Photo by User:Mattes [Public domain], from Wikimedia Commons
To promote multilingualism and cultural diversity and to honor the men who gave their lives on February 21, 1952 in defense of Bengali language and culture, UNESCO declared February 21st “International Mother Language Day” in 1999, and it has been celebrated annually throughout the world since the year 2000. Please watch this 6-minute-long video about International Mother Language Day, produced by UNESCO, and then leave a comment in which you respond to the following 2 questions before class on Monday, 10/29 (*Note: You do not need to connect to another Globalization essay in this response!):
1. What role do you feel technology plays in the extinction and preservation of minority languages around the world? Do you agree with Leonard’s point of view?
2. Do you feel as though your own mother tongue is currently endangered? Why or why not? Are there minority languages or regional dialects in your home country that are in danger of extinction? How are you affected (or not affected) by the risk to linguistic diversity in your home country and/or around the world?
Refer to the “Blog Response Evaluation Criteria” handout distributed in class (also available on BB > Handouts > Unit 2) for guidelines and expectations in your response.
WR112: The Global University 
Technology, as both the reading and the video mentions, has the power to play both sides of causing languages to be extinct or preserving languages. I disagree with Leonard and believe that technology causes languages to be extinct, because the television and internet restricts themselves by only listing popular languages or the most-known languages. Even though the number of languages provided has increased and includes more languages than the past, the internet cannot possibly contain all thousands of different languages. In the video, a woman stated that Nigeria has more than 500 languages and the internet cannot possibly hold every language effectively. Therefore, minority languages will continue to become ignored, causing them to eventually disappear.
I do not believe that my mother tongue, Korean, is currently endangered. I have realized that few secondary boarding schools provide Korean as one of the language options to fulfill, on top of other popular languages such as Chinese, French, and etc. Also, universities such as Boston University offer Korean as one of the language options as well, contributing to the preservation of Korean. In addition, according to the statistics in the video, Korean language was ranked within the top 10 languages that people use, which shows that it is not endangered yet. Since Korean people only use Korean (even though there are different syntaxes within Korean), there are no minority languages that are in danger of extinction. The risk of linguistic diversity does not affect me personally because Korean is becoming popular among the world and continues to be on the Internet, which prevents us from worrying the extinction of language.
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I feel the connection between technology revolution and language is really close. To some extent, the technology provides convenience for modern people to express their thoughts in a specific language. For the external living environment of the language, in the past, people usually used pen or pencil to write a letter for people who lived far from the sender. Currently, with the development of the technology, people are more likely to “write” by typing on the phone or computer. It seems like the development of the technology helps people a lot. However, I do not think so. Nowadays, some typing systems are come up with a lot of correct function. For example, if you type “lingiustic”, the system will help you correct it into “linguistic” automatically. Although it is beneficial for students like me to avoid getting a low grade because of spelling mistake, it shows a situation that people are forgetting the correct spelling of a word. Therefore, I quite agree with what Leonard’s says in his essay.
For my mother tongue, I actually don’t worry about the extinction of Mandarin, Chinese. However, what I worry about is the extinction of the basic structure of Chinese. Like I mentioned above, people are more likely to use typing instead of writing. Chinese writing are disappearing in my daily life. As time passes, one day I discovered that I forgot some strokes of a character of Chinese. That was enough to shock me. The language of Chinese is one of the most difficult languages in the world, because the composition of it is complicated. Even losing one of the small part of it, such as meaning of the character in the ancient times and modern times, will make me feel regret about it. Now, English has become hegemony around the world. I’m glad to see currently in China Chinese is not at the risk by the invading of the English. Under such a circumstance, every summer when I came back from America, I will stay with my Chinese teach from my middle school to do some research about Chinese language and literature, in order to avoid the extinction in the future.
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I feel like technology and internets definitely affect the frequency of using people’s mother tongue. To utilize a certain technology or browse a website, you need to first understand the language, particular English, that shows on instruction manuals or blogs. Indeed, I agree with Leonard’s point of view on extinction of minority languages due to the advanced technology. More and more people learn English as a common language to adapt in current society, especially with some indispensable technologies, such as mobile phones. However, there are thousands of languages around the world, whereas those “advanced” technology can only support one tenth of them.
I am certainly believe my mother tongue, mandarin, is not currently endangered. In Fact, it will never be endangered in the future as well. Since China is one of the strongest and biggest country in the world with high industry and population, mandarin will never be extinct. However, there are 56 ethnic groups in China, and some of them speak totally different languages than mandarin, and I am sure there are minority languages in China that I never heard about or facing extinction. Although most of the chinese speak mandarin in nowadays, people still knows their mother tongues and speak them when they have the chance. For example, people in southeast part of China, such as Hong Kong, speak Cantonese all the time. For me personally, I don’t think the risk to linguistic diversity affect me that much, since China is getting more and more popular around the world. Basically I can see Chinese walking down the street and chat in mandarin everywhere. Moreover, there are subtitles and translations in Chinese on almost every websites or videos, which once again prevent mandarin disappear in the world.
