Mysuru: Expressing alarm at the manner in which the death of languages was being celebrated the world over, Prof Peter Austin , who holds the Marit Rausing Chair in Field Linguistics at the School of Oriental and African Studies , London, called on the audience to play an active role in preserving languages.“About 7,000 languages are spoken by people across the world today, but more than half of them are threatened, or on the cusp of extinction, said Prof. Austin, who was at the sixth edition of the international conference on endangered and lesser-known languages (ELKL-6) on Wednesday at the Central Institute of Indian Languages (CIIL).Warning against perceiving death of languages as a progressive step towards the establishment of a harmonious society, he added, “Death of languages is being seen globally as a step forward for the promotion of social cohesion. People are of the opinion that communication will be a lot easier in the coming days when one language will dominate the scene.”Pointing to the decline in the number of students in India not learning their respective mother tongues, Prof. Austin said, “Although there are 22 scheduled languages in India, English and Hindi are the more predominant ones in children’s education. More and more children are taking up learning English, and Hindi, than their mother tongues.”Prof. Austin further added that efforts needed to be made to save languages lest they be lost to posterity. “The government needs to provide economic, political and social support to communities to help preserve native tongues,” he said.Former professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University Anvita Abbi remarked that February 21 was observed as International Mother Language Day. “It is the only non-religious celebration in Bangladesh,” Anvita said, adding that research had shown that learning the mother tongue was essential to the enhancement of cognitive abilities in children.Meanwhile, former professor of Osmania University B Ramakrishna Reddy opined that exploratory research on language studies had not been undertaken seriously at educational institutions. “Languages that were prevalent during the Indus Valley Civilisation, and the Vedic period continue to be spoken in forests of India. Unfortunately, exploratory fieldwork in linguistics has not been undertaken in India,” he said.CIIL director Prof. DG Rao feared that all Indian languages could become extinct. “Documentation of languages is under way across the entire country. People are concerned about endangered languages today. All Indian languages may go extinct one day if measures are not taken to preserve them,” Prof. Rao said.He added that CIIL was doing its bit to save the 197 languages listed by UNESCO as endangered.

Stay updated with all the Latest Mysore headlines here. For more exclusive & live news updates from all around India, stay connected with NYOOOZ.