Forty one ethnic group languages under threat in China

Half of the world’s languages are under the threat of extinction with China facing the loss of 41 ethnic group dialects , the China Radio International (CRI) reported on Monday.

As Feb 21, 2011 marks the 11th International Mother Language Day, UNESCO, the cultural arm of the United Nations (UN) has created safeguarding and promoting languages as its theme, according to their website.

Speaking of the 41 endangered ethnic group languages in China, Dr Bradley, a language professional, says we risk losing component of our history. “Every time a language disappears that indicates the entire cultural understanding of that folks disappears.” He also says the factors that trigger the possible disappearance of ethnic languages around China include the wide use of Putonghua (Chinese mandarin).

“Putonghua, regular Chinese, is so dominant that everyone desires to make use of that instead of their own language. So there is a two-way tension between the right to maintain your personal language along with the desire to turn out to be component of the mainstream.”

The Chinese government is conscious of the importance of protecting ethnic group languages, and according to the State Ethnic Affairs Commission (SEAC), China is expected to roll out its first examination to test the proficiency of certain students and workers in a language spoken by the Zhuang ethnic men and women in the Guangxi Zhuang autonomous region.

China has also established much more than 10,000 schools that teach both Mandarin and an ethnic minority language, according to Xinhua. 2,500 training classes in which an ethnic group language is taught as the primary language are also to be held to eliminate illiteracy.

The International Mother Language Day is an observance held annually on Feb 21 worldwide to promote awareness of linguistic and cultural diversity and multilingualism. It was first announced by UNESCO on 17 November 1999.
 

Source: Chinadaily