legacy materials

[Claire Bowern]

>   We also snap-shot them as anthropological artifacts, ensuring that they
> do not change as they would if they were alive.
>
Mia, I think this implies that linguists have much more power than they
really do in communities. In my experience, the languages that die after
they've been documented are the ones that have already ceased to be used as
everyday vehicles of communication in their communities. That's a community
decision (beit usually an unconscious one) and there's nothing much that a
transient outsider visitor can do about it.

Claire
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