Date: 29-Jan-2007 From: Elyse Turr <elyse.turroup.com> Subject: When Languages Die: Harrison
Title: When Languages Die
Subtitle: The extinction of the world's languages and the erosion of human knowledge
Published: 2007
Publisher: Oxford University Press
http://www.oup.com/us
Author: K. David Harrison
Hardback: ISBN: 9780195181920 Pages: 304 Price: U.S. $ 29.95
Abstract:
Speakers of thousands of the world's languages are now switching to speaking global tongues, abandoning their ancestral tongues at an unprecedented rate. As these languages vanish, what exactly is being lost? This book highlights the complex systems of knowledge embedded in language, and shows their loss, on the individual and global scales. Language abandonment is a loss not only to the communities, but to the scholars of every field, and to humanity as a whole.