11.1634, Books: Endangered Languages

Wed Jul 26 21:05:47 UTC 2000

LINGUIST List:  Vol-11-1634. Wed Jul 26 2000. ISSN: 1068-4875.

Subject: 11.1634, Books: Endangered Languages

Moderators: Anthony Rodrigues Aristar, Wayne State U.<aristar at linguistlist.org>
            Helen Dry, Eastern Michigan U. <hdry at linguistlist.org>
            Andrew Carnie, U. of Arizona <carnie at linguistlist.org>

Reviews: Andrew Carnie: U. of Arizona <carnie at linguistlist.org>

Associate Editors:  Ljuba Veselinova, Stockholm U. <ljuba at linguistlist.org>
		    Scott Fults, E. Michigan U. <scott at linguistlist.org>
		    Jody Huellmantel, Wayne State U. <jody at linguistlist.org>
		    Karen Milligan, Wayne State U. <karen at linguistlist.org>

Assistant Editors:  Lydia Grebenyova, E. Michigan U. <lydia at linguistlist.org>
		    Naomi Ogasawara, E. Michigan U. <naomi at linguistlist.org>
		    James Yuells, Wayne State U. <james at linguistlist.org>

Software development: John Remmers, E. Michigan U. <remmers at emunix.emich.edu>
                      Sudheendra Adiga, Wayne State U. <sudhi at linguistlist.org>
                      Qian Liao, E. Michigan U. <qian at linguistlist.org>

Home Page:  http://linguistlist.org/

The LINGUIST List is funded jointly by Eastern Michigan University,
Wayne State University, and donations from subscribers and publishers.

Editor for this issue: Scott Fults <scott at linguistlist.org>
 ==========================================================================

Links to the websites of all LINGUIST's supporting publishers are
available at the end of this issue.

=================================Directory=================================

1)
Date:  Wed, 19 Jul 2000 14:14:38 +0100
From:  "daniel.nettle" <daniel.nettle at quista.net>
Subject:  Endangered Lang: Vanishing Voices, D. Nettle & S. Romaine

-------------------------------- Message 1 -------------------------------

Date:  Wed, 19 Jul 2000 14:14:38 +0100
From:  "daniel.nettle" <daniel.nettle at quista.net>
Subject:  Endangered Lang: Vanishing Voices, D. Nettle & S. Romaine

Vanishing Voices: The Extinction of the World's Languages

By Daniel Nettle and Suzanne Romaine, Oxford University Press, 2000

Hundreds of the 6,000 or so languages of our planet are disappearing
every year, dying one by one like the creatures on the Endangered
Species List.  Indeed, language-diversity and biodiversity have a lot
in common, so, shouldn't we be alarmed about the disappearance of
linguistic diversity as well?

VANISHING VOICES tells the story of how and why languages are
disappearing.  Nearly 100 native languages once spoken in what is now
California are near extinction, and most of Australia's 250 aboriginal
languages have vanished.  In fact, at least half of the world's
languages may die out in the next century. The authors Daniel Nettle
and Suzanne Romaine assert that this trend is far more than simply
disturbing.

Making explicit the link between language survival and environmental
issues, they argue that the extinction of languages is part of the
larger picture of near-total collapse of the worldwide ecosystem. The
authors contend that the struggle to preserve precious environmental
resources-such as the rainforest-cannot be separated from the struggle
to maintain diverse cultures, and that the causes of language death,
like that of ecological destruction, lie at the intersection of
ecology and politics.

And while Nettle and Romaine defend the world's endangered languages,
they also pay homage to the last speakers of dying tongues, such as
Red Thundercloud, a Native American in South Carolina, Ned Madrell,
with whom the Manx language passed away in 1974, and Arthur Bennett,
an Australian, the last person to know more than a few words of
Mbabaram.

In our languages lie the accumulated knowledge of humanity. Each
language is a unique window on experience. VANISHING VOICES is a call
to preserve this resource, before it is too late.

Publisher's website: http://www.oup.com

---------------------------------------------------------------------------

 If you buy one of these books, please tell the publisher or author that
 you saw it on LINGUIST.

 The following publishers contribute to the support of The LINGUIST List:

 MAJOR SUPPORTERS

         Academic Press
                  http://www.academicpress.com

         Arnold Publishers
                  http://www.arnoldpublishers.com

         Athelstan Publications
                  http://www.athel.com

         Blackwell Publishers
                  http://www.blackwellpublishers.co.uk/

	Cambridge UP -USA
                  http://www.cup.org

         Cascadilla Press
                  http://www.cascadilla.com/

         CSLI Publications
                  http://csli-www.stanford.edu/publications/

         Elsevier Science Ltd.
                  http://www.elsevier.nl/

         John Benjamins
                  http://www.benjamins.com/

         Kluwer Academic Publishers
                  http://www.wkap.nl/

         Lernout & Hauspie
                  http://www.lhsl.com

         Lincom Europa
                  http://www.lincom-europa.com

         MIT Press
                  http://mitpress.mit.edu/books-legacy.tcl

         Mouton de Gruyter
                  http://www.deGruyter.de/hling.html

         Multilingual Matters
                  http://www.multilingual-matters.com/

         Oxford UP
                  http://www.oup-usa.org/

         Rodopi
                  http://www.rodopi.nl/home.htm

         Routledge
                  http://www.routledge.com/

         Springer
                  http://www.springer.de

         St. Jerome Publishers
                  http://www.mcc.ac.uk/stjerome

         Summer Institute of Linguistics
                  http://www.sil.org/

 OTHER SUPPORTING PUBLISHERS

         Finno-Ugrian Society
                  http://www.helsinki.fi/jarj/sus/

         Graduate Linguistic Students' Assoc., Umass
                  http://www.umass.edu/linguist/GLSA/

         IULC Publications
                  http://www.indiana.edu/~iulc/

         Kingston Press Ltd.
                  http://www.kingstonpress.com

         Linguistic Assoc. of Finland
                  http://www.ling.helsinki.fi/sky/

         Linguistic Society of Southern Africa (LSSA)
                  http://www.safest.org.za/bsp

         Orientalia et Africana Gothoburgensia
                  http://orient218.orient.gu.se/afrikanska/afrpubl.html

         Pacific Linguistics
                  http://pacling.anu.edu.au

         Sage Publications, Inc.
                  http://sage.com

         U. of Antwerp, Dept of Germanic Languages
                  http://apil-www.uia.ac.be/apil

         U. of Arizona Press
                  http://www.uapress.arizona.edu

         U. of Huelva
                  http://www.philologia.uhu.es

         U. of Marburg & Max Hueber Verlag
                  http://staff-www.uni-marburg.de/~introlin/

         Utrecht Institute of Linguistics
                  http://www-uilots.let.uu.nl/

         Vaxjo: Acta Wexionesia

         Virittaja Aikakauslehti
                  http://www.helsinki.fi/jarj/kks/virittaja.html
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
LINGUIST List: Vol-11-1634