Blog 27: Languages getting extinct too?

The BBC Radio has an online story about languages getting extinct and the English language taking over.

The article (rather alarmingly) says: "In 1992 a prominent US linguist stunned the academic world by predicting that by the year 2100, 90% of the world's languages would have ceased to exist." Another quote from a reputed source, French linguist Claude Hagege: "If we are not cautious about the way English is progressing it may eventually kill most other languages."

It is obvious that globalization has a big impact in everything we do, from the food we eat to the books we read. But it is hard to believe that globalization will make a language go away. There are many reasons languages will disappear, but I am not sure it is because of the influence of English in the global market either (look at the Belgians, they can speak three languages with no problem).

Recently historical evidence in totalitarian countries such as Spain or Soviet Russia had shown that after the collapse of those systems, languages that were not allowed to be used, resurfaced.

So I am going to be optimistic and not believe that by 2100 we will be all talking in English, and this is not because I am against a universal language, but because the richness in different languages is so important to understand the people from those countries.