The Importance of Language Diversity

Language is the set of conventions that a society uses to communicate with each other. It may be spoken, written, or phonetically or abided by on a daily basis. A language is a highly organized system of verbal communication used by people consisting of spoken words and actions. Most languages contain a visual or a graphical representation encoded in symbols, usually alphabets, which are used to spell out the meaning or sound of the message and its intended meaning. The significance of language can be determined by the number of languages that are spoken or the number of words used in a language.

A language has been in existence for as long as people have been communicating. Archaeological evidence indicates that some forms of spoken language appeared around 6000 BCE in ancient Egypt. Evidence of spoken language in China, India, Tibet, and the Andes Mountains dates back to about 5000 BCE. The earliest traces of writing appear in the form of stone seals from around 1500 BCE. Since writing and spoken language diverged significantly, it is not possible to give a precise age for the appearance of writing.

The development of written language is sometimes marked by linguistic differentiation. Old Egyptian, Sanskrit, and Greek were three very different but influential languages that gave birth to the works known as Ancient Greek, Old Hebrew, and Roman Hebrew. The development of one language may have led to the appearance of another. For example, the Indo-European language family (also called Indo-Swedish language) emerged from the Old English language down to the period of Latin, probably after the 7th century CE. In addition, Latin and Greek also developed independently from the same Greek language group, thus ensuring the existence of four separate languages in a literary tradition that spanned four continents.

When analyzing language diversity, the first step is to determine the language in which a particular document was written or spoken. However, modern analysis usually relies on morphological language diversity, which consists of all the structural features of languages that differ from spoken language. For instance, all languages make use of nasal accents, while all also have nasal vowels and similar phonetic elements. On the other hand, all languages share similar vocabulary and grammatical structure. Based on this criterion, all languages are classified into two broad categories: Indo-European languages, which are spoken ancestors of all modern languages (including English, Spanish, French, German, Danish, and Swedish); and the other, the minority language variety, which include languages like Hindi, Urdu, Tamil, Telugu, and Marathi.

As language diversity evolves, it usually takes two or three generations for an original language to completely vanish and be replaced by a descendant of its ancestor. However, changes in language usage do not necessarily indicate the existence of a language variety. For instance, languages spoken in India and Sri Lanka (or even Pakistan) can be grouped together despite their quite different grammars and usage. The same goes for languages spoken in China and Japan.

It is very important to pay attention to language diversity in education because children from a very young age are influenced by the environment they live in, including the country they live in (for example, a school in Mexico would have very different linguistic habits from one in the United States). As a matter of fact, many language minority children are often alienated from their parents' languages, especially when it comes to spoken language. These children often become quite proficient in non-linguistic languages, such as English or Spanish. Some language-minority children even go on to develop their own language, sometimes taking after their parents' language. But this is hardly the norm; most children adapt to the majority language used in their home country.

As a matter of fact, the number of languages being used in daily life is actually increasing due to globalization. One of the reasons for this phenomenon is language diversity but there are also socio-cultural aspects involved. For instance, culturally and linguistically diverse countries tend to get along better than monolingual countries with similar policies. The language policy adopted by students from abroad plays an important role in this respect.

Language policies adopted by schools also differ in their application in the United States and other Western countries. In the United States, English is the dominant language used in education. There is also a history of English at the forefront in educational systems throughout the world. However, many schools in the United States have made the decision to include languages other than English, most notably Spanish. In Europe, French is also gaining ground, especially in the academic world. Similarly, in Asia, Chinese and Japanese are gaining in popularity as language of choice for educated and middle-class people who wish to study globally.