A 5,000-year-old language in Cambodia on extinction list

Updated January 21, 2010 11:13:47

The United Nations cultural organisation UNESCO says one language becomes extinct every fortnight. By the end of this century, the world will likely lose half of its 6,700 languages. Cambodia has 19 languages listed as endangered, and it is unlikely that many of them will survive the next 90 years.

Presenter: Robert Carmichael
Speakers: Dr Jean-Michel Filippi, linguist; Mr Noi, S'aoch villager; Blaise Kilian, UNESCO; Ron Watt, CARE International

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CAMBODIAN VILLAGER: (S'aoch)

CARMICHAEL: You might have guessed that those words are the numbers from one to ten in someone else's language - in this case, that language is known as S'aoch and it is found in one small village in southern Cambodia. The S'aoch word for ten is LOP. And that is also the total number of people who are fluent in the 5,000-year-old language. In short S'aoch is dying. Language experts reckon it has perhaps 10 years before it disappears for ever. That is because the 110 S'aoch people prefer to speak Khmer, the language of the majority of Cambodians, rather than their own tongue. Dr Jean-Michel Filippi is a linguist who speaks more than a dozen languages. Filippi is studying S'aoch and has transcribed around 4,000 S'aoch words to date. His target, once the dictionary is completed, is a grammar book. Transcribing is a laborious process - here is Filippi using the Khmer language to transcribe the S'aoch word for durian, the pungent fruit common to Southeast Asia, with Mr Noi, the village chief, and his 40-year-old son, Tuem.

FILIPPI, NOI AND TUEM: (KHMER AND S'AOCH)

CARMICHAEL: And what does that mean?

FILIPPI: Durian.

CARMICHAEL: The durian fruit.

FILIPPI: Absolutely, absolutely.

CARMICHAEL: It is painstaking stuff, and even Filippi acknowledges S'aoch has no chance of survival. So why bother?

FILIPPI: Culturally-speaking a language is a unique vision of the world. You can take two languages which may appear to be - if not similar [then] very close to each other, like French for instance and English - in fact the vision of the world which applies in the French language or the English language are totally, totally different. If language disappears, a whole vision of the world disappears as well at the same time.

CARMICHAEL: Filippi explains that the S'aoch suffered such extreme poverty that they have rejected their own language and culture in favour of Khmer, hoping things will improve.

FILIPPI: In the case of the S'aoch they apparently want to get rid of their language and their cultural institution because it is linked to their poverty, to I would say to their economic situation, which compared to the Khmers is a very poor one, and so on and so on.

CARMICHAEL: But the S'aoch people are not alone in facing language extinction. The UN cultural body UNESCO says at least 19 languages spoken in Cambodia are at risk. Blaise Kilian is UNESCO's joint programme coordinator in Phnom Penh. He says the obvious factor in the demise of any language is having too few people who are fluent.

KILIAN: But besides this you have the environment. You have the way people themselves - especially the new generation - react to the change of environment. How much they are interested in preserving and transmitting their own languages. It's a number of I would say internal and external factors which play an important role besides the number of speakers.

CARMICHAEL: Kilian says the outlook for many of Cambodia's languages is bleak. But measures are being taken to revitalise some minority languages in the country's north and north-east. One step is bilingual education for schoolchildren. CARE International, an NGO, started a bilingual school programme seven years ago - it is now used in 25 schools and last year benefited 1,900 children. Ron Watt, CARE's education adviser, says the programme has gone from strength to strength.

WATT: Bilingual education is really spreading - people are very enthusiastic about it.

CARMICHAEL: Ron Watt explains that children in the first year of school use their own language for 80 per cent of classes with the rest of instruction in Khmer. The proportion of minority language used drops over the following two years, and by the time Grade 4 begins, all instruction is in Khmer. It's not ideal, but it is better than nothing. Good though that is, the lessons from the S'aoch are instructive and worrying. Their descent into poverty started when they lost their land 30 years ago. In today's Cambodia land-grabbing is rife, particularly in the north-east where many minority peoples live. With 19 local languages endangered, it is anyone's guess as to just how many Cambodia will have lost by the end of the century. This is Robert Carmichael in Phnom Penh. (S'aoch)