TASK 2 --THE ROLE OF LANGUAGES IN PRESERVING CULTURE.

3. In the age of globalization, which is more important to the rest of the world, preserving ethnic languages, or enabling speakers of small ethnic languages to develop fluency in a major language such as English, Spanish, or Mandarin? Defend your position.

In my opinion, the rest of the world prefers that speakers from small ethnic languages develop fluency in a major language such as English, Spanish or Mandarin. Globalization helps to other countries generate connections as economical, culture, political and for communication. Principal language in the world is English, and all the countries are learning this to communicate. Schools teach English to every student for create this way of communication to others. I think that it is important to learn other languages, and people from small ethnic language learn other languages too. The reason of this is because through language we can express ourselves and share culture to other countries. We learn history, culture, beliefs, values from other countries through books. Books share information using language. They communicate dreams, ideas and opinions. Communications through news is important to know about what happened in other countries. For the same, languages are important to learn. The meaning of this is for generate major communication. This doesn’t mean that small ethnic languages must to lose their native language and culture. Every ethnic have their cultural origin, and we must appreciate all the history of our ancestors. In my opinion, languages can be learned, and it doesn’t mean that we can “murder” our native language. Languages are good for everyone, but I really think that some nations are in a wrong way. Some nations want to make disappear ethnical groups as United States with the American Native or Chile with the Mapuches or Aymaras. It is not correct because we must preserve our origins, and the beliefs of their culture. It is part of us because we born of our ancestors and their belief. As I said at the beginning, it is important to learn language to communication, but we can’t forget our origin.

4. Writers like Chinua Achebe and R K Narayan are not native speakers of English, yet they write and publish in that language. Many other writers from ethnic language backgrounds write and publish in the language of colonization, usually English, French, Portuguese, or Spanish, rather than in their ethnic languages. Given your answer to #2 and #3 above, do you think writers like those mentioned above should continue to write in major languages, or should they be encouraged to write in their ethnic languages, possibly with translations into major languages? Explain your answers.

Some writers are from ethnical groups and use their language, but their publications of books are in English. Some Spanish writers write books in Spanish and others make their translations. In some cases, it is common to see South American writers who write their books in English and don’t use their native language. With this in mind, I would like to say that writers can write in any language. Maybe is better to write first in their native language, and then use major language in the worlds with translations. I think it is important being a writer. You use your imagination and your knowledge to share what you know. Use a major language as English who is understated in the entire world it is a correct form to share your knowledge with others. The major reason of this is the really meaning of write books. Share the culture, adaptation of stories depending of the setting. Other people from another countries and cultures learn about the place of born of the writer, about the culture, new information. Read is good for everyone, and it doesn’t matter the language. The language is not important here, it is only the context from the entire book and the information. I think writer could write in any language, the importance here is to create communication with others using words.

Sebaalliu. I disagree with what you said because ancient cultures cannot be forced to belong to a world they don't want to. What we should do is to integrate them into our world, or even better, we should try to open up our minds and get integrated in their world.

1. How important is language to any culture?


    Language is one of the most important feature of any culture. It is the key to understand the culture of a society, their customs, traditions and values. Each different culture use their language to express its individuality. Language should be understood as much more than just a tool. I agree with the comment of Miguel Leon-Portilla, on the belief that languages should be useful in order to stay alive, showed on Kenan Malik’s essay. But I also believe that is our fault to take off their usefulness. Languages die because we take their purposes off. We start to use the most widely spread language to communicate or explain our culture, but we forget to keep our individuality. Societies should increase the necessity of their languages and by this I do not mean that they should close up of their frontiers to foreign languages. The real richness of a multicultural society is to have their citizens to be polyglots because in that way those societies really understand every feature of each other’s culture. To be polyglots is the key to maintain cultural richness among every culture. In addition to that, it is a fact that learning another language is beneficial. It brings intellectual practical, and aspirational benefits to the one who makes the effort of learning a new language.



