Words of Wonder - Endangered Languages and What They Tell Us (Broché)

In the new, thoroughly revised second edition of Words of Wonder : Endangered Languages and What They Tell Us (formerly called Dying Words : Endangered Languages and What They Have to Tell Us), renowned scholar Nicholas Evans addresses the impact of mass language endangerment on the world's "Library of Babel." He explores issues surrounding the preservation of indigenous languages including the most effective ways to respond to the challenges of recording and documenting fragile oral traditions while they're still with us.
This latest edition includes an entirety new chapter on new developments in language revitalisation such as the impact of technology on language archiving, the use of social media, and autodocumentation by speakers. It also includes new sections on how recent innovations in language documentation give us a fuller picture of human linguistic diversity. Seeking to answer the question of why widespread linguistic diversity exists in the first place, the book weaves in portraits of individual last speakers" and anecdotes about linguists and their discoveries.
Readers will also have access to a companion website with sound files and embedded video clips of various languages mentioned in the text. Perfect for undergraduate and graduate students studying language endangerment and preservation and for any reader who wants to discover what the full diversity of the world's languages has to teach us, Words of Wonder : Endangered Languages and WhatThey Tell Us, Second Edition, is for all with a professional or personal interest in endangered languages and, beyond that, in the full wealth of the world's tongues.