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You are surely right about the idea that mandarin would never extinct because as a Chinese, I can always hear people speaking Chinese no matter I am in China or in other foreign countries, and I am clearly aware of the phenomenon that more and more people are willing to learn Chinese. Though I agree that technology and internets affect the frequency of using people’s mother tongue, I cannot accept your overall conclusion that the extinction of minority languages is completely caused by the technology and the Internet. I believe that to some extent, technology and the internet definitely help preserve the minority language by helping people are able to learn different languages online and use different languages to talk to others to practice. Also, Internet provides people with information about minority languages which arouse our interest.
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In my personal view, the use of internet actually contributes to kill a lot of the minority languages. Because of the commercial nature of the internet, it’s almost impossible for it to provide all the languages that people speak over the world. Instead, it will only list the most famous and widely used languages. People using some of the minority languages are forced to use other major languages instead of their mother tongue to use the internet and catch up with the world. Therefore, I don’t agree with Leonard that Internet can be useful to preserve minority languages. Well, it may can, but only if it’s an ideal world that the businessmen don’t care about business anymore and only wants to help preserve the world’s linguistic diversities.
As my mother tongue, Mandarin, is a language spoken by the largest amount of people except the universal tongue English, it’s actually impossible for it to be in danger. Mandarin is the only official languages in my country, almost all Chinese are capable with speaking Mandarin. Expect all the tremendous Chinese population, a lot of foreigners are choosing Mandarin as their second language because of the profound Chinese culture and the attractiveness of the huge Chinese market. Therefore, programs like the Confucius Classroom are set up for these students to learn Chinese languages and cultures. Meanwhile, Mandarin is also one of the most popular language classes in High schools and Universities. However, with the spread of Mandarin, a lot of the Chinese dialects spoken by people in different regions are now in a great danger. Chinese schools, are now mostly using the standard Mandarin in teaching, and Chinese parents also mostly use it at home to prevent their Children to have any accent in speaking Mandarin. Therefore, this makes the young generations, including me, to have little opportunities learning our regional dialects, and makes us hard to communicate with the olds that only speaks their dialects.
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Though I concede that the Internet is based on profit which makes spreading minority languages difficult, I still insist that Internet can provide great opportunities to popularize minority languages because compared with TV programs, contents on the Internet are more diverse and are required low costs to produce. What is more, people have great access to Internet nowadays which helps the spreading of minority languages become easier since large amount of people can know the diminishing of minority languages from only an article published on the Internet. From the prospective of minority groups, Internet needs relatively low cost to add new languages which is an advantage for them to use their regional languages to communicate without learning English for convenience.
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Truly, the Internet only provides people several languages currently, but it is only a matter of time. After all, the internet was invented in early 1960’s, and scientists are not paying their whole attention to the preservation of minority languages. Nowadays, with the continued advance of Internet, scientists are focusing on constructing the Internet family, and they would consider what the customers really want. I believe more and more languages will be available on the Internet within few years. Also, talking about the business on the Internet, I think the minority languages would be an opportunity for businessman since these days it does not have a mature market for minority languages, which means that some people do need minority languages, and they do not know who they can ask for help. When there is a demand, there is a market. Updating a language on the internet requires programmers and money, and we have the producer, customer and the market. So businessman will make profits. As a result, the Internet does play an important role in preserving the minority languages.
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In my opinion, technology is one of the most useful method to help the minority languages and prevent them from distinction. So I totally agree with Leonard’s point on the potential of technology to save minority language. People argue technology limited the use of the minority languages, however technology can also help to spread the minority languages. Minority languages are usually not recognize by many people, but internet can let more people to know the insist of different language. Language is not only a tool for people to communicate, but people also use it to create art such as, music, novels and poetries. Internet is one of the best way to introduce them to the world. When people from different part of the world have the chance to enjoy music or poetries written by minority languages, they can also feel the charm of the minority language and may have interest to learn them.
My mother tongue is Cantonese which is not the most common language speak in China. In my city, school use Mandarin to teach and most of the TV channel use Mandarin to present their TV show or report news. Months ago I watched a video shows that some parents in my hometown decide to teach their children Mandarin as their first language instead of Cantonese. Continuously, some kids admit that they can’t speak Cantonese. I think this is woeful. The culture behind Cantonese is wonderful and the charm of Cantonese is huge. However, because of technology many Cantonese songs and movies are introduced to people from all around China. At the mean time, I have heard many times that people told me they want to learn Cantonese. Therefore, technology really help to spread languages and fortunately internet make more people to recognize the beauty of Cantonese. I don’t think the risk of linguistic really impact my life because technology really help to introduce Cantonese to the world.
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Though I agree with you that Internet can help preserve minority languages through the introduction of variety forms of art, I cannot accept your overall conclusion that other people from all over the world will have the chance to enjoy music or other forms of art from the people who use minority languages because those languages are not familiar with them. Even though the types of art from the people who use minority language can be easily accessible through Internet, not many foreigners will have the opportunity to listen to the music or read the poetries. In fact, a very few foreigners will have the chance to do so because those types of art are not popular. Unless people have the knowledge about the type of art previously, it would be difficult to find the specific art piece online because the Internet rates the type of art based on the popularity, preventing the rise of certain type of music or poetry that is not familiar (and having prior knowledge of music/poetry for hundreds of different minority languages is difficult). For instance, youtube and google list the most popular websites or videos when people type in the keywords. In addition, in order for people to read the poetry or listen to music that is written in the minority language, they need to understand the language with perfection. However, majority of the people will not be able to comprehend all the hundreds of different languages in the world, preventing them from understanding the true meaning behind those art pieces. Even though there might be English or translation to other popular language, the people will remember the translation better than the original form of art, which essentially further contributes to the spread of popular language and disappearance of non-popular languages. Few minority languages might be able to benefit from Internet, but not all minority languages are guaranteed this privilege, which proves why the Internet is not helping the preservation of minority languages.
