PRESENTATION: How to Kill a Language

From the cultural prestige of dominant languages to colonial coercion, war, migration and climate change, languages are endangered. Sophia Smith Galer, author of How to Kill a Language and an award-winning journalist who writes and broadcasts about language, technology and culture, will take a closer look at the complex reasons behind this phenomenon. Sophia warns that half of the world’s 7,000 languages will have disappeared by the end of this century. If the limits of our language mean the limits of our world, how much do we lose when languages die? And what can we do to stop or slow down this process, retaining the richness of cultures, memories, imaginaries and identities that we inhabit through language?