2. In the age of globalization, which is more important to the users of small, ethnic languages: preserving the language of the culture, even if it is of limited use outside of the group, or developing fluency in a major language such as English, Spanish, or Mandarin?


    I think both are important. Users of small ethnic languages should maintain their language because it is part of their culture. A lot of things are related to the use of their mother tongue: their values, traditions, customs, common meanings, and many more elements are fundamental characteristics that users of any language should keep safe. Changing completely from their mother tongue to a more widely spread one, and stop teaching newer generations to use their mother language is an enormous mistake. I know that cultures change, that adding new features to a society’s culture is a way to develop a richer one. Perhaps the question is where should be the limit? When is adding foreign words to a mother tongue taking out of use native ones? And if making a society richer means that another will become poorer.

    The belief that some languages are more important (in a sense of being better) than others is what is making societies to include more widely spread languages to their cultures, but at the same time they are excluding their mother languages to oblivion. No language is better than other. Some might be more useful for different purposes, but that does not make them better. I just reflect our lack of capacity to learn different languages to adapt to another’s cultures.

As I said before, I think that is important for small ethnic language users to become fluent at a mayor language too. I believe that because the use of a small language on a different culture might be very difficult to their speakers; they should learn a widely spread language to communicate. Users of small ethnic languages face the necessity of learning new languages because their own language is not useful anymore. However, I am not stating that small ethnic language users have to completely quit their mother tongue. My belief is that people should learn different languages regarding to their necessities, but we all should maintain our roots because that is what makes us rich in a multicultural aspect.

On the whole, I believe that to the majority of small ethnic language users is important to keep their language because it represents their culture, but at the same time they should learn a more useful one to communicate.


3. In the age of globalization, which is more important to the rest of the world, preserving ethnic languages, or enabling speakers of small ethnic languages to develop fluency in a major language such as English, Spanish, or Mandarin? 

    I think that in this case my opinion is completely contrary to my previous answer. Before I stated that to small ethic language users is important to maintain their mother tongue because it represent their culture. Additionally, I said that it is important to ethnic language users to learn a widely spread language for useful purposes. Unfortunately to the rest of the world this might not be true.

    Globalization has made this world a more selfish one in a sense. Speakers of widely spread languages rarely decide to learn small languages. This a collateral effect of globalization processes. People do not see the use of learning a small language. We have lost the conception of learning languages because that will make us a cultured person. I believe that in general people will learn a second language only if this language will be considered useful to their life goals. Some people might even believe that small languages are so useless to them, that if they had the opportunity to help saving them from oblivion, they will think is not worth it.



    The view of living life that carries globalization is what has made us become selfish people. The development of this American Pop Culture. The acceptance of American political, social, cultural and economic standards developed by this invasion that globalization drives has developed a pop culture. The belief that economic success is the goal we all have to pursuit is what I believe their mayor influence. Globalization promoters said that this American political and economic model is an opportunity to small countries to pursuit better economic conditions. But the question is: Is it always more important to improve the economy of the country to become successful (in the American way of thinking) than to protect the richness of its culture individuality?

    Let us recapitulate, as a summary, I believe that to the rest of the world is more important to become fluent speaker of widely spread languages just because of their useful purposes. I also believe that many of widely spread languages’ speakers would not step ahead against the perishing of a small language because they believe is not worth it. Finally I attributed these phenomenon to the acceptance of American pop culture drove by globalization expansion.





4. Writers like Chinua Achebe and R K Narayan are not native speakers of English, yet they write and publish in that language. Many other writers from ethnic language backgrounds write and publish in the language of colonization, usually English, French, Portuguese, or Spanish, rather than in their ethnic languages. Given your answer to #2 and #3 above, do you think writers like those mentioned above should continue to write in major languages, or should they be encouraged to write in their ethnic languages, possibly with translations into major languages? 


