Folium: How to Save a Dying Language via Smithsonian

Posted by LEAF Architect on Friday, February 1, 2013 · Leave a Comment

Folium: How to Save a Dying Language via Smithsonian

I honestly had no idea that anyone still spoke Aramaic, and even more surprising that the few that do are living in Chicago!

Aramaic, for those who are uninitiated in ancient middle-eastern languages, is believed to be the language of Christ. There are many examples and references in old, crumbling manuscripts, and even a shout-out in Monty Python and The Holy Grail. (YouTube Reference Here…)

But to think that people still spoke the language just blew my mind. Leave it to the Smithsonian to not only inform us about Aramaic in the modern days, but give us a passenger-side view of the work that is being done to preserve what is left of the language before it disappears completely!

The linguist, Geoffrey Khan of the University of Cambridge, was nominally in town to give a speech at Northwestern University, in Evanston. But he had another agenda: Chicago’s northern suburbs are home to tens of thousands of Assyrians, Aramaic-speaking Christians driven from their Middle Eastern homelands by persecution and war. The Windy City is a heady place for one of the world’s foremost scholars of modern Aramaic, a man bent on documenting all of its dialects before the language—once the tongue of empires—follows its last speakers to the grave. – Smithsonian

Image via Smithsonian.com

Like Indiana Jones in front of the Ark of the Covenant, it’s awe-inspiring to read about these social scientists and their adventures in saving the remnants of once-great civilizations. The knowledge gathered in these last moments could help us decipher puzzles that are yet to be discovered! The world is smaller than you think, and as technology brings us together, we’ll need more information than ever before in order to fit all if the puzzle pieces together.

Did your family speak another language before moving to a new country?

Did you know what Aramaic was before reading this article? Speak out in the comments below!