ISSUE13 [REBORN FROM THE ASHES] TASK ONE by 海王泪

海王泪UID: 2673613

TOPIC: ISSUE13 - "Many of the world's lesser-known languages are being lost as fewer and fewer people speak them. The governments of countries in which these languages are spoken should act to prevent such languages from becoming extinct."

It is regrettable that the world’s lesser-known languages are being lost and thus some precious heritage of culture becomes extinct simultaneously; but governments should not always spare no efforts to prevent people from abandoning such languages. Instead, they can preserve them. Prevention and preservation are really different.

Prevention aims at holding and keeping back the unique communication tool of people. The purpose is to make minority reuse their endangered languages. However, that seldom works if governments and residents are in pursuit of economic development. Those who give up their own language are always incented by a substitute language, which brings them more opportunities. Talking about my experience, my big family using Mandarin lives in China and I have relatives speaking French who have moved to France when we have the same great-grandfather who uses a unique language, Hakka dialect. An interesting question: why Hakka disappear no matter locally (China) or aboard (France)? The answer is that Mandarin or French serve as better living tools than Hakka. We find theses wildly used languages can bring us better education, jobs and so on. Even when local government publicized and offered classes for Hakka, our latest two generations in China are not interested in it, needless to say about those members in France. What is more, when native members meet relatives aboard, we use English as the communication tool instead of our collective ancient one.

Clearly, languages are in a natural selection of economic process. Lesser-known languages are used by groups which often live in poor economy. By frequent interaction with a stronger civilization, people find that they can get more information and more business if they use stronger languages. Governments would appreciate if the substitute languages really serve as catalyst for economic growth and naturally improve the life of people who use endangered language. In contrast, holding back the lesser-known “tongue” not only cost a lot but also stops the development of economy.

However, must these unique languages give in to those who are economically strong? As far as I concern, not only linguists, historians but also scientists would stand out and shout: “No, they cannot. “


The reason is that without lingual keys, we may forever lose some unique and valuable culture in human’s evolution. For instance, Maya civilization, which amazes human being by its mathematics, astronomy, building and etc, becomes unsolved mystery as Portugal’s invasion and colonialism. How could Maya calculate and get the statistics of the cycle of planet long ago? How could they build unbelievable edifices during their period? Scientists want to know why! But the answers on the stone or books performed in ancient words cannot be read and understood any more.

So what else can governments do when prevention is not practical but cultures are needed to be saved?

Preservation may serve as a better suggestion. It is more effective for governments to fund groups of experts to save the lesser-known language instead of requiring majority of residents to reuse their endangered language. Preservation is held by people such as linguists, historians and anthropologists when technology nowadays makes available their work, specifically digital record tools and costless Internet. These “preservers” would recognize and record the lesser-known languages before their extinction by editing dictionaries, translating important literature, taking sounds tracks, pictures, videos and so on. For instance, Manchu language is almost extinct, now spoken only among a few scholars and small number of elderly people in remote rural areas. In fact, it is experts who make intercultural contact available. People today can read books, watch program to understand the magnificent ethnic group without knowing a word of Manchu language. If somebody is interested in this language, he or she can buy a Manchurian dictionary and download some record or videos from Internet. Others from relative academic field also benefits from the preservation. All of these are difficult to be realized by the small number of Manchu people in remote rural areas when they are lack of money, expertise and interaction with the world.

In sum, preservation could be more practical and effective than prevention. The governments of countries in which endangered languages are spoken should not act to prevent such languages from becoming extinct by extensively inducting people to re-use it. Instead, governments can preserve it by funding experts. Experts save the access to lesser-known languages and free the value of unique cultures behind words. Moreover, thanks to preservation, groups can easily reuse their own languages even though they once give up them. Government needn’t worry too much about people’s free will to choose languages.





磕磕碰碰，罗哩罗嗦。。。居然改得那么长。。


Plan
Thesis:政府不应该阻止大部分人放弃语言，而应该通过小部分专家保存语言。

1 如果谋求经济发展，政府无能力阻止人们对于语言的选择。
2 语言是了解文化必要的Key, 每一种文化应当被保留。
3 如果谋求文化保留，政府可以资通过助专家来达到目标。