
Icelandic language battles threat of 'digital extinction' - bertzzie
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/feb/26/icelandic-language-battles-threat-of-digital-extinction
======
radagast
This has been discussed for as long as I remember myself (am 30 now). First it
was the influence of english in TV (we only dub childrens shows and movies). I
came unscattered from my youth and really doubt that my children won't be as
good or better at icelandic than me.

Everyone has learned icelandic, basic danish and advanced english at age 16.
From the age 16-20 majority of kids add a fourth language which is either
french, german or spanish. I'm now extra grateful for all the languages that I
was exposed too in school even though I didn't find them interesting at the
time. It's easy to communicating and understanding the basics when travelling.

And I really love my language and I'm sure that it'll hold up just fine for
the next decades. I know few examples of families with children that have
grown up abroad and yes, their grammar often is strange but they speak quite
well and they feel a connection back "home" through the language.

~~~
powercf
My problem is that, as time goes by, English use will become more common, and
Icelandic less. The spread of the English language (e.g. the children in the
article who '“know what the word is” for something they are being shown on the
flashcard, but not in Icelandic.') is accompanied by the spread of US culture
(TV, film, music). While US culture isn't neccessarily better or worse than
any other, I get a lot of enjoyment from visiting places where English isn't
spoken, and where one can see different traditions, greetings etc. I see the
spread of the English language a step in the Americanization of the world,
which is a shame.

~~~
SEJeff
You know that the English language doesn't originate in America, right?
Equating the spread of English as a step in the Americanization of the world
(to me) is a bit silly.

I can reword your statement to use Spanish and Peru. It sounds just as weird:

    
    
        I see the spread of the Spanish language a step in the Peruvianization of the world, which is a shame.
    

In America, we speak all kinds of languages, of which English is the most
common.

~~~
powercf
> You know that the English language doesn't originate in America, right?

Of course, but it's not relevent.

> I see the spread of the Spanish language a step in the Peruvianization of
> the world, which is a shame.

Peru isn't driver of Spanish-speaking culture the way the US is the driver of
English-speaking culture.

TV shows, music, film, technology news and discussion websites, …. Most are
US-made, and go hand in hand with the spread of the English language. An
English lerner in ${X} will watch Breaking Bad, House of Cards, Spiderman, …
(all in English, maybe with suptitles), will listen to Rhianna, Eminem, …, and
will talk about "Performance", "Data Center" or use other English loanwords
(if working with technology at least). It's obvious to me enough exposure to
US culture does lead to a US way of thinking.

~~~
ascorbic
They'll also probably listen to Ed Sheeran, One Direction, Adele, watch Top
Gear, Doctor Who, Downton Abbey, Bake Off, read Harry Potter. The US might be
dominant, but it's the English language that's the global hegemon.

~~~
SEJeff
This so much! This was literally my point! The English language != America,
and I say this as a born and bred (slightly unhappy with our buffoon in chief)
American.

------
cal5k
Just got back from Iceland! (I'm Canadian) Outside of the touristy parts of
Reykjavik, everybody will assume you speak Icelandic until you respond in
English. Then they'll switch to almost perfect English, with remarkably few
exceptions. It was pretty amazing.

In small towns like Akureryi, there's a lot of local pressure to keep signs
mostly in Icelandic. I was actually surprised by this since there were a lot
of English-speaking tourists in the area, but I respect it thoroughly. It's
their country, I should learn how to get around.

Oh, as an aside - as someone who is single and still uses the various datings
apps, I was also impressed by how idiomatically correct their english was even
down to slang and figures of speech. There's clearly a large influence from
American media.

If you're travelling to Iceland, take the time to learn a few basic Icelandic
phrases - the locals have a lot of pride in their culture and will love you
for it.

~~~
personlurking
On the flip side, trying to learn the language of the country you’re in when
everyone speaks fluent English kind of sucks exactly because everyone will
just switch to English instead of let you practice. I suppose that’s the rub:
to a local, when they notice you speaking (or, rather, trying to speak) a
foreign language in a their country, are you struggling or trying to practice?

~~~
pacaro
I’ve often heard this, it’s never been my practical experience. If after the
other party switches to English you either persist in their language, or ask
politely if you can continue in their language, everyone I’ve ever encountered
has been happy to help me stumble on

~~~
Mediterraneo10
There are countries where either persisting in the local language or asking
nicely, will meet with a negative response. Take the Netherlands, for example,
where 90% of the population is said to speak English now. A foreign
novice–intermediate learner trying to practice Dutch in everyday situations is
likely to be told “Let’s just speak English and not waste time.” Your
attempting to persist with your less-than-fluent command of the local language
is interpreted by your interlocutor as disrespect for his time. If you want to
learn the local language, you are expected to place the burden on your
language teacher, not random shopkeepers etc.

~~~
pacaro
Agreed, it’s definitely context dependent. There’s a world of difference
between holding up a line in a store and having a conversation, however
limited, with a taxi driver.

