A month from today, I participated in an engaging discussion about the anatomy of endangered language. Citing www.insidescience.org, “there are approximately 7,000 languages in the world, and 95 per cent of the world’s population speak 300 of them. Half the world speaks the largest 16. According to the Endangered Languages Project, some 40 per cent of the world’s languages are threatened.”
The participants were all too keen to jump to the conclusion that globalization and the ‘link language of the world’ is to blame.
And are you not?
When did you first become an active supporter of this charade which proclaims that the English Language is the most prominent, if not single most way, to climb the ladder of success?
Since when have you been doing this, withdrawing from healthy communication and expression just because you’re afraid that your words would sound like you’re rambling?
For how long have you curtained your thoughts with the pretext that your third language isn’t good enough to be heard?
Don’t get me wrong, I wholly perceive the concept of a binding language which facilitates free speech and understanding amongst different cultures.
But tell me this, isn’t basing judgement of merit and skills on the level of proficiency of one language taking it a bit too far?
Truth be told, I no longer know what it’s like to live in a harmonious society where your native language isn’t discouraged and looked down upon.
Nor do I comprehend the manic rush of grasping a foreign language and making it stick on your tongue so firmly that it becomes your primary ambition in life.
But here’s what I do know-
I know what it’s like to be crushed under the overpowering urge to put your thoughts to paper.
To be driven by a force much stronger than myself and to give brimming emotions and brewing contradictions a voice, all the while fighting their way through grammatical and pronunciation errors because they know, they know, even if I don’t yet, that your feelings are worth way more than a handful of petty age old- rules set by prudes.
I know what it’s like to mutter incoherent sentences in the hope that for once someone would notice the content and not the language.
Let’s settle the score here- I’m not disregarding the importance of the English language and neither am I trying to establish propaganda against it. All I have to say is- use words and languages and sentences to voice your thoughts, perspectives and opinions in whichever manner you’re comfortable in. let no one tell you that a tool of communication is worth more than the tiny voice inside your head that your anxiety has been shushing for far too long now.