Key Issue 3 Distribution of Other Language Families

Key Issue #3 Distribution of Other Language Families Classification of languages Indo-European; Includes English; Spoken by 48% of people today Sino-Tibetan; Includes Mandarin; Spoken by 26% of people today Afro-Asiatic; Includes Arabic; Spoken by 6% of people today Austronesian; mostly in S E Asia; Spoken by 5% of people today Dravidain; mostly in India; Spoken by 4% of people today Altaic; mostly in Asia; Spoken by 3% of people today Niger-Congo; mostly in Africa; Spoken by 2% of people today Japanese; Spoken by 3% of people today the 3% left speak a language belonging to one of 100 smaller families

Language Families of the World Fig. 5 -11: Distribution of the world’s main language families. Languages with more than 50 million speakers are named.

Major Language Families Percentage of World Population Fig. 5 -11 a: The percentage of world population speaking each of the main language families. Indo-European and Sino-Tibetan together represent almost 75% of the world’s people.

Key Issue #3 Cont. ’d • Distribution of language families – Sino-Tibetan language family: No single Chinese language. ¾ of China speaks Mandarin (most USED language in the world). Others: Cantonese, Jinyyu, Xiang, Hakka, Gan. • Mandarin is being imposed; unity is also encouraged via print (characters are the same in all Chinese languages). Method of writing with a collection of 1000 s of characters or IDEOGRAMS some = sounds; some = ideas or concepts.

Chinese Ideograms Fig. 5 -13: Chinese language ideograms mostly represent concepts rather than sounds. The two basic characters at the top can be built into more complex words.

Language Family Trees Fig. 5 -12: Family trees and estimated numbers of speakers for the main world language families. Pg. 165 in your text

Key Issue #3 cont. ’d – Other East & Southeast Asian language families • Japanese • Korean form distinct languages. Why? Geography – Austro Asiatic: • includes Vietnamese. (uses Roman alphabet/missionaries) – Afro-Asiatic language family • Arabic, Hebrew, No. African Languages, SW Asia widespread via holy books. – Altaic and Uralic language families: • Band of Asia across to Turkey (W) and China and Magnolia (E). – Suppressed by USSR – Boundary issues (pol. & lang. barriers not the same) – Uralic: 3 countries not dominated by INDO EUROPEAN speakers, • Estonia, Finland, Hungary – African language families: > 1000 distinct languages & 1000 dialects. • • Isolation for 5000 yrs. Most lack written tradition Families: Niger-Congo, Nilo-Saharan, Khoisan Austronesian Nigeria= > 490 languages = conflict

Language Families of Africa Fig. 5 -14: The 1000 or more languages of Africa are divided among five main language families, including Austronesian languages in Madagascar.

Languages of Nigeria Fig. 5 -15: More than 200 languages are spoken in Nigeria, the largest country in Africa (by population). English, considered neutral, is the official language.

Key Issue #4 Why Do People Preserve Local Languages • DISTRIBUTION of language is a measure of the FATE of an ethnic group. – English has been diffused around the world from a small island in NW Europe b/c of the cultural dominance (globalization) of England & the US over other territories. Conversely, – Icelandic has remained a little-used language (localization) b/c of the ISOLATION of the Icelandic people.

Language displays the two competing geographic trends of globalization & local diversity also found in other cultural traits • English has become the primary language of communication of the entire world AND…. • Local Languages endangered by the global dominance of English are being protected & preserved

Key Issue #4: Language Diversity & Uniformity Preserving language diversity : 1000 s of languages are extinct & 516 nearly extinct Some die due to integration via political or religious dominance. Some are deliberately preserved Only about 300 languages are safe from impending extinction • www. ethnologue. com

Hebrew: reviving extinct languages • Rare case of extinct language brought back • One of 2 official languages of Israel (1948)

Celtic: preserving endangered languages • Major language in British Isles before Germanic invasions • 2000 yrs ago it was spoken in most of present day Germany, France and Northern Italy too • Only left in remote areas of Scotland, Ireland, Wales and peninsular France. Survival of a language depends on its political & military strength Celtic languages declined because the Celts lost most of the territory they once controlled to speakers of other languages.

• Today Welsh training is compulsory in all schools in Wales • Local govt. & utilities offer services in Welsh • Welsh road signs • BBC produces Welsh language programs Result: Use of Welsh is up from 19% to 21% in 10 yrs

Ireland Road Signs Road signs in Ireland are written in both English and Gaelic (Goidelic). Gaelic (language: Celtic) is spoken by 7% of the population

Multilingual states • Difficulties arise between two languages THE CHALLENGE: Reconciling them Belgium : Antagonisms arise from economic & political differences Switzerland: peaceful coexistence Key: Decentralized Government with power in local hands

Language Divisions in Belgium There has been much tension in Belgium between Flemings, who live in the north and speak Flemish, a Dutch dialect, and Walloons, who live in the south and speak French.

Bookstore in Brussels, Belgium The name of the bookstore is printed in both French (top) and Flemish (bottom).

Language Areas in Switzerland remains peaceful with four official languages and a decentralized government structure.

Isolated Languages • Basque- best example of an isolated language. Geographically isolated (Pyrenees Mountains). The language is connected to no other language family. This lack of CONNECTION reflects isolation • Icelandic- arrived in Iceland as a result of MIGRATION (874) it is related to the Germanic branch of the Indo-European family, however, over 1000 yrs of isolation (Island) it remains virtually unchanged, while Norwegian (its direct ancestral origin family) has had centuries of interaction with other languages & has thus changed a lot.

Global dominance of English as a lingua franca Lingua Franca: A language of international communication to facilitate trade Evidence of rapid growth in the importance of English • • high % of students learning English as 2 nd language 90 % of European students learn English 500 mil. speak English around the world as a 2 nd language Unknown # of speakers with a working understanding of English • Japan is considering making it mandatory in education

– Diffusion to other languages Originally diffusion occurred via migration or conquest Current method of diffusion is: EXPANSION DIFFUSION- spreading via a “snowballing effect” of an idea vs. the relocation of a group. Occurs in 2 ways: 1. English is changing through diffusion of new Vocabulary, Spelling & Pronunciation 2. English words are fusing with other languages

Jerusalem Street sign A street in Jerusalem was re-named New York after Sept. 11, 2001. The street name is shown in Hebrew, Arabic, and English

French-English Boundary in Canada Although Canada is bilingual, French speakers are concentrated in the province of Quebec, where 80% of the population speaks French.

Online Population, 1996 - 2005 English is still the largest language on the internet, but there has been rapid growth in many others, especially Chinese.

E-Commerce Languages 2000 & 2004 English and Englishspeaking countries still dominate e-commerce, but other languages are growing rapidly.

French Signs in Québec City

Spanish Signs in New York City