~~~
Mediterraneo10
The shop could be completely empty, no queue, and the shopkeeper might be free
and even bored, but chances are he _still_ won't want to listen to a novice-
intermediate foreigner practicing Dutch. Listening to halting speech can feel
like a waste of your time even if you have nothing better to do.

------
johan_larson
I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand, yes, it's a pity to see a
cultural artifact like a language fade away. I get that. But on the other
hand, having the world Balkanized into thousands of mutually incomprehensible
linguistic ghettoes is a bad thing, because it makes it harder to get things
done on large scales. Things would just be easier if we spoke a manageable
handful of languages.

~~~
tmountain
It'd also be easier if everyone painted all their houses the same color, ate
the same foods all the time, and lived in a universally cookie cutter world,
but that'd be terribly boring.

Culture is embedded into language, and suggesting that we should standardize
on a handful of languages for the sake of convenience places very low (or
maybe no) value on cultural preservation.

As someone who's been working very hard for the last two years to become bi-
lingual, I had no idea how much I'd learn about my own native language from
studying a different language, and incidentally, I've learned a ton about the
underlying culture of the target language I'm learning. Every time a language
dies, we lose a another piece of our global cultural tapestry, and I think
that's a loss that's hard to quantify.

~~~
gruez
>It'd also be easier if everyone painted all their houses the same color, ate
the same foods all the time, and lived in a universally cookie cutter world,
but that'd be terribly boring.

not a fair comparison. learning a second language takes much more resources
(time and money) than having different paint colors or food choices.

~~~
tmountain
Putting energy into cultural preservation of languages (learned at birth in
the case of the article), is a different proposition than asking someone to
learn them from scratch later in life. The question boils down to what is
worth saving and investing in, and why we place value on those things.

------
bjourne
Same thing with Swedish. :( I feel kind of guilty myself because as a
developer, I write almost exclusively in English. Most software related terms
simply don't exist in Swedish and with everyone using English no new words are
being invented.

It's even worse with the younger generation. They can't even use Swedish
idioms so they switch to English. For example, they might know and use "You're
on thin ice" but don't know what "Ute på hal is" eller "Ute på tunn is" means.
If I say "det ligger en hund begraven här" they will look at me funnily and
not understand what I mean. However, if I say "Something smells fishy" they
will know.

People older than me used even funnier idioms that no one uses anymore. For
example "Du ler förnöjt som en katt som nyss svalt en kanariefågel."

I don't know what to do about it, if anything. :/ Undoubtedly, it is easier if
everyone speaks the same language. But it is also much less interesting and
much less diverse.

~~~
kuschku
And the worst part is that with the removal of the language barrier, people
also all start to consume the same media.

And that means US culture starts to affect more and more people.

Already today people that primarily watch english media have significantly
different views on driving children to school, or social safety than those who
watch primarily media in the local language, even correcting for age, gender,
education, etc.

It’s scary to see because it’s means more and more of the broken parts of US
culture end up here in Europe as well.

~~~
irrational
What is preventing Europe from creating media that reflect their culture and
exporting it to the world? If Europe could create music, movies, etc. that are
more popular than the offerings from the US then... problem solved?

~~~
kuschku
Simply said, economics. This is a winner-takes-all problem, nothing short of
banning US media and forcing creation of a local media industry will be able
to do that.

~~~
kodis
I don't really see it as a winner-takes-all situation. Here in the US my wife
and I both enjoy many of the BBC productions, the 'Brit-com' comedy shows, and
have noticed that a significant percentage to the actors even in US produced
shows are from the UK or Australia.

It seems that there's plenty of room for good programs no matter what their
country of origin.

~~~
kuschku
How many German productions have you seen? How many French?

Germany and France each produce just as much or even more content than the UK.

Yet, none of this content ever leaves the country. British content can
directly be sold on the US market, which means they can get much more money
from those licensing deals to finance more productions.

The only situation where German or French productions show up internationally
are nature documentaries (many of the documentaries the BBC or PBS show are
produced by Germans, or as cooperation).

The English-speaking market is so large that English productions always have
an advantage, and US productions even more. A US production reaches 300
million people in its home market, and a billion globally. A German production
reaches 80 million in the home market, and 130 million globally.

