What is our expectation of language longevity? (BrisbaneTimes)

To read the title brings certain expectations - Rush to record Inuit tongue doomed by global warming.  In my case the reference to Inuit was the attractor.  I have spent a good portion of my career working amongst the northern people of Canada and the circumpolar north (photo taken by me in Tuktoyaktuk, NWT October 2001).  Though I have not been to Greenland.  A good friend and I have spoken for more than 10 years about the exploration potential off Greenland's east coast.  An activity taking place as of this day.  But the voice of the native northerners is being heard.  Canada's efforts to conduct geophysical surveys in the Eastern Arctic have been halted.  These people have all the 'modern' worries with development and our changing climate.  

My question was - how is global warming rushing the Inuit tongue to doom?  First and foremost, I applaud the interest and effort being carried out here.  Creating a record is an important part of our commitment to future generations.  Our experiences can be their lessons.  However, the linguist professional cited believes that the changing climate will force these folk off their land and adopt modern society as the new norm.  Although that is certainly one of the possible outcomes, it is not the only one.  Which, for me, puts into question the labeling of doomed.  


Will it be the same?  not likely.  Will it have to change?  more likely.  Will it disappear entirely?  I do not believe in any immediate sense - but really, it's all about time frames isn't it?  Take a look at a price chart for anything, one minute, 15 minute, daily, these time frames all provide a different perspective on the same thing.


And as with most aspects of our lives, there are dynamisms that occur, all the time, and on different time frames.  With the Earth having a 4.5B year history, we can still look at materials from that era with some confidence of our interpretations of what was happening at that time.  We have some ideas about the development of language through the ages, from pictographs to the present day.  Language has and always will evolve.  In my immediate family I went from a wholly Austrian centered existence to one wholly Canadian centered.  


My mother tongue changed.  Some by choice and some by circumstance.  Some within the limits that I might have some control over, and others outside.  The fundamental basis to environmental assessment is an interaction that has an effect - positive, negative, or neutral.  And we place some judgement on that effect.  Acceptable or unacceptable.  Measured according to our life values.  And as always, if measured over different time frames, it will provide  different perspectives.


What expectation do we have of the longevity of language?  Look at computer language.  Again it can be said that it has been somewhat stable for several decades.  But in the big scheme of things, how important is that small slice of time?  Certainly its importance as measured by the advance of technology has been huge.  As for so much in my world these days, I will continue to (question) and watch and learn.

Rush to record Inuit tongue doomed by global warming

Mark Brown

August 14, 2010

LONDON: A group of Inuits in Greenland who thought they were the only people on the planet until 1818 face the loss of their oral language traditions because of climate change, a British linguist says.

Stephen Pax Leonard is about to swap the comfort of Cambridge University for three months of darkness, - 40 degree temperatures and hunting seals for food with a spear in order to take the last chance to document the language and traditions of an entire culture.

Dr Leonard, an anthropological linguist, is to spend a year living with the Inughuit people of north-west Greenland, a tiny community whose members manage to live a similar hunting and gathering life to their ancestors. They speak a language - the dialect is called Inuktun - that has never fully been written down, and they pass on their stories and traditions orally.

''Climate change means they have around 10 or 15 years left,'' Dr Leonard said. ''Then they'll have to move south and in all probability move in to modern flats.'' If that happens, an entire language and culture are likely to disappear.

There is no Inughuit written literature but a very strong and ''distinctive, intangible cultural heritage'', Dr Leonard said.

''The aim of this project is to record and describe it and then give it back to the communities in a form that future generations can use and understand.''

The Inughuits thought they were the world's only inhabitants until an expedition led by the Scottish explorer John Ross came across them in 1818. Unlike other Inuits they were not influenced by the arrival of Christianity in Greenland, so they retain elements of a much older, shamanic culture and their life is not very different now to how it always has been.

Many of the men spend weeks away from home hunting seals, narwhal, walruses, whales and other mammals. And while they have tents, they still build igloos when conditions get really bad.

Their language is regarded as something of a linguistic ''fossil'' and one of the oldest and most ''pure'' Inuit dialects.

There appears to be an inevitability to the Inughuits being forced from their homeland to southern Greenland, making Dr Leonard's mission more pressing. Climate change is leading to a noticeable reduction in seal numbers and the ice will become so thin that it will be impossible to use dog sleds.

Dr Leonard intends to record the Inughuits and, rather than writing a dictionary, produce an ''ethnography of speaking'' to show how their language and culture are interconnected. The recordings will be digitised and returned to them in their own language.

''These communities, which are just years from fragmentation, want their cultural plight to be known to the rest of the world,'' he said.