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I disagree with you on how Internet can be a beneficial archive for minority languages. The purpose of having a language would be meaningless if no one is going to speak it. Since the internet has a preference for major languages, any cultural entertainment and medium from minor cultures will be overshadowed by the overwhelming presence of western media. The very existence of a globalized network is a threat to all minor cultures.
The only people who will acknowledge the existence of minor languages and make use of these online archives would be linguists who are not your average internet user.
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I think technology plays as a double-edged role. On one hand, it helps people learn a new language. Back in the ancient time, it was difficult for people to know other languages, not to say learn a new language. Nowadays, with the help provided by Internet, people are able to learn different languages online and use different languages to talk to others to practice. Also, Internet provides people with information about distinct languages which help arouse interest. Technology definitely helps preserve languages. However, on the other hand, the limited number of languages provided by the Internet shows the endangerment of minority languages. When we shop online or look for information, English is always the priority language because it is the most commonly used language around the world. I agree with Leonard’s point of view. Since English and other most-spoken languages cannot only fulfill our needs in daily life but also help us get more opportunities, who will still speak native languages, especially those are the minority? Technology would put minority languages and cultures in danger.
I don’t feel that my mother language, Chinese, is endangered. Chinese is one of the five most spoken languages. And there are more and more people currently learn Chinese and its culture. However, there are some languages in China are in danger of extinction. The official language in China is Mandarin. When we go to school, we are forced to speak Mandarin. Other dialects and languages are not allowed to speak. As a Shanghainese, I can understand its dialect but never speak it. Some words or phrases in the dialect have special meanings behind, but for me, I don’t understand why these occur which sometimes make me feel sorry. Also, I use English and typewriting a lot. Since Chinese is really difficult in writing, I sometimes even cannot write specific words or remember the pronunciation. But I am glad that mandarin is now often used in subtitles or websites. Mandarin would never extinct, but will be used by more and more people.
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I agree with your claim that technology has its pros and cons, a point that needs emphasizing since so many people believe that internet is promoting the world, especially in cultures and languages. Indeed, in today’s society, advanced technology are all close connected with internet. Thus internet become an essential part of our life. As you said in your response, “technology plays as a double-edged role”, people are blinded by the benefit that internet provided, such as Learning different languages online and using different languages to talk to others through Skype. However, people ignore the disadvantage that internet has made. With limited number of languages, people who speak minority languages do not have access through those website, which endanger those minority cultures and languages, and eventually lead to extinction. At the end, you put a rhetorical question, which once again emphasize the negative effect that internet will bring on minority languages.
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1. Technology plays a nuanced role in both facilitating and preventing the loss of languages. On one hand, technology is causing the extinction of minority languages by forcing people to use the languages spoken by the majority. As Leonard says, “media entertainment will, however, never be produced for a language of 770 speakers because it is loss making. Technology, be it mobile phones, DVD, or video games may support the top 50 languages maximum, but never more than that” (146-147:5) In order to accommodate their need, whether it is to order goods from Amazon or use phones for communication, minorities are forced to use another language to fit in the world. On the other hand, technology is giving people a chance to preserve those minority languages. More and more applications on smartphones and websites on the internet provide a platform for people to learn languages. Moreover, technology connect the minority to the majority, providing a chance to communicate and exchange their culture, value and language. I mostly agree with Leonard’s point of view, who pointed out that the wide consumerism is destroying the minority languages and the potential in preserving them still lies in technology, which is internet. Even though it is impossible to include every language in internet, but technology provides the minority a platform to voice out their language and culture in possibly a language spoken by majorities to reach more people.
2. I do not feel my mother tongue is currently endangered, because Mandarin is the most widely spoken language in the world due to the huge population in China. Chinese dialects, however, are truly endangered. Less children, including myself, are learning the dialects my parents speak. I often hear the elderly shaking their head sighing: “I miss the old days when everyone could still speak Shanghainese”, “I hope that you children would learn my dialect”. Personally, I am not affected by the risk to the linguistic destruction, since I am a part of the majority. I do not speak Swahili, isiZulu, isiXhosa, or Igbo, but rather Japanese, Chinese and English, the realtively popular languages in the world. However, I do want to take part in preserving that diversity by appreciating the linguistic diversity in the world, which is why I want to learn more languages in order to understand and appreciate the differences in culture, values and thoughts of different people. Even just by learning a small portion of the language, it establishes an opportunity for people with different backgrounds to connect on a personal level.
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I think technology, in the long run, will kill many minority cultures and languages. It is known that major technologies that people use only have certain number of languages in them. It is due to the globalization and consumerism that producers are not willing to add minority languages into the systems because it does not bring enough profit. Minority groups have to learn mainstream languages in order to adjust to the modern world. While they learn the mainstream languages, certain way of acting and thinking is learned as well. In the long run, the homogenization of cultures bring destruction to minority cultures. These cultures do not have the population base and technology base to defend the invasion of other cultures. Many cultures and languages will be lost because these cultures do not fir into the world. Some people argue that globalization and internet actually preserve many languages and cultures. However, I think that the preservation of these languages will be only on the form of books because nobody will speak them or use them in the original way. I agree with Leonard that multi-linguistic world is important. Humans should not wait after they lost the languages to realize how important some languages are to the civilization. I also know that it will be extremely hard for some languages to survive because of many realistic problems. At least, people should not intentionally ignore the fact that many languages are dying.