And that's without the venefits hollywood has from having all the actors,
staff and technology in one place.

This battle has been decided long ago.

~~~
Grue3
>Yet, none of this content ever leaves the country.

And whose fault is this? People enjoy Japanese media all over the world
despite the language barrier. French media used to be very popular in my
country, like for example Louis de Funès movies? Even Iceland produces media
that's popular worldwide, like Lazy Town or Bjork.

~~~
kuschku
Is there any pair of countries (A, B) so that A != USA, B != USA, and A
consumes more movies from B than from USA?

I’d argue that no such pair of countries exists, except potentially ones with
restricted media import rules, e.g. the pair of (North Korea, China).

~~~
Grue3
There probably are (something like Sri-Lanka/India or Guatemala/Mexico), but
even if there aren't, what is this supposed to indicate? Yes, USA has strong
film industry, fueled by its strong economy and large population. American
films are distributed worldwide and tend to be popular with people. There's no
other country that can match USA in the sheer volume (maybe China and India).
But when making a movie you don't need to compete with the entire country. You
just need to produce something that's appealing to the audiences. Somebody
from Bulgaria doesn't care if the movie is American or German made, it's going
to be dubbed in Bulgarian anyway.

~~~
kuschku
But that was exactly my point. The US movie industry is globally dominant, and
through that, influencing other countries’ cultures.

~~~
irrational
But the EU has a greater population than the US. I don't know anything about
economics, but surely the EU as a whole is as strong as the US economy. So...
why can't the EU create a movie industry that is as dominant as Hollywood?

------
ocschwar
Hebrew, like Icelandic, is subject to a conscious effort to maintain its
character as it modernises. Icelanders want their new vocabulary to stay
Norse, as opposed to the far less picky tendencies of everyone else who uses
Germanic languages. With Hebrew, it's keeping things Semitic. New words should
be derived from Arabic/Aramaic/Maltese/Ethiopian sources before anything else,
and if that fails, first go to Persian, Greek or Latin before getting words
from English or French.

Icelanders are going to have a harder time of it, because English can worm its
way into Icelandic more easily than it can enter into Hebrew. Plus they have
less of a critical mass.

------
spraak
Reverse example: I've only [1] let my child consume Swedish media (mostly the
SVT app Barnkanalen, while we live in the US) and their accent is really good,
and they often correct me and remind me of how something should be said.

[1] Not 100%. They still watch e.g. Moana in English, or sometimes watch shows
in German, French, some English ones, etc.

~~~
nickpeterson
I think it would be especially difficult with children, since the English
version tends to be the 'real' version. As such I would assume songs to just
be more natural in english, and that tends to be the part children obsess
over. I'm from the US, so I have the same problem from the other perspective,
"Why learn a language when everyone speaks English." So you get a bunch of
children who don't want to become bilingual since it serves no apparent value
in their lives.

It doesn't help that schools basically only push Spanish, which is actively
besieged by half the population. I really wish schools would push things like
mandarin and german more since it's a much larger part of the world economy.

~~~
meheleventyone
Isn’t Spanish a globally important language as well?

~~~
icebraining
In number of speakers it is, but parent talked about the economy, and Germany
alone has a GDP of almost 70% of all the nations with Spanish as their
official language combined.

------
luxpir
Learn Icelandic for free online, via the gov-supported course:

[https://icelandiconline.com/](https://icelandiconline.com/)

Goes up to advanced level. The appeal for me is the ability to understand one
of the least changed old European languages, much akin to our Old English. One
that is bizarrely and amazingly still spoken.

Admittedly I do speak a fair bit of Swedish, potentially making things easier,
but even without that there are many cognates that make learning it easier for
English-speakers. Or German-speakers, for that matter.

~~~
amyjess
> The appeal for me is the ability to understand one of the least changed old
> European languages, much akin to our Old English.

From what I understand, written Icelandic is mutually intelligible with Old
Norse, so if you learned Icelandic you could actually read the sagas. The
pronunciation has diverged enough that the spoken languages aren't mutually
intelligible, but nobody really speaks Old Norse anymore so it doesn't matter.

I guess it's kinda like the relationship between Middle English and Modern
English. The written forms are similar enough that Chaucer is usually
presented in the original Middle English alongside a gloss for whatever words
have disappeared from the language since.

~~~
legulere
I can't say the opposite is true. I learned a bit of old norse in university
reading sagas and looking at modern Icelandic the problem really is the
vocabulary, which seems completely different from what you find in the sagas.

