Essay on Effect of Dying Language in America

In the next 100 years, approximately 7000 spoken languages in the world are anticipated to vanish (Mufwene, 2008). Languages are dying faster while compared with the loss of biodiversity with economic growth as the leading cause for the loss of many Native American tongues. As economy develops, there erupts a dominant language in a nation’s educational and political spheres leading to people adopting the dominant language due to risk of being left out. Example of a dying language is Athabaskan which is spoken by Siletz tribe in Pacific Northwest. Chief Marie Smith Jones of Anchorage, Alaska, was the last native Eyak speaker and passed away in 2008. The culture of Athabaskan is dying as there are less people identifying with the language. Language is the mode of communication that certain group will have and every group using one language has similar customs and beliefs. It’s a clear observation that, losing a language is losing culture and losing culture is losing precious knowledge.

Youst & Seaburg 2002, language is not just a means of communication, but it’s a marker of identity among tribes. The Athabaskan regarded themselves as small local groups’ members not a portion of the enormous Athabaskan culture. Every group typically had 25 to 100 members, but some had up to 200 members. Every group belonged to a larger regional group sharing the same language and occupying a defined territory. The regional group was the important cluster to select marriage partners. Families would join to go for social events and scale hunting and they mostly traced their ancestry through the female line. Children were assigned tasks while quite small where they learnt through practice and observation.

Upon reaching womanhood, girls were secluded from the family, and the taboos restricted them on all aspects of their behaviors. They had to avoid contact with men as their menstrual cycle contained spiritual power that would bring scarcity and alienate animals. Throughout their adult life, women followed monthly seclusion and taboos. Girls were married shortly after reaching puberty through arranged married from a man of the same language. The selected husband used to move to the woman’s family to work for them for a year. The Athabaskan used to celebrate successful fishing and hunting seasons during winter which they combined with renewing ties of friend or families and arranged marriages. Most of the Athabasca performed ceremonies to honor the dead.

Globalization process has intertwined the cultural energy which drives human relationships, interactions and behaviors that disturb the culture from its most authentic, native custom. In the midst of integrating different cultures in the US, a common culture has been formed, ‘‘American’’ culture which is a hodgepodge of different cultures. This is both positive in its integration of people from different walks of life and negative as it diminishes the comparative quality of different native cultures. In Athabaskan, losing some of their practices is beneficial as they are out of date. It is beneficial to lose some of the beliefs like restricting the girls from choosing partners to marry, restrictions during monthly period and others.

The economic advantages should not be allowed to cause extinction of some languages and culture. People should be bilingual where they retain their culture which identifies them as they familiarize with the globalization aspect. Economic growth is essential but retention and reservation of culture is important too. This calls for a balance of both aspects for it to benefit speakers. Language extinction should not be an option for economic growth as individuals can learn more than one language. This will help in retaining culture of every group which they identify with.

However, culture is defining characteristic of a person’s identity, that contributes to how we see things about ourselves and the group we identify. Language is a true instrument of a group’s or community reality perception as it influences the way they perceive their environment, the way they think, the way the act and speak. Language thus acts as an instrument that communicates the culture and uniqueness of a community or a group of people from the rest. It is imperative to develop and sustain languages by protecting them from adulteration from outside influences which happens when one culture dominates another. Every ethnic group has changed with time but some still carry on with their practices and their language is not demolished thus retaining their culture. Athabaskan should not be any different calling for constructive models to learn the language for the ethnic community will help in conserving their culture.

Reference

Mufwene, S. (2008). Language evolution. London: Continuum.Youst, L. & Seaburg, W. (2002). Coquelle Thompson, Athabaskan witness. Norman, Okla.: University of Oklahoma Press.