According to a study, 1,500 endangered languages will be extinct by the end of the century. The findings were published in the journal 'Nature Ecology and Evolution.'
The Australian National University (ANU) led the study, which found variables that put endangered languages at risk.
Around half of the world's 7,000 recognised languages, according to co-author Professor Lindell Bromham, are currently endangered.
"Without prompt intervention, we discovered that language loss might quadruple in the next 40 years. And 1,500 languages could be extinct by the end of the century "she stated. Their study charted the widest range of factors ever putting endangered languages under pressure.
One finding was that the number of years spent in school increased the risk of losing a language. The findings showed that we need to develop curricula that supports bilingual education, developing both indigenous language ability and the usage of regionally dominant languages, according to the researchers.
"Across the 51 factors or predictors we investigated, we also found some really unexpected and surprising pressure points. This included road density," Professor Bromham said.
"Contact with other local languages is not the problem - in fact, languages in contact with many other Indigenous languages tend to be less endangered," she added.
"But we found that the more roads there are, connecting country to city, and villages to towns, the higher the risk of languages being endangered. It's as if roads are helping dominant languages 'steam roll' over other smaller languages," she explained.
The researchers said that the findings also have important lessons for preserving many of the endangered languages spoken by Australia's First Nations peoples.
"Australia has the dubious distinction of having one of the highest rates of language loss worldwide," Professor Felicity Meakins, from the University of Queensland and one of the study's co-authors, said.
"Prior to colonisation, more than 250 First Nations languages were spoken, and multilingualism was the norm. Now, only 40 languages are still spoken and just 12 are being learnt by children," Meakins added.
"First Nations languages need funding and support. Australia only spends $20.89 annually per capita of the Indigenous population on languages, which is abysmal compared with Canada's Dollar 69.30 and New Zealand's Dollar 296.44," Meakins explained.
Professor Bromham said that as the world enters the UNESCO Decade of Indigenous Languages in 2022, the study's findings would be a vital reminder that more action was urgently needed to preserve at-risk languages.
"When a language is lost or is 'Sleeping' as we say for languages that are no longer spoken, we lose so much of our human cultural diversity. Every language is brilliant in its own way," she said.
"Many of the languages predicted to be lost this century still have fluent speakers, so there is still the chance to invest in supporting communities to revitalise indigenous languages and keep them strong for future generations," she concluded.
