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No Language Left Behind

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Re: No Language Left Behind

#161

Post by cyphar »

Gigachad wrote: post #126
eCa wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> prunes out as many languages as possible Would you feel the same way if that includes all languages you know, including all versions of English?

Yes, I’d be happy to learn a new language if it was the step to one unified language. Of course there is no way to back that up since it will never happen but I at least assume I’d do it if that was the case.

Would you not feel even slightly unhappy that your children (or grandchildren) would not be able to read the original versions of Shakespeare, Dickens, or Austen or that they wouldn't be able to watch the original versions of movies and shows you've enjoyed? They would only be able to watch and read translations, and all of the linguistic artistry would be lost to them.

It's not just about becoming bilingual, a population becoming bilingual in a "prestige language" is the first stage of language death (though of course it doesn't /always/ lead to language death).

Re: No Language Left Behind

#162

Post by Gigachad »

cyphar wrote: post #161
Gigachad wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, I’d be happy to learn a new language if it was the step to one unified language. Of course there is no way to back that up since it will never happen but I at least assume I’d do it if that was the case.

Would you not feel even slightly unhappy that your children (or grandchildren) would not be able to read the original versions of Shakespeare, Dickens, or Austen or that they wouldn't be able to watch the original versions of movies and shows you've enjoyed? They would only be able to watch and read translations, and all of the linguistic artistry would be lost to them. It's not just about becoming bilingual, a popul…

No not really. English has shifted so far that those works are hardly as understandable now as a modern translated work.

Re: No Language Left Behind

#163

Post by raverbashing »

cyphar wrote: post #159
raverbashing wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Icelandic won't disappear soon. (it's a bit of a mistake to say latin disappeared but I digress) It might take some work (and more media being produced in it, surely) but I don't think it's at risk > because smartphones do not support their native language Nowhere in the article says that. And most smartphones do even have support (including the Icelandic keyboard) what is not supported is voice activated devices: >…

(I guess we've skipped over the discussion about whether language death can occur without genocide.) > it's a bit of a mistake to say latin disappeared but I digress Latin is a dead language. It's not extinct (because it's used for ceremonial reasons by the Catholic Church) but it has no native speakers. This is not a remotely controversial statement. Old Church Slavonic has a similar role in Slavic Orthodox Churches…

Thanks for clarifying

You're of course right about "Latin is dead" (for practical purposes). But there's lots of nuances that get lost in this statement

Latin is dead in the same way as Middle English is dead. The Latin that died is the one around the late Roman Empire time that was "photographed" and frozen in time as Ecclesiastical Latin (oversimplification, of course)

And of course the modern romance languages derived from it, but there's no exact time where those "flipped the switch" and became modern French, Spanish, Catala, Portuguese, etc. So in a way it could be argued that they're Latin 3.0 w/ DLCs (which I'll totally give that it's a big stretch)

Re: No Language Left Behind

#164

Post by MrPatan »

cyphar wrote: post #160
MrPatan wrote: post #137

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How would you feel about being the one that has to teach your children a language that will hinder their prospects instead of one that will help them succeed, just so that the speakers of the bigger language feel good about themselves that they are good people or something?

I could not think of a more obvious way of telling everyone that you are monolingual than implying that knowing another language is a burden. Children are not burdened by being multilingual. It is true that social pressures kill off local languages, but it's usually not because parents don't want to teach their children their mother tongue, it's that people stop using the language to communicate because of the influe…

English is, of course, my second language, maybe that's why you didn't quite grasp what I was saying.

The burden is not in knowing another language, the burden is in making the "less useful" language your main one.

Your parents and all of the parents in the immigrant community you live in are very happy that English is now your main language which you acquired through school, friends, tv etc. Or maybe they put you in your-language-only schools, made sure you socialized with your-language-only friends and watched your-language-only media?

Re: No Language Left Behind

#165

Post by cyphar »

Gigachad wrote: post #162
cyphar wrote: post #161

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you not feel even slightly unhappy that your children (or grandchildren) would not be able to read the original versions of Shakespeare, Dickens, or Austen or that they wouldn't be able to watch the original versions of movies and shows you've enjoyed? They would only be able to watch and read translations, and all of the linguistic artistry would be lost to them. It's not just about becoming bilingual, a popul…

No not really. English has shifted so far that those works are hardly as understandable now as a modern translated work.

That isn't the case for every language, I'm just trying to come up with an equivalent explanation of why wishing for languages to die out is a bad thing.

Re: No Language Left Behind

#166

Post by LtWorf »

rmbyrro wrote: post #57
LtWorf wrote: post #49

Facebook translations are horrifying for the mainstream languages already. They go from completely wrong to kinda understandable but still wrong.

Looks like they're investing to get better. The model is also available and they called for contributions to improve it.

Why would I help them? If it was public data sure.
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