The concern for the fastdisappearing language stocks of the world has arisenparticularly in the past decade as a result of the impact of globalization.This book... » 

The concern for the fastdisappearing language stocks of the world has arisenparticularly in the past decade as a result of the impact of globalization.This book appears as an answer to a felt need to catalogue and describe thoselanguages making up the vast majority of the worlds six thousand or moredistinct tongues which are in danger of disappearing within the next fewdecades. Endangerment is a complex issue and the reasons why so many of theworlds smaller less empowered languages are not being passed on to futuregenerations today are discussed in the books introduction. The introduction isfollowed by regional sections each authored by a notable specialist combiningto provide a comprehensive listing of every language which by the criteria ofendangerment set out in the introduction is likely to disappear within thenext few decades. These languages make up ninety per cent of the worldsremaining language stocks. The Encyclopedia therefore provides in a singleresource expert analysis of the current language policy situation in everymultilingual country and on every continent detailed descriptions of littleknown languages from all over the world and clear alphabetical entries regionby region of all the worlds languages currently thought to be in danger ofextinction. The Encyclopedia of the Worlds Endangered Languages will be anecessary addition to all academic linguistics collections and will be a usefulresource for a range of readers with an interest in development studiescultural heritage and international affairs. «