Analytical Blog Post- The Linguists

How can language empower or oppress a group of people?  

The one thing that I noticed, that I'm sure everyone also saw, was that all the endangered languages introduced such as Chulym, Kallawaya, and Sora, are all spoken by a community who are secluded from what we can call the "mainland" (the "mainland" being the populated cities that are generally more advanced than villages). This directly relates to the theme of environments, due to the seclusion from the majority of people, the Sora villagers are more of a close-knit group. Being a close-knit group could increase the cultural meaning and significance the language has to the community. But the problem with this, if a language is not widely spoken, it can also limit communications between others. This leads to a type of oppression that would force the villagers to send their children to the more advanced cities to learn a foreign language for the betterment for the people. This connects to Theme V, as there are more economic advantages if they were to lose their native language. Another layer to this is that a child will be given a choice between the native language or the language with economic power. The decision made by the child between the two languages is usually irreversible. So if the child were to choose the 'foreign' language, this would decrease the significance of the native language and will soon die out, as fewer children will speak it. This presents this concept that seclusion from cities (cities that are very populated and have some type of "foreign" language as a tool for communication) can lead to the strengthing of a tribe or culture, but also, can lead to the downfall of that language.