Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger (Third Edition)/Preface

by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

Preface

by Irina Bokova, Director-General of UNESCO

Over recent decades, as information technologies have brought more of the world’s knowledge to more of the world’s people at unprecedented speed, humanity’s linguistic diversity has been shrinking. That process is inexorable but not inevitable: international cooperation and well-planned, intelligently implemented language policies can bolster the ongoing efforts of speaker communities to maintain their mother tongues and pass them on to their children, even in the face of powerful forces pressing them to shift towards larger languages. When UNESCO published the first edition of the Atlas of the World’s Languages in Danger in 1996, it sounded an international alarm that has now been heard by public officials and policy makers, language communities and scholars, the media and civil society worldwide. With this third edition – available since February 2009 in an online digital format – we note that while the gravity and urgency of the problem of language loss are no less acute today, our tools for understanding the phenomenon are increasingly effective, and our repertoire of proven responses continues to grow daily.

Language loss entails an impoverishment of humanity in countless ways. Each language – large or small – captures and organizes reality in a distinctive manner; to lose even one closes off potential discoveries about human cognition and the mind. The death of a language inevitably leads to the disappearance of various forms of intangible cultural heritage such as performing arts, social practices, rituals and festive events, traditional crafts and the priceless legacy of the community’s oral traditions and expressions, such as poetry and jokes, proverbs and legends. The loss of indigenous languages is also detrimental to biodiversity, as traditional knowledge of nature and the universe, spiritual beliefs and cultural values expressed in indigenous languages provide time-tested mechanisms for the sustainable use of natural resources and management of ecosystems, which have become more critical with the emergence of urgent new challenges posed by climate change.

To complement its set of international standard-setting instruments aimed at defending cultural diversity as the common heritage of humanity, UNESCO seeks to provide practical tools for safeguarding endangered languages such as this publication and its digital version. Whereas the first edition reported on 600 languages only, and the second included 900, this third edition has been substantially expanded to include information on the endangerment status of about three times as many languages. As a result, the number listed in the present edition now approaches the estimate generally accepted by linguists of some 2,500 endangered languages worldwide.

The first edition’s twelve maps left large parts of the world blank because we lacked accurate knowledge. The thirty maps featured in the new edition provide global – if still not comprehensive – coverage. Thus, with this edition, and particularly with the ever-changing, ever-growing digital version, the Atlas has become a powerful tool for monitoring the situation of the world’s endangered languages, while continuing its proven role as an instrument for raising awareness among policy makers, the media, the general public and especially the speakers of languages in danger.

This new edition also features another significant improvement: it reports on a wealth of effective community experiences in safeguarding and revitalizing endangered languages and a number of national policy initiatives that support such efforts. While the threats facing such languages are no smaller or fewer than they were in 1996 and the urgency of their endangerment is no less acute, I am encouraged by the increasing effectiveness of the global response. Let us continue to seek better ways of supporting the speakers of endangered languages whose strong commitment to their mother tongue is the most decisive factor for language maintenance and ensuring sustainable results.

Irina Bokova