------
irrational
I visited Iceland for 2 weeks in April of 2016 (doing the ring road). Without
exception, everyone we met spoke great English. One day we were eating dinner
in a small cafe in the north part of the island. Our server's English was so
perfect we were convinced he grew up somewhere in the US. He informed us that
he had never left his village and had just picked it up from American TV,
movies, etc. Amazing.

------
cletus
In a world of agricultural monocultures, it's not really surprising that
languages fade while others become increasingly dominant.

Language is really an artifact of isolation and distance. In an incredibly
connected world, the pressure changes from divergence to convergence.

Like other commenters, I have mixed feelings about this. Another used the word
"balkanized" (which is a great word) to describe a world divided by
incomprehensible language.

Others note that a monoculture isn't the only solution. (Bi|multi)lingualism
is another alternative. Multilingualism was the historical response to a world
becoming increasingly connected. My great-grandfather grew up in an area where
he spoke Russian, French, German and Latvian... by necessity. Depending on
which way the political winds were blowing his generation could be conscripted
into the Russian or German (maybe Prussian at this point) armies.

That works fine when your sphere is your country and neighbouring countries.
But now the sphere is increasingly "the world".

Multilingualism seems to be somewhat cultural and, more importantly, is
something that's passed down from one generation to the next. Older children
and adults can (and do) acquire new languages with varying success (some are
adept, others are not). It seems like if you don't have this from birth you're
kinda screwed. If there's no pressure for you to use another language, you're
also kinda screwed.

This comes up particularly in the English speaking world where those countries
that have English as the predominant first language tend to have no pressure
to use another language nor the cultural heritage of multilingualism.

It seems inevitable to me that the world is heading towards a future with a
handful of remaining languages. Obvious candidates include English, Arabic,
Mandarin, Spanish, Hindi and Russian.

------
aestetix
I think that the idea that all languages but English are going to fade away
makes sense to people who only speak English.

I've lived in Germany for a couple years, and have noticed that when native
English speakers come here, the Germans all speak to them in English, and when
the English speakers go away, the Germans immediately revert back to their
native tongue. They can usually do the same for French speakers and sometimes
Spanish or Italian too. What this means is that Europeans speak several
languages, and English speakers speak one, and therefore English speakers only
encounter English.

I suspect the same is true in Iceland, but I have never been there so I can't
say for sure.

~~~
jsnell
I don't think what's being proposed here is that all other languages will
automatically fade away. It's that a language needs a critical mass to
actually produce all the cultural artifacts that make speaking it worthwhile.
And it's possible that in the modern world the required critical mass is
larger, since the expectations are higher.

Literature and music get made even for tiny languages. AAA-video games mostly
get made for maybe the top 10 languages; teams from small countries can still
make them, but they have to make sure the project has appeal worldwide. Making
a Facebook clone with better Icelandic support? Not going to happen.

------
hyperrail
Windows has provided UI language packs for Icelandic since at least the
release of Windows 8.0 in 2012, and now offers them for supported versions
starting with Windows 7: [https://support.microsoft.com/en-
us/help/14236/language-pack...](https://support.microsoft.com/en-
us/help/14236/language-packs) (The UI translation/localization is partial; the
most read strings are in Icelandic, but the rest are typically in English, and
you need to install the English UI language pack to load those strings.)

And if you go to Bing's website [https://www.bing.com](https://www.bing.com)
and set your browser to request webpages in Icelandic (via an "Accept-
Language: is" HTTP header), then much of the website changes to Icelandic.
However, the search query auto-complete suggestions and the search results
will only be in Icelandic if you are in Iceland yourself.

From the article, it seems like the Guardian reporter either didn't know this,
or doesn't think Microsoft is important (!):

> Online, however, is the biggest concern. Apart from Google – which, mainly
> because it has an Icelandic engineer, has added Icelandic speech recognition
> to its Android mobile operating system – the internet giants have no
> interest in offering Icelandic options for a population the size of
> Cardiff’s.

------
remir
I wonder what will happen to languages and culture when we will eventually be
able to transmit direct thoughts to another person using brain implants or
other tech. Imagine being able to communicate without any possibility of
misunderstanding. The idea you have in mind is the exact idea the other person
receives.

~~~
wil421
I don’t think it works that way. My thoughts are in English. I’ve asked
bilingual people about their dreams and thoughts. Most of them say it can be
both languages usually depending on where they are.

