Right? I think language probably does shape how we think about the world, and if biological diversity is critical to a healthy environment, why wouldn’t linguistic diversity be equally important to a healthy social ecosystem.
We’ve already lost way too many languages in the rise of capitalist modernity and the centralization of languages as part of nationalists projects… seems like we should be doing all we can to undo that damage and bring back greater linguistic diversity.
I haven’t watched this in many, many years. Since before 2016, certainly. It has a whole different tone. Slightly sadder in a way. If I may.
Totally! How we understand other cultures and other human experiences. I remember as a very naive 18 year old living in Germany and learning German from just being there how many epiphanies I had into other cultures and ways of seeing the world. And also understanding better the experience of those who are forced to live as adults in foreign lands without knowing the local language. It’s completely humbling and builds empathy.
To imagine seeing a whole language be killed off, thinking of experiencing that as someone who grew up with that language is heart wrenching.
I met an elderly Chinese woman on a trip to Beijing, Nanjing, and Shanghai. She lived in San Francisco, and subscribed to a newspaper that used the Traditional Chinese characters she learned as a child. However, Simplified Chinese was adopted after she moved to the US. So, she could speak to our guide and people we encountered during tours, but couldn’t understand signs or other written material.
Just watching her trying and failing to figure out what she was reading was painful. I couldn’t imagine being cut off from a significant part of my native language that way. However, that experience was decades ago - before widespread use of slang, acronyms, and emojis started making me worry about heading down the same path. 
Thanks @KathyPartdeux
Taiwan still uses traditional characters.
So does Hong Kong, although the way things are going there will probably be pressure to use simplified characters.
and Mandarin rather than Cantonese as well.
Not exactly a glowing review, is it?
I wonder how simplification intersects with this
It’s worse than that. The point is that the language of state and government has in many cases never been translated into Irish. This is why my Grandfather’s father didn’t want him to be an ignorant Irish speaker like he was and spoke English at home as much as possible. So his children would have a better life than him.
This addresses that issue.
An annual list of “banished words” compiled by Lake Superior State University in Michigan has caused a stir by including the distinctively Australian phrase “no worries”. Dislike of this idiom appears to be based on the misconception that it is an instruction not to worry. “If I’m not worried, I don’t want anyone telling me not to worry”, complained one person who nominated the phrase for boycotting, adding: “If I am upset, I want to discuss being upset.”
I had no knowledge of this phrase being Australian. I’ve been told it’s the replacement for “you’re welcome”, which Millennials apparently see as passive-aggressive. I know the list of banished words is tongue in cheek and whatever, and is more about overused words and phrases than anything else, but this one surprises me. What replaces it?
No worries.
It’s nothing
NBD
Fuggedaboutit
Worry not, prithee.
Their track record is here:
Problematic is newly used to describe this list.
Another Aussie favourite “too easy”.
I’ve heard some people feel the same about using the punctuation of the period in text messages. I disagree, sometimes I even use ellipses, ffs! Triple threat…
Yep, the only two acceptable punctuation marks are the exclamation point and nothing at all, and occasionally a comma!