I personally do not think my mother tongue, mandarin, is in danger. The major reason for it is because the population base and the international impact China has in the globalized world. There are 1.4 billion Chinese people who speak the same language which makes the language very hard to disappear through time as the language itself has already evolved through thousands of years. Because of the international impact China has in the world right now, many foreign people are learning Mandarin which makes it more prosperous in the world. However, there are many local languages in China that are endangered because the new generation Chinese people speak standard Mandarin rather than their local languages. Each local language has its own unique feature which is very sad to lose some of them. Young Chinese people travel more than ever to different areas in China. This situation forces them to speak standard Mandarin in order to communicate with other people. Because my language is not currently endangered, the extinction of languages does not happen to me. I am also very glad that Chinese culture and products are widely used and accepted by the majority of the world. Chinese people are spreading all around the world which continues the prosperous of the Chinese culture and languages.
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I concur with the claims and visions included in your texts, of which explains why the minor cultures and languages are endangered. You incorporated notions from other sources, such as learning other languages also gives them the certain ways of thinking rooted in those languages. And as consumerism and globalization further prevails, more and more people will convert into a standardized and homogenized identity. The small communities cannot stand a chance just as you mentioned, because of their irrelevantly small amount of population. However, i think that with internet and other sources of medias, we are able to record and preserve the forms of these languages. Unlike the old times, when everything can only be recorded on paper, multi-media and the internet actually give us a chance to forever possess those endangered knowledges.
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Technology has really complicated impact on minority languages. I partially agree with Leonard’s idea that technology can preserve minority groups and cultures. On one hand, an article published on the internet can easily and rapidly draw public attention to the diminishing of minority languages. The rapidly developing internet can also help save and spread minority cultures and languages. On the other hand, due to narrow consumer and huge cost, technological companies won’t choose to produce digital products with minority languages addressed. One of the results of this is that minority group, like Eskimos mentioned in Leonard’s essay, has to learn English or other common-spoken language in order to use technological devices fluently. What is more, due to extreme weathers and isolated places that they live in, Minority groups have much less access to new technology or even internet, which further prevents them to connect with the rest of the world. Thus, major world knows little about the diminishing fact of minority groups and cultures, and at the same time, minority groups cannot connect with the rest of the world, which is the hardship for them to get involved in rapidly changing world.
I don’t think mandarin is currently endangered since at the time people around the world are learning Chinese because of their interest in Chinese culture or potential development of China. However, as Mandarin gets more and more popular, some regional dialects are in danger since most teenagers nowadays cannot speak those dialects. Especially in the place where I grew up, people speak a dialect called “Wu”, which is a heritage of ancient Chinese and the language for traditional opera. Teenagers like me or younger than me cannot speak it any more sine schools are promoting the use of Mandarin, which is one of reasons why regional dialects are diminishing so rapidly. Thus, it is a pity for me and the most young generation not to understand and extend the meaning of traditions and values related to regional dialect.
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I agree with your point that technology provides a two-sided effect on minority cultures. On one hand, technology does save a language from dying out because technology sometimes brings people’s attention to certain minority languages that people have never heard of. Just like what you mentioned in your response, internet can save the rules and characters of many languages for people to check and learn anytime they want. I also agree with your point that main stream technology usually does not include minority languages which force minority groups to learn other languages. You mentioned a interesting point which is that majority cultures do not realize the problem that minority people face. Many people do not realize the importance of traditions, which applies to all cultural groups in the world. Traditions are being lost with no conscious. It will be very late when people finally realize what they have lost in the years.
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In my opinion, I feel that technology plays a role contributing towards the both the extinction and preservation of minority languages around the world. I agree with Leonard to a large extent that technological advances in devices such as mobile phones tend to exclude minority languages on keyboards as some minority language alphabets can be too complexed to input into the system, thus leading those who speak minority languages to type on their phones with another language. Gradually, as time passes I think will contribute to larger and larger scales of minority languages becoming extinct, due to more people not being exposed to their minority languages on a platform that is globally used. However, through viewing technology, technology, especially the internet, can help preserve minority languages in many ways. For example, the internet can raise awareness of minority languages through various websites and chat forums that allow people from around the world to connect with one another to share their thoughts and ideas on topics that range from culture to language. Therefore to wrap up my ideas, I feel that technology plays a bigger role in the extinction of minority languages rather than the preservation of them.
As a native speaker of Thai, I feel as though my own mother tongue is currently endangered. We do not have as much regional dialects when compared to countries such as Nigeria, however, I sense the common Thai language being endangered. Not only is Thai not widely used by people, but also seen as a difficult language to learn. Speaking on a broader scale, unlike languages such as Japanese or Chinese, Thai is often not offered as majors in universities or even courses in schools, as the language aspect of Thailand is not seen as important in the daily lives of non-natives when compared to languages that are commonly used by second or third language learners. I think that this also links to the business world where multinationals around the world are often non-Thai business; therefore I can understand why people may choose not to preserve Thai language since business trading and decision makings are done in English or other widely languages such as Chinese. I would say that I am affected by this risk to linguistic diversity as globalization rapidly continues on.
