Reviving a fading language called Quechua
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| | | That's wonderful. | May 16, 2014 |
I am really proud of her.
| | | | Stephen Franke
United States
Local time: 14:24
English to Arabic
+ ...
| Quecha is a vital & popular language among some emigre populations resettled in southern California | May 19, 2014 |
Greetings to all in this interesting thread.
May one observe that Quecha is a vital and popular language among a number of emigre populations resettled in southern California, particularly those in Los Angeles and Orange Counties.
That said, there reportedly is some difficulty in finding fluent English Quecha bilinguals who can interpret during legal, school, and administrative hearings.
The most-common work-around has been using two interpreters in a three-ph... See more Greetings to all in this interesting thread.
May one observe that Quecha is a vital and popular language among a number of emigre populations resettled in southern California, particularly those in Los Angeles and Orange Counties.
That said, there reportedly is some difficulty in finding fluent English Quecha bilinguals who can interpret during legal, school, and administrative hearings.
The most-common work-around has been using two interpreters in a three-phase process:
English -- Spanish, then Spanish -- Quecha, and v.v.
Regards,
Stephen H. Franke
Senior veteran Arabic linguist
San Pedro (Los Angeles Waterfront Area), California
[Edited at 2014-05-19 22:12 GMT]
[Edited at 2014-05-20 16:40 GMT] ▲ Collapse
| | | | Reed James
Chile
Local time: 17:24
Member (2005)
Spanish to English
| A few observations | May 28, 2014 |
First of all, we all speak languages that evolved from other languages that are now extinct or only survive in written form. I get the feeling that if people actively preserve Quechua, it will be something of a museum piece. It won't be what it used to be, and certainly not on US soil where speakers are far away from their native habitat. What is wrong with just preserving Spanish? I'm almost sure that there is no Quechua speaker who emigrated to the United States who does not speak Spanish. Spa... See more First of all, we all speak languages that evolved from other languages that are now extinct or only survive in written form. I get the feeling that if people actively preserve Quechua, it will be something of a museum piece. It won't be what it used to be, and certainly not on US soil where speakers are far away from their native habitat. What is wrong with just preserving Spanish? I'm almost sure that there is no Quechua speaker who emigrated to the United States who does not speak Spanish. Spanish is going to be the language of reading and writing, the language of doing business. Also, I wonder about the funding going toward preserving a language. With the US national deficit as gaping as it is, isn't there something better that could be done with those funds? ▲ Collapse
| | | | | What is lost when languages die | Jun 5, 2014 |
@Reed - your rather out-of-date functionalist approach to language, completely ignores how languages are containers or repositories of thousands of years of a people’s science and art. That part is not translatable, and will not transfer from Quechua to Spanish.
"The disappearance of a language is not only a loss for the community of speakers itself, but for our common human knowledge of mathematics, biology, geography, philosophy, agriculture, and linguistics. In this century, we a... See more @Reed - your rather out-of-date functionalist approach to language, completely ignores how languages are containers or repositories of thousands of years of a people’s science and art. That part is not translatable, and will not transfer from Quechua to Spanish.
"The disappearance of a language is not only a loss for the community of speakers itself, but for our common human knowledge of mathematics, biology, geography, philosophy, agriculture, and linguistics. In this century, we are facing a massive erosion of the human knowledge base."
See: http://www.swarthmore.edu/SocSci/dharris2/endangered.php
" The effort to keep languages alive can lead to hard arguments, especially where limited funds are available to spend on education and official communications. In both America and Britain, some feel that, whatever people speak at home, priority should go to making sure that children know English well.
But supporters of linguistic diversity make strong arguments too. Nicholas Ostler, a scholar who heads the Foundation for Endangered Languages, a non-profit group based in Britain, says multilingual children do better academically than monolingual ones. He rejects the notion that a common tongue helps to avoid war: think of Rwanda, Bosnia and Vietnam.
Mark Abler, a Canadian writer, says the protection of endangered species is closely linked to the preservation of tongues. On a recent expedition in Australia, a rare turtle was found to have two varieties; a dying but rich native language, Gagudju, had different words for each kind."
See http://www.economist.com/node/12483451
To get a deeper feel for the subject matter, I also suggest:
http://www.economist.com/node/3518542
http://www.economist.com/node/21528592 ▲ Collapse
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