Babbel On: November 2018 Language News Roundup
Tourism in Iceland, the language of the environment and more news from the world of language this past month.
Tourism’s Toll On The Icelandic Language
If you follow lots of influencers on Instagram, you have probably seen a few pictures of Iceland. Or a lot of pictures. Like, so many pictures. In 2018, tourism is the largest industry in Iceland, and several factors have led to this. First, the global recession in 2008 made it far more affordable to get to. Second, the country is objectively photogenic, and it’s a wonderful place for many people to visit. At this point, locals are vastly outnumbered by the outsiders who visit each year.
Tourism can be great for a country, but it can also harm people who actually live there. One feature that has been hit especially hard is the prevalence of Icelandic. In The Guardian, author Ragnar Jónasson writes about how English is now becoming a dominant language. Local businesses and restaurants are pivoting to English. Icelandic — despite being spoken by 400,000 people in the world — is losing its hold in the country, to the dismay of many people. Iceland is a very literary country, but book reading seems to be on the decline. Most worryingly of all, Icelandic children are having difficulty reading their own language. Their understanding of English, however, is on the rise.
English is useful in Europe because, in many ways, it’s become the lingua franca of Europe. With so much culture and business being facilitated by English, there is a huge benefit to learning the language. But when learning English comes at the cost of other cultures, it is worth giving second thought to. Jónasson argues that it is imperative for Iceland to defend the language from extinction now rather than later. English isn’t going away any time soon, but that doesn’t mean other languages shouldn’t fight for the right to coexist peacefully.
An Ancient Written Language In Scotland (That Is Probably Roman)
When Roman forces were building their empire, they made many inroads to the United Kingdom. Scotland, however, remained uninvaded, largely thanks to the Picts, who were one of the many groups that lived in Scotland from about the 2nd century to the 10th century. There is plenty left unknown about these people who lived over a thousand years ago, but they do have one lasting legacy: the Pictish symbols that were carved into stones, bones and metalworks. One example is the Serpent Stone, pictured here, which shows the language of the Picts.
For a while, the Pictish symbols were a perplexing mystery. Where did they come from? A writing system bursting forth where none existed before is a very, very rare occurrence: in all of human history, there have only been two proven instances of a culture inventing a written language. Could the Picts have created a written language from scratch, becoming the third society in all of history to have done so?
In short, the answer is no, the Picts probably did not invent this written language without any outside influence. New research published in Antiquity suggests that the Picts were inspired by the invading Romans, who brought their writing with them to Scotland. It seems that upon realizing that Romans were able to write, the Picts discovered that they could co-opt this technology for their own uses.
The main problem today, however, is that no one is capable of reading the Pictish symbols. And unless there’s a major discovery on the caliber of a new Rosetta Stone, it’ll probably stay that way. Still, it’s interesting to see written languages that were created merely because people became aware of the possibility of written languages. It shows that written language can be an elusive idea, even if it seems like a given to us today.
Read More: We’ve written about another instance where a written language was invented because someone had seen other examples of written language. Sequoyah, a Native American who lived in the 18th and 19th centuries, single-handedly developed a writing system for Cherokee, and in doing so, helped preserve dozens of indigenous languages.
Creating A Language For The Environment
Every once in awhile, we just lack a word to describe a phenomenon or a feeling. Sometimes we’ll turn to another language by acquiring loanwords, or morph existing words to fit this void in our own vocabulary.
What’s hardest, however, is inventing entirely new words and convincing others to use them. But that hasn’t stopped plenty of people from trying. One such linguistic innovator is Glenn A. Albrecht, a retired professor who is trying to create a new language to describe the relationships between humans and nature. Motherboard talked with Albrecht about the language he invented for his website and his upcoming book Earth Emotions: New Words for a New World, which comes out in May. Here’s a sampling from his dictionary:
- psychoterratica — a word to describe the relationship between the mind (psycho) and the planet (terra)
- sumbiology — “the study of humans ‘living together’ with the totality of life”
- tinpany — “the sound heavy rain makes on a tin or metal roof,” mainly a play on words referring to the timpani drum
- solastalgia — “a form of ‘homesickness’ like that experienced with traditionally defined nostalgia, except that the victim has not left their home or home environment”
- meteoranxiety — “the anxiety that is felt in the face of the threat of the increasing frequency and severity of extreme weather events”
- tierraphilia — “the love of the Earth”
While all of these words may never catch on, some might. Solastalgia has already been used in various circumstances, and these words are useful for humans on a changing planet. Next time you’re talking about your fears of massive storms, maybe try throwing “meteoranxiety” into the conversation.
Babbel Bites
The Babbel staff’s favorite language articles from the last month.
The Secret Language of She-Ra
Animated shows love sneaking in little Easter eggs for their fans to spot, and the reboot of She-Ra, called She-Ra and the Princesses of Power follows in that tradition. The creators recently tweeted out a guide to writing your name in the language of the First Ones, which involves learning a lot of shapes and rules. But it sure does look cool:
The Great Debate: Assclown vs. Asshat
Quartz asked linguists what they thought about the slight differences in connotation between “asshat” (an insult going back hundreds of years) and “assclown” (which comes from the movie Office Space). The results are very entertaining, particularly one line that attempts to explain the difference: “A hat is something you wear; a clown is something you are.”
Translating Harry Potter Is Hard Work
It’s been 20 years since Harry Potter first appeared in the world, and since then, it has rounded the globe multiple times. To mark the anniversary, Entertainment Weekly wrote about the difficult task of translating the book into so many languages so quickly (it took a lot of creativity to make J.K. Rowling’s wordplay work in dozens of languages).
The Almost-Forgotten North American Language
The BBC wrote about Chinook Wawa, a language that may have originally formed so that various First Nations tribes could communicate with each other. It became the lingua franca of the Indigenous and European peoples on the Pacific coast of the Americas, and despite waning in relevance, there are still traces of it today.
Starbucks Opens All-ASL Store
We wrote about Starbucks planning to open a location in Washington, DC, that features American Sign Language. The store opened this past month, and a CNN article about its opening offers a look inside the store, demonstrating exactly how ASL is used there.