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Admittedly, technology helps to enlarge the influence of a minority language to a large extent, and advanced networking enables people to be interested in the language of a country to a large extent. To be specific, technology provides current people with a platform to get in touch with diverse cultures by watching their TV plays, films, and listening to music. However, currently, people learn about a minority language based on the technological devices other than deciding to understand it deeply. Instead, they will be more likely to acquire a wide-spread language, English, which helps them to be competitive in society. In this way, minority languages are easily disappearing thoroughly. Therefore, I disagree with Leonard’s point that networking today preserves linguistic diversities.
Take an example of my mother tongue, Cantonese, a minority language in Guangdong. ( southern China.) There is no doubt that more and more people outside Guangdong Province presently learn about Cantonese in details because of its music, video, and celebrities, but nowadays fewer people are able to speak it fluently, especially the Guangzhou’s individuals. Specifically, people there gradually change to speak in Mandarin, a mainstream language throughout China. This decreased trend of using Cantonese causes it to have fewer influences. Even if people throughout China know the existence of a language called Cantonese, minority people can speak it significantly so that it will be more difficult for Cantonese to develop from the generation to generation in the future.
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As for me, I think technology is playing an extinction role in language so I do not agree with Leonard’s point of view. Although the internet can help us to have a better understanding of other cultures and languages, these knowledge are still limited and as we know from Gleiser’s essay, the majority of the communication is restricted in local or their own country. Therefore, most benefited language and culture must be the most popular one which is English and western. On the other hand, capitalism is a dominated fact that consumerism been spread. This will also play a very important factor for western culture to spread.
As for my local mother tone, I think Chinese is not treated. The first reason is that the Chinese have developed for thousands of years and already become a dominant language in eastern Asia. Many languages in eastern Asia are been affected by it. Therefore, since it is not dominant in the globe, but it is still had to shake its position in eastern Asia. Second, the Chinese have a strong speaker population and culture as back up. The Chinese population makes sure that no matter where you go, there will always be Chinese people to speak Chinese with you rather than another language. Also, for the internet, the easiest thing that may spread through it is pop culture. In the meantime, when the teenagers influenced by these, they will be also influenced by English as well. However, the Chinese have a strong modern culture for the young people in China. Lastly, it is the huge cultural difference make Chinese stand. For many countries I went no matter middle east, Europe and America, the historical interaction make them have some ways of similarity. However, China in history is a place that is kind of separate culturally from other places. This makes us unique in culturally and linguisticky, therefore, this is the reason why I think Chinese is not endangered.
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I agree with your claim that internet can help us understand better other cultures but is limited because it shelds light on another issue. I think that leonard contradict himself when he says that languages have special characteristics that are part of the culture and he forgets to acknowledge that those characteristics would not be able to be transfer by the internet.
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Juan, you only had to respond to one student for this assignment, but thank you for engaging in several different conversations!
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I think that technology plays a dual role with the extinction and preservation of minority languages. It contributes to the extinction of the language through only representing “universal languages” and using them to convey messages through internet, television, and other media. They restrict themselves to these languages because they are the most widely spoken across the world. So, this means that people who speak a minority language have to learn these other languages in order to be connected with the world, and at times, it is more convenient to just teach children this other language. Meanwhile, technology could be used to preserve minority languages through their usage on the media and including them in the daily lives of people. So, people do not feel pressured to learn other languages and forget their mother tongue. However, I disagree with Leonard’s view that technology will preserve these minority languages. I think that it is going to be impossible to have media coverage of so many languages, especially for those who are not well-known. It is very idealistic to think that minority languages will be included in the internet due to their lack of speakers and users. The countries with the most people and speakers of a language will always have more dominance of the media.
I do not think that my mother tongue, Spanish, is endangered. On the contrary, I think that Spanish is endangering other mother tongues in many Latin American countries. But in Venezuela, I do not think that this is the case. Many of the indigenous tribes in Venezuela live in very secluded places in the Amazon, so they rarely come in contact with Spanish-speakers. Some of them do speak Spanish, but their culture is still flourishing. I am not affected by this risk to language diversity because nowadays, Spanish is one of the most spoken languages in the world. People are rushing to learn Spanish, but it is unsettling to think that many languages will be lost due to those who are learning Spanish rather than their original mother language.
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As far as I am concerned, I agree with the Leonard that Internet plays an important role in preserving the minority languages. With the development of society, many people from minority communities travel long distances to other countries to make a living. For years they can only use the local languages to talk, work and read. Internet provides a useful tool for those people to finally get in touch with their mother languages. In Leonard’s essay, he points out the current limitation on the preserving of minority languages, some languages are too hard to use them in internet software, and I would like to express that preservation of minority languages is quite a long run for people around the world, the internet programmers are doing their best to create a way to help preserve the minority languages. As a result, I believe that the Internet is a helpful way to preserve the minority languages.
As a Chinese, I really don’t believe that my mother language would be endangered since the population of China is more than 1 billion. Everyone in China speaks Chinese and people from other countries are learning Chinese since it is also an international language. However, there are dialectal differences among different regions in china. Although we all speak Chinese, the accent varies a lot. But in my region in China, I cannot feel that my hometown dialect is endangered since people all speak it in daily life. And people would feel more comfortable when others speak my regional dialect.
