Emergent Vitalities: New Ways of Revitalizing Languages in the Modern Age

By Jam Ham

Language shift — a phenomenon where a speech community shifts their primary linguistic medium to another language or variety, such as from Lombard to Italian in Northern Italy or from many Indigenous American languages in North America to English — is one of the many effects of contact between two or more groups. However, due to issues such as colonization and linguistic imperialism, more and more people are expressing concerns over language shift among their own groups and among other groups as well. 

One way linguists and anthropologists claim to “preserve” such languages undergoing shift and obsolescence is through language documentation, where the grammatical structure of a language is encoded in writing. However, although this is a very practical (and often necessary) way to aid those learning their own endangered languages, many members of endangered language communities and advocates of language reclamation often strive to push for further efforts beyond documentation as this does not always guarantee that the language would be put into everyday use.

So what can people working with language revitalization programs and efforts do? Bernard Perley, an anthropologist and Maliseet member of the Tobique First Nation, suggests bringing endangered languages into new, unique domains of usage, emergent vitalities. Rather than solely being on a piece of paper—unspoken—languages may be placed in a broader social context by applying it to more contemporary mediums. 

Perley, for example, has seen first hand the Maliseet language being applied to emergent vitalities such as children’s games and the recording of a story completely in Maliseet done by his mother. Today, there are also a wide range of modern mediums, such as film and social media, that act as emergent vitalities for endangered languages. Let’s see some more examples!

Language Revitalization in Film

The animated movie Klaus (2019) is one film I enjoy referencing. With the movie’s own unique telling of the origins of Santa Claus, mainly set in the archipelago of Svalbard, this movie also features tidbits of Sámi culture and language.

The film also features a character named Márgu, a young Sámi girl who only spoke Northern Sámi in the film. Northern Sámi is spoken in Northern Norway, Sweden, and Finland—not Svalbard—but those who worked on Klaus strove to ensure an accurate portrayal of the Sámi by communicating with actual Sámi people in real life about their culture and language.

The science-fiction movie Prey (2022), an installment of the Predator series, is also an excellent example of film as an emergent vitality. Set in the 1800s, this movie follows a Comanche warrior named Naru as she protects her community from a skulking foe armed with technology more advanced than any nation on Earth—an extraterrestrial predator. 

What makes Prey particularly unique as an emergent vitality is that this is the first film with a complete Comanche dub available upon its release. This allows Comanche speakers and learners to hear Comanche in a domain outside a more meta context. It’s a science fiction movie—but in Comanche!

Language Revitalization in Music

Modern forms of music and music applications have also provided a unique platform for endangered language community members to both musically express their culture and language.

Oki Kano, lead singer and tonkori player (a traditional Ainu stringed instrument), maximizes this emergent vitality by integrating modern forms of music with traditional Ainu music through Ainu-language songs with his band Oki Dub Ainu Band.

Language Revitalization in Text and Signage

One of the most widely used emergent vitalities is through linguistic landscapes, or any form of signage and visual representation of a language. Some communities in Brittany, for example, a region in France, do make an effort to implement signs in Breton (as well as French). An example is shown below, displaying Breton signs referring to everyday spaces in society.

The Yarra Valley ECOSS (Ecological and Social Sustainability) also utilizes signage to bring the Woiwurrung language (spoken by the Wurundjeri people) into new, more unique contexts. It is a non-profit organization that promotes environmental and ecological awareness while providing a site with local food producers and yearly festivals which uphold environmentally sustainable values.

Throughout their park, the Yarra Valley ECOSS hosts signs in Woiwurrung (and English) which feature basic vocabulary referring to elements one may find in their park. With this emergent vitality, the Yarra Valley ECOSS had the intention of employing the Woiwurrung language with a variety of purposes—as labels to name and pinpoint to locations as well as to help others engage with the language by teaching them useful words.

The Future for Language Revitalization

As the relationship between technology and society develops in our modern world, it is clear to see how beneficial contemporary platforms can be for people in endangered language communities. By bringing language into new, unique domains of usage, the effects of language shift may hopefully be reversed, ensuring the status of a language as a tool for everyday use.

With this, many in endangered language communities challenge the notion of “endangerment” and “linguistic death.” If we are seeing reclamation efforts elsewhere for communities who have “lost” their language, such as with Cornish and Miami language communities, Do languages really die? 

Redefining the way language “lives” in social spaces may help us bring a stronger sense of optimism in many reclamation efforts today. Rather than languages “dying,” Wurundjeri Elder Aunty Kim Wandin, for instance, who worked with the Yarra Valley ECOSS,  describes Woiwurrung words as being “asleep and hiding” and that the signage project proposed by Yarra Valley ECOSS could have Woiwurrung become “awakened and revived.” Shifting our rhetoric from being dead to sleeping allows for the idea that languages could be reawakened, motivating endangered language communities to apply their language to unique emergent vitalities—new contexts to keep it awake.

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About Jam Ham

22-year-old Filipino-American and enthusiast in linguistic anthropology, sociolinguistics, and historical linguistics. Speaks English and Tagalog, and is learning French at the moment. Likes hiking and traveling and would like to explore other countries someday.