Monday, May 3, 2010

The Linguists

The Linguists is a documentary that follows two linguists in their search to document dying languages. They travel to remote areas of the world that have been subject to colonization or linguistic suppression by a "killer" language, to search for native speakers. What drives the linguists to conduct their study is the hope to not lose a way of seeing the world by letting languages become extinct.

What I liked the most about the documentary was that the linguists know the importance of "living" a language. They immersed themselves in the target language's culture and shared in rituals and festivities.

One question that I have is why has it taken so long for people to appreciate linguistic diversity? And what will it take to remove the stigma surrounding minority languages?

No comments:

Post a Comment