If you mean transfer a feeling then I’d agree it’s possible. Like happy, sad,
angry etc.

~~~
remir
I am bilingual. I personally do not dream in a specific language. When I wake
up, I'll remember scenes, people, feelings and actions. Sometimes there are
dialogues in French, but it's rare.

As for thoughts, I often think in French or English, but for a lot of
thoughts, no language is involved. For example, I do not think _" I must pay
my electricity bill"_ or " _I should do some laundry today "_.

------
jonathanyc
Not to be trite, but note that Iceland's total population (~300k) is less than
half of San Francisco's (~800k).

> “It’s called ‘digital minoritisation’,” said Eiríkur Rögnvaldsson, a
> professor of Icelandic language and linguistics at the University of
> Iceland. “When a majority language in the real world becomes a minority
> language in the digital world.”

This makes the phrase "digital minoritisation" seem pretty silly. We should
definitely try to protect the heritage of uncommonly spoken languages like
Icelandic, Basque, etc. But it's not clear why the plight of Icelandic, a
language with its "own country," is particularly deserving of this sort of
dramatization.

------
gabordemooij
I am creating a programming language that supports native languages, I would
love to release a version in this language. If any of you here is a native
Icelandic speaker pls contact me and help me create a proper translation
([https://citrine-lang.org/](https://citrine-lang.org/))! I'll send you a
dictionary file that contains the translation strings (from everything like
IF-ELSE to CREATEHASH and so on...)

------
lopmotr
Oh no, not another save-the-language story. As with all of them, it takes for
granted the assumption that it needs saving but doesn't explain why beyond
"cultural heritage". Why do people need to persist the same culture as their
parents and grandparents? Whatever good that does should be more than the cost
of learning it and using it everywhere. Does anyone know what the good of
maintaining a little-used language is?

In my country we have a similar issue except the local language was
artificially revived from dead so there's no or almost no unbroken chain of
native speakers. There's still debate about how some (English) letters are
supposed to be pronounced. They've added useful words, then changed them to
sound more authentic. Eg days of the week used to be transliterations from
English but now they're references to various native Gods and things. The
whole concept of a week didn't exist in the original culture so how can
authentic day names exist at all?! It's a big effort with no justification.

It leads to things like this gem of nonsense in an code of practice for
electrical work:

"From a Maori perspective, the term “earth” or Papatuanuku translates as Earth
Mother – the source of all energy. When aligning this concept to the flow of
electricity, a useful parallel can be made to the 3-pin plug."

~~~
atlih
Language affects our thought process, so therefore the fewer languages there
are in the world the more monotone the thought process of the world. I'm not
saying there's any chance of saving the languages, we will most definitely end
up with only one language somewhere in the next 200 years, I'm just pointing
out that there's something we'll lose along the way.

~~~
lopmotr
This has come up a lot but do you have any examples where it's significant?

~~~
atlih
Yes the best everyday example is when you start to think in another language
that you have learned, you cant easily translate those thoughts in your native
language. Here's an old TED talk related that has some examples and here's one
quote from it:

"Two English scientists were doing an experiment to do with genetics, and the
forelimbs and hindlimbs of animals but they couldn't get the results they
wanted, they really didn't know what to do, until along came a German
scientist, who realized they were using 2 words for forelimb and hindlimb,
whereas genetics and does not differentiate, and neither does German. So,
bingo, problem solved. If you can't think a thought, you are stuck. But if
another language can think a thought, you can learn and achieve so much more."

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCTI5tcnEok](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sCTI5tcnEok)

------
bitcoinboi9
Very easy, make Duolingo as a CAPTCHA for translating the web into Icelandic.

------
microcolonel
Well, they could start by making Icelandic accessible to the outside world,
good luck learning it outside Iceland.

------
elliottkember
"Icelandic is spoken today by barely 340,000 people"

The population of Iceland is 334,252.

~~~
dsr_
Seems reasonable that there could be 6000 or so Icelandic speakers outside
Iceland.

~~~
astrodust
Many live and work abroad, plus there's several pockets of Icelanders in
various countries, like one notable group in Western Canada as you'd see in
places like Gimli, Manitoba:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimli,_Manitoba](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gimli,_Manitoba)

It's not clear how many still speak Icelandic, but there's heritage.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icelandic_Canadians](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Icelandic_Canadians)

------
erfgh
This is bullshit and you can mostly write the same article for any non-English
language.

~~~
dsr_
I'm pretty sure French doesn't think of itself as dying. Or Spanish. Or
Portuguese, even if many more people speak it in Brazil than in Portugal.
Mandarin, Hindi, Arabic, Russian, Japanese, Malay, Korean -- English may be
the most popular second language for all these populations, but there's lots
of new work being produced in all of them, and thriving populations who use
them all day long.