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Although I agree with you that some of the immigrants might have a chance using their mother tongues on the internet and help them not to forget about their own languages, I can’t agree with you that these people are actually come from a minority community. Most of the minority languages even only have around 10 thousand speakers compared to the majority languages like English which has 400 million people speaks it as their first language. Because of the commercial nature of the internet, it’s almost impossible to provide these choices of language just for such a small amount of population. Therefore, people speaking minority languages can hardly use their own languages frequently on the internet. Even in the long run, the commercial nature for the internet will not easily disappear. There might possibly be some charitable websites that introduce the minority languages to the public in the future after people raise their consciousness of preserving them, but there’s still no much chance for the scene Leonard expects to happen –that the internet as a whole will provide these minority languages as an option in order to preserve them.
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It is true that the development Internet make people less reliable on their native language, but I still believe that language have a positive impact on the protection of language. With internet, people are promoted with the newest idea that language is pressure and it gave them a awareness to protect language. What’s more, I think technology can help record many exist language for their pronunciation, I think the pronounce is important for a language. In the long history, many languages have already existed, and language is also developing, I think it a nature progress for a language to distinct. What people needs to do is to try their best to protect the remaining language using the help of technology. I partially agree with Leonard’s point of view, but I still think if we use it correctly, technology actually helps with the protection of linguistic diversity.
The case of Chinese is very complex, the language people use in their daily life, the Mandarin, is not endangered because we have the largest number of people speaking it. However, there are less people choose to use dialect. Take an example of me, I grow up in Nanjing, and during my education process, I speak Mandarin. Some of my relatives and my friends speak nankinese, so I can understand nankinese, and I can also speak it. However, since I do not use it in my daily life, my spoken is not so standard compared to those who use it in their daily life. And most of my classmates and friends have the same situation with me. When in a circumstance that mandarin is encouraged and dialect is not encouraged to use, it makes the number of people who speak dialect become smaller and smaller. But to my opinion, there are still a great amount of people who using dialect to communicate, so actually I do not worry about the dialect in my hometown to disappear.
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I think you point of view exaggerates the importance of internet for minor languages because of tribalism. From the data that provided by Gleiser’s essay, we know that only a small amount of people are using internet to communicates with people rom other places, most of them are just choose to stay in their own language group. On the other hand, if you want to communicate with people from the world, you need to speak something that they can understand. Therefore, when you are speaking English with then, you are helping the dominate language to empower themselves and indirectly spread the main stream culture to other cultures. This even weaken the minor culture more.
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Technology is a double-edged sword for mainly everything, but for minor languages and cultures it’s mainly negative. What technology can do for the minor clans are preserving the information and knowledge of them, but it will not help the groups bringing the cultures and languages to exist longer. I agree with Leonard’s idea that the consumerism and new technology will follow the trend of the majority. The more common the group is, the easier for the group to be accepted by globalization. Been accepted by globalization means faster development and better living standard. When a clan is owning a minor culture or language, it’s very possible that it doesn’t has a good living standard since its not developed. Most people would like to have a better life than to preserve a culture, thus its very possible that the culture will be sacrificed.
My mother tongue is Chinese and it’s already one of the biggest language group in the world. It will not be threatened by English or the trend of globalization. It may threaten the position of English in the future, too. The dialect of my hometown is hard to be threatened as well since it’s not like Cantonese or Shanghainess which will be an partially independent subordinate language system to Chinese. My hometown dialect mainly differ from Chinese on its pronunciation, thus it will much more easier to preserve. I have yet not been affected by the language diversity.
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Though I concede that the internet, as a product of technology advancement, has a negative impact on minority languages, I still insist that it has a more significantly positive influence on it. The internet, or in general, advanced technologies and globalization are likely to make minority cultural groups shift their language to some mainstream language. However, it does not mean that their culture is lost at the same time. The situation Leonard depicts is that no one keeps and understands the cultural legacies. However, this job can be done by the internet. All literature, speeches, musical pieces, even and the languages themselves can all be stored online. Therefore, there is no need to worry about the loss of cultures, and the job is done due to the advanced technologies.
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In no doubt, internet pushes forward the pace of globalization. Information is shared with an extremely fast speed. Though this creates convenience to our life and help to the booming of technology, it smothers the living space of minor cultures. Urbanization and the introduction of technology changes our life; it is everyone’s goal to live an ideal life with modern conveniences. For this one goal, humanity is coming closer together; With the aid of internet and other technology humans are working towards a homogenized future, as it is easily the most beneficial solution to economical growth, collective technology advancements and perhaps a conflict-free world, since everyone shares the same culture. We are currently in this process. There are already cultures merged and extinct because of globalization. The minor community which has unique values and traditions will be assimilated due to the comfort of technology. And the internet certainly assists this process.
In china, there are many ethnical groups inhabiting different parts of the land, and they usually each speak an unique dialect of Chinese. And, those languages are very much endangered ever since mandarin is elected to be the standard language of China. Except for the dialects spoken in the bigger cities, many minorities are fading, as the younger generations are seeing better opportunities in working in the cities than in their own niche. I personally am born speaking mandarin, so there is nothing for me to lose, and especially as China is an big economical power, the mandarin language definitely doesn’t face too much threat. However, it is also a true, that English is responsible for Chinese’s slowly fading of priority, as the benefit of English internationally is indeed alluring.
