Apodion.net

Another Language Log post! This one quotes a review of a textbook, the review questioning some of the conventional wisdom within the field of linguistics about dying languages:

Much of the problem is apparent in the rhetorical stances of many of the authors in this volume. They are preaching to the choir in a church full of dull-witted pagans from another, very wicked planet. […] Apart from a few asides about the necessity for Americans to know second languages in the global village, [one author] nowhere explains to his readers WHY the USA would be a better place if the primacy of English were less than it is today, or WHY the apparent gradual death of Yiddish (his example) is such a great national loss […] Students—and liberal humanities professors, for that matter—know in their hearts that the linguistic melting pot has always been the great American tradition, and that it has been viewed almost totally positively by everybody but linguists, and that there are powerful common-sense arguments in its favor. Dismissive scolding has little effect against such engrained ideologies.

My answer to that question has always been simple: it is, like many other things about which I feel strongly, essentially a matter of aesthetics. Diversity is a simple aesthetic, for me—density and richness and variety resonate with my sense of beauty. I love language, and the more languages there are being spoken, the richer the linguistic biosphere, the more beauty and diversity I get to enjoy.

Of course this is self-serving, but what else is there? We all fight for our own vision of the world. I might note, however, that this reviewer’s dismissal of tribal languages might make sense to the desire for a world where everyone can communicate perfectly with everyone else—but even those people who would be served by more perfect acquaintance with the dominant language tend to feel a sense of loss—of culture and identity—as their languages die. So it’s not just the linguists, but also the speakers of those languages. Presumably they have some right?