    I think they should be encouraged to write in their ethnic languages and also translate their work into other languages. I believe that there might be an economic and aspirational motivation from ethnic writers to publish their work in a widely spread language. In the case of Chinua Achebe and R K Narayan both writers have as a mother tongue a language that is not widely spread. In addition to that both grown up in a country where English was the language of the colonizers. These factors at the moment of being analyzed leaves two hypothesis: first they might have decided to write in English because that will make their work more likely to become widely known. Second, they might have decide to write in English because they feel this language represent the culture that now they accept as their own.

    The first hypothesis can be exemplified at Chinua Achieve‘s essay "The African Writer and the English Language"(1975). In which he deliberates about how the process of colonialism on the hand of Western colonizers provided to the colonized people, "a language with which to talk to one another". He stated that his main purpose while writing is being able to communicate with different readers across Nigeria. Therefore he decided to use "the one central language enjoying nationwide currency" (pp. 77–78). I believe that the idea of having a common language is a valid one because that will ensure common understanding. On the contrary I also believe that can be achieved by writing their book on their native language and then translate them into another.

    The second hypothesis: the belief that those writers might write in English because it represents the culture that is now their own takes place on a promise that R K Narayan made. During 1938, R K Narayan made a promise to his dying uncle. This said that he would translate a 1930’ mythological Tamil book into English. The book was called Kamba Ramayanam. This promise represent the importance of English language to R K Narayan and to his family.

    In conclusion, I stated that I believe that ethnic language writers should write their works in their native language and then translate it into another. I also stated that I considered valid to those writers to publish their work in a widely spread language because of its communicative purposes. Finally, I stated that there might be two main motivations that incentive those writers to publish in English: first the fact that will make their books more accessible to different cultures, and second, because they might have an emotional connection to English.

4. Writers like Chinua Achebe and R K Narayan are not native speakers of English, yet they write and publish in that language. Many other writers from ethnic language backgrounds write and publish in the language of colonization, usually English, French, Portuguese, or Spanish, rather than in their ethnic languages. Given your answer to #2 and #3 above, do you think writers like those mentioned above should continue to write in major languages, or should they be encouraged to write in their ethnic languages, possibly with translations into major languages? Explain your answers.

I believe they are thinking in what is more profitable to their careers. Maybe they could write their books in their native language but these books would have been translated into English. But it could be interesting if they have used their own language because they can close people to their language and their culture through their books. Also, when some book is translated into another language the essence of the story is lost. A specific word can be a different meaning from an English word. I think these stories should write in their ethnic languages because they are about their culture. It´s strange you write a story of Chile if you write it in English. There some words that can express in English, or they don´t have the same meaning, so the sense is lost. That´s why I advice them to weite in their ethnic language, I think will be more interesting.

1. How important is language to any culture?


“Many societies, particularly indigenous peoples, view culture as their richest heritage, without which they have no roots, history or soul. Its value is other than monetary. To commodify it is to destroy it.” (Maude Barlow, “The Global Monoculture,” Earth Island Journal. Autumn 2001).

Personally, I believe this phrase answers any question related to culture, language and ethnic identity. Not only the spoken language is important in a society, but the facial, corporal and non-linguistics language define a culture. The culture, customs, language, beliefs, traditions, history, and religion are the basis of our background and the root of who we are nowadays. We can’t delete our past or change it, but appropriate it and not feel embarrassed of it.

Chileans are not aware of the importance of language. It is seen in all the variations that we made to the language and the degradation of itself. We are more concerned on learning other languages, which we think are better than the one we have, thinking on our own benefit which these other languages provide us than the richest that Spanish itself has.


2. In the age of globalization, which is more important to the users of small, ethnic languages: preserving the language of the culture, even if it is of limited use outside of the group, or developing fluency in a major language such as English, Spanish, or Mandarin? Defend your position.