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Hi Andy. I speak mandarin too. I strongly agree with you idea and I think our language does not face that kind of problem. And I also agree with you that globalization is boosting the disappearing off lose speical languages because globalization means we need to share our resource and experience with each other in common language. Currently, the common language is English.
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I am not really a fan of Leonard’s idea. Leonard suggests that distinction of minority language is heavily related to development of technology. However, in my point of view, technology isn’t the main cause for losing language diversity. Technology has advantages in advocate local culture and language, like creating website for other’s to learn about the culture and languages. And also in Leonard’s essay, he believes use of phone and video game also cause the distinction of minor language. But, actually, playing video games won’t take 24 hours and 7 days. This entertainment is just a part of people’s life. The rest and majority of their life is surrounded by other mother tongue. Thus, the effect of technology has been exaggerated in Leonard’s essay.
Fortunately, my mother tongue is not actually facing distinction. Chinese is my first language, which is a main language from the second most-populated country. However, those regional dialects are threatened or even dismissed through times. Myself is not affected by lose of dialects, because I am not born with it. The effects are on elders, who is born speaking dialects or even sing with it in some region of China. Young people are not used to learn dialects and even consider shame speaking dialects in public, which further deteriorates the situation. Losing dialects is just like losing regional figures: folk stories, ancient metaphors, and phrases describing ancient living styles. In fact, minority languages and regional dialect should be preserved as intangible cultural heritage. It would be a mistake to lose them.
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I strongly agree with your point of view that technology isn’t the main cause for losing language diversity, a point that needs emphasizing since so many people reject to consider the impact of technology on linguistic diversity is destructive. As you stated, technology can help protect some minor languages, if we use it correctly, it would be a great helper for us to protect languages. What’s more, the point you stated that the harm of technology on language is actually not as serious as we think is a novel way to think, and I believe technology is no doubtfully help a lot in protecting language.
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Though I agree with you that technology is only a part of a person’s life, I cannot accept your overall conclusion that technology is not essential to people’s lives. People, especially young people, spend a lot of time on technologies like the internet, social media, and games. Recent studies have shown that the average time a person spend with technology is about three to four hours each day, almost one third of the time a person is awake. Also, the time they spend with technology is often very important and crucial for young people’s development. They learn about the world or connect with people important to them in a foreign language that is not their mother tongue could contribute to the extinction of many minority languages. What is more, the influence of technology is increasing every day. In a few years, maybe people will spend half or more of their time on technology. If by then technology and media have not incorporated more minority languages, they could be a huge threat to language diversity.
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Globalization is almost an inevitable thing in the 21st century. It can be generalized that everyone is being affected by it this way or another. Along with globalization, technology is growing so fast that sometimes it makes people frustrated to be able to keep up with it, and it is now in everyone’s lives. Although technology can be very helpful in its own ways by allowing people to have access to a variety of sources, it is also harming people’s lives. In what way? The globalization and technology concepts are spreading fast enough to cause a damage on numerous cultures and minority languages. For example, like Leonard discusses in his essay, the internet doesn’t have a wide option of languages for people to utilize. When you set your phone or laptop, for example, to the language you want it to display, you cannot come across to a wide option of languages. There are only the popular and known languages that are presented. Technology, taking internet, can help in some ways to preserve minority languages because you can have access to the information of those languages, and maybe even some adequate sources to learn them! However, technology plays a bigger role in the extinction of those languages. People who are the native speakers of minority languages are forced to learn/ know other languages then them owns because that’s what they need in order to use phones, laptops, televisions etc. In time, they become more familiar with their second languages, and their mother tongues slip away from their hands. I agree with Leonard for the fact that this is not okay but it is also hard to prevent it. It is hard for tech companies to include almost every language in their products because there are thousands of languages all over the world. Also, this means that the companies should lessen their profits and increase their money losses. Thus, in a perfect world I would say yes, the minority languages should be included and preserved by technology and the products it provides, however, in a realistic world it is almost impossible.
In today’s world, I don’t strongly feel like my mother language Turkish is endangered but it definitely has the tendency. Currently, Turkey is experiencing a multitude of immigration from Middle eastern countries whose main language is Arabic. There are more signs that are in Arabic than there used to be a just a few years ago. Not just Arabic but also English. Due to globalization, English is invading Turkey and Turkish too. There are many signs in English, including shop names and some names of buildings and businesses. I am partly affected by the risk of linguistic diversity in my home country because sometimes when I wonder around in my country, I feel like I am at a country where its first spoken language is English and that feels terrible. It makes me think as if I am and Turkish people are losing a part of our culture and our beautiful language. I come across to people who use some English words while having a regular Turkish conversation. Never the less, I am pretty sure Turkish is not the only victim to this language merge and loss of culture eventually.
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The role plays by the technology on the preservation and extinction of languages depends on how people view it. As Leonard states, it can act as a vehicle to spread minor languages as well as a threat to it. It is the people speak a language who preserve the vitality of it. The influence of the technology on it is only a side effect instead of a direct cause. Language is after all a tool, and if there exists a more powerful tool, people are likely to replace the old one.
