine after freedom in 1991 was to establish its linguistic identity to rise up the stature of nation-state. After breaking up Soviet-union, one of differences between other nation-states and Ukraine was the define of Russian. Unlike other nation-states, Russians was used in more widely and stable made an impact on culture, science, management and so on in Ukraine. In this situation, Ukraine declared the new constitution and it expressed all the way that on that point is only one national language. By this process, Ukrainian became only one official language of Ukraine. People who used Ukrainian thought that people who still used Russian didnt have any ethnic identity as the member of Ukraine (Zhurzhenko, 2002).For another example of historically dark side, during the Japanese occupation in the past, Hangeul, Korean native language made by Sejong the Great in 1443, was strictly banned to use among Koreans as a colonial policy for ethnocide. Koreans were forced to change even their Hangeul names to Japanese names. Koreas national stature could not help fall.These historical facts above clearly demonstrate that language can not be divided from the ethnic identity. For this reason, if minority languages become extinct, the ethnic identity of those who use minority language will be disappeared as well.The third cultural value of minority language is its aesthetic value. Every language has its aesthetic values. This is expressed by art works through languages such as novels, poets and even music. question has shown that there is the tendency to regard analogies between artforms and linguistic structures as germane(predicate) and illuminating. (Kraut, 2007177). It is said that Jazz improvisation is analogous to spontaneous speech.(ibid). In other words, it means that all minority languages have their alone(p) aesthetic values.For an instance, mainland China is unified multiracial nation and 56 tribes are living unneurotic in an extensive land. The numbers of minority tribes languages are around 60. til now though they are minority languages, their aesthetic values are proved by their literatures. Tibetians literary value is excellent and its Gesaer, written in the thirteenth century BC, has been well-known as the longest heroic epic over the world. Dong, one of minority ethnic groups in China has their native language, Kradai. It is told that Kradai is a profusion of musical value because it has various tones and vocabularies. Kradai has been developed in unique musical ways of Dongs people. It is known that Kradai is the most complex language over the world because it has 15 tones whilst the language of the Han race in China has 4 tones. As a matter of fact, its complexity contributed to make its aesthetic value. Therefore, it is raw(a) that this great value dies if minority languages of Chinas minority ethnic groups die.For these three cultural values, which are academic, ethnic and aesthetic values, it is self-evident that minority languages are definitely deserved to be protected and transmit to their next generations as their great legacy. That is to say, minority languages are not a part of culture and a method of communications but culture itself. When a language dies, a culture dies.ConclusionIn conclusion, it is urgently asked at this time to protect minority languages. Firstly, it is essential that the endangered languages ought to be found, stabilised all linguistic functions and all people help them be transmitted to next generations. Secondly, it is needed to make preserving minority languages be an important part of Conservation ethic. It means that people should realise that our language is equally one of the great ingrained environments and endeavour to protect our linguistic environment. Lastly, there has to be unremitting achievement for native language education even if it is minority language. For an instance, some Korean scholars pointed out to Koreas education environment just focused on English instead of Hangeul, Korean language and predicted there will be no Hangeul after 200 years if we keep this education system. Minority language education is important especially for next generations. Therefore, the fact that extinction of a language engenders extinction of a culture should be r emembered to all generations and make a great effort to preserve minority languages.BibliographyEllis, Anthony (2005). Minority Rights and the saving of Languages. Cambridge Journals 199-217. The Royal institute of Philosophy.Harrison, David. K. (2007). When Languages Die The Extinction of the Worlds Languages and the Erosion of Human Knowledge. USA, Oxford University Press.http//news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7206411.stm (Accessed 08 November 2010).Kraut, Robert. (2007). Artworld Metaphysics. Oxford Scholarship Online January 2008.Nettle, D. and S. Romaine (2000). Vanishing voices the extinction of the worlds languages. Oxford, Oxford University Press.Romaine, Suzanne. (2007). Preserving Endangered Languages. Language and linguistics compass 1/1-2115-132. Blackwell Publishing Ltd.Zhurzhenko, Tatiana. (2002). Language Politics in coetaneous Ukraine Nationalism and Identity Formation. IWM Junior Visiting Fellows Conferences, Vol. XII/2.