Yet this entire globalization theme I believe is more important preserving the language of the culture for the users of small, ethnic language. Meanwhile people are focused on learning English, Spanish or Mandarin to acquire a higher status in society, these people from tribes or ethnic background are worried on maintain and preserve the rich of their language through several technological devises, such as recordings, online dictionaries, etc. In somehow, I envy these people because they strongly believe on their customs and traditions, something that we have been losing through time. Globalization and the modern age are the responsible of all these changes in tradition and of losing identity.

I believe that the reason for losing the interest on preserve these ethnic languages is because there aren’t people interested on learning it or there isn’t a living person to share the language and traditions to preserve their roots. As in the example of the Siletz language, it has been reborn thanks to a man who has been working on a dictionary for years and recordings made by himself in effort to preserve the language and the culture in spite of he was born in another country and speaking another language. I believe in the inspiration and in the love he shows to have to his ancestors and native roots to preserve just this little piece of what his tribe used to be. His determination has lead him to create an amazing work based on oral traditions that their elder relatives gave him, and now are the only living proof of their existence.

That’s what we should do to preserve the roots of who we are and where we come from; determination is the key for this. I’m not from an ethnic tribe or so, but I would like to have native or aboriginal blood just to say with proud that I’m a real Chilean.





3. In the age of globalization, which is more important to the rest of the world, preserving ethnic languages, or enabling speakers of small ethnic languages to develop fluency in a major language such as English, Spanish, or Mandarin? 

As I previously said, I believe that in the age of globalization people are more interested in developing fluency in a major language than protect and preserve their own language. Today is more important to learn a new language or more than one than improve and develop your own language due to this globalization and the importance of knowing more languages so you can travel around the world expanding your knowledge or company. Also, knowing other languages provide you a higher qualification among other professional in the same area, so you can have more chances of having a better paid job than other people. Nowadays is well seen to learn other language, a global language; such as English, which opens more doors than Spanish, than improving our own native language. I believe is important to learn other languages due to this globalization and the growing of English as a global language, but we can’t forget our roots and the importance of our native language and its beauty, which make us who we are.

We should be aware of this globalization effect and list our priorities, we shouldn’t think only in ourselves, but to think in the roots that our ancestors gave us to be the persons who really are today. It’s important to be “in” in the globalization and modern age process, but in this process we can’t forget where we come from. I believe in feeling proud by saying “I have native blood” or so, but also I know many people who don’t feel proud of it, and I can’t understand why. They only use it to have scholarships and stuff; very clever, but not real. Of course, globalization opens an unknown world, which we desperate want to explore, but in the way we are so shortsighted that we forget even who we really are. I believe in changing for a good reason, for the good of humanity and population, but I desperately beg don’t forget our north and our roots.



4. Writers like Chinua Achebe and R K Narayan are not native speakers of English, yet they write and publish in that language. Many other writers from ethnic language backgrounds write and publish in the language of colonization, usually English, French, Portuguese, or Spanish, rather than in their ethnic languages. Given your answer to #2 and #3 above, do you think writers like those mentioned above should continue to write in major languages, or should they be encouraged to write in their ethnic languages, possibly with translations into major languages?


If I were a member of their tribe or community, I will probably feel upset and disappointed. If you want to write and tell the world about our customs, traditions, way of living, and how we feel about the rest of the world and people, then you should write in our own language in the first place, and make a translation afterwards. Of course, they should write in their ethnic language first to let the rest know the importance of their roots and believes. They should also tell their communities about the book and the intentions and purposes on writing it.

Obviously, they wanted to get and reach as many countries as they could, so they wrote their books in English, “the global language”; and they did, they reached many countries, tribes and communities from all over the world, but in the way, they forgot to include some words or vocabulary related to his own ethnic language for the rest of the world could have the possibility for knowing this different way of living in times of globalization and/or with less technology to be incorporated to their lives. I thank them for writing in English, so I could read their books, but I will also thank them in incorporating more language phrases or words from their language because sometimes it is more hard to understand and believe on these stories without avidence of what they are talking about.