Mandarin is one of the most speaking languages in the world, so I do not think it is endanger. However, there are many dialects in china are endanger as the government promotes Mandarin. Losing those dialects do have its disadvantages like losing parts of the regional cultures. However, it accelerates the integration of regional cultures on a larger scale. Linguistic diversity has its own advantage as well as disadvantage, and vice versa. Losing linguistic diversity is not always a bad thing, if the return is worthy enough. But, determining how worthy it is may be the hardest part in this problem.
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I think that techonology has a strong role in the preservation or extiction of languages. I strongly beleive that the fact that many languages are not supported by most of our daily devices will move people from some minority dialects or languages to other that are more globalized. I agree with leonard that internet has a potential to preserve languages, however, I dont think that is something that is going to happen. in terms of my language, Spanish, I don’t think it is affected by techonology at all since is one of the most spoken languages in the world. In addition, the minority languages that I know from my country I don’t think are going to be affected either because they are used by small tribes usually that are away from technology. However, if they get more connected with the world or technology in the future they will eventually give up their langugage.
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I strongly agree with the point you have made about the idea that technology can contribute towards both the extinction and preservation of languages around the world. From my experiences, I can see that there are many devices that support only a few languages, leaving out the minority languages. As a Thai speaker, it is without doubt that the growing number of EFL speakers is due to these devices not supporting Thai language, thus making communication difficult for those who do not know of the languages supported by such devices and resulting in an urge to learn English as it is a language that is supported by nearly 100% of all the technological devices across the globe.You have made a very clear point that daily devices play a big role in this. Though you have made very strong points on your overall response, I would like to say that I am unable to agree completely that minority languages used in rural areas will not be affected by the increasing use of technology. This is because I feel that technology is spreading geographically faster than what we think and within very little time it may reach those who live in rural areas as well. Therefore, I think every minority language will be affected by this movement in technology.
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I believe technology plays a very big role. Technology has become a medium to amplify the impacts of globalization. We have an Arabic saying that translates to technology has made our big world a small town. As a result, technology spreads news, entertainment, and becomes a medium for communication. Nonetheless, technology only incorporates widely spoken languages. as a result, minority languages are in danger. However, if these minority languages are spoken at home and in the community then we can still preserve them.
Yes, technology is not as friendly to the Arabic language. However, I dont think the language could ever be extinct since it is the language of the Quran our holly book. Nevertheless, the newer generations. are moving further and further away from the language. This new generation includes the more privileged children that have had the opportunity to travel and explore other cultures.
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In my opinion, the technology boost the evolution of the society . It help us know more about the world. Without the technology, some special language still do no get some effecient methods to teach and let many people know because these people do not need this language. Now, technology help some widely used language let more people know. They feel unfair.
My mother language is Chinese. I love it and I dont think technology hurts it because there are a lot of people use it. Actually, some dialects in China is disappearing, However, i still think it is not about the technology. No people use this language any more so they are disappearing.
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Technology is very important to the lives of most people in the world. We use technologies daily, and it is a huge part of our lifestyle. We use to it to connect to other people, entertain ourselves, and to gain knowledge. Connecting to other people can help preserve minority language because most softwares have many different language options. They cover the majority of the languages in this world. Even if some very minor languages are not included, people could strive for the software developers to make that particular language available. Otherwise, people could always just call each other instead of texting. However, for entertainment and knowledge seeking, I agree with Leonard that technology is not very friendly to minority language users. The users base is simply too small for people to make a profit. I think people will just have to accept that this is the way since it is impossible to stop globalization. Minority language users should record their culture and traditions thoroughly as soon as possible for later generations to look back, since their culture could be gone before they realize.
My mother tongue, Mandarin, is definitely not endangered. It is the mother tongue of billions of people, and more people are learning it as a foreign language, so it is not endangered at all. However, there are many regional languages in China that are on the edge of extinction. Since about fifty years ago, the education system made it mandatory for everyone in the country to learn the standard mandarin, and everyone has to speak mandarin in public schools. Their local dialects, some are very different from mandarin, are only spoken at home. If people move out of their hometown into big cities, they definitely need to speak standard mandarin, or else other people would not be able to understand them, and it is also not fashionable to speak their local dialects in big cities as it represent their rural upbringing. Therefore, linguistic diversity is decreasing rapidly in China. Fortunately, this trend does not affect me very much because I was born in the city of Beijing, and my mother tongue is standard Mandarin. I feel lucky that I am able to speak two of the most widely spoken languages for this is definitely going to help me in my career and life.
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I agree with your claim that minority users should record their culture and traditions, a point that needs emphasizing since so many people reject the fact that minority culture is diminishing with the burst of technology and ignorance of the predominating cultures.
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It is obvious that technology favors languages used in first world countries where internet access is ubiquitous. Many online service providers prefer using English as their main language, forcing non-English speaking users to learn the language. With English being the quarter of the languages used in the internet, it is most likely that majority of the users will learn English in the future to opt-in to many services.
Being in a country with a leading tech industry, I do not feel that my mother tongue is being endangered. Just like China and the United States, we have a huge presence in the global economy, safeguarding our language from potential extinction. Furthermore, South Korea is one of the most ethnically homogeneous countries in the world, so we do not have any minor regional dialects or languages that are in danger of extinction. In my experience, I was surprised to learn that many students in Boston University are taking Korean classes which reassured me that my language has an important place in this globalizing society.
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