Decline of languages and culture linked to loss of Biodiversity

Updated on: Monday, May 14, 2012

A new study has claimed that the decline of languages and culture across the world is a result of loss of biodiversity.

Researchers at Penn State University in the US identified in their study,that high biodiversity areas on Earth also had high linguistic diversity.As a matter of fact 70 per cent of the world's languages were found within these hotspots.

Researchers say, as these key environmental areas were degraded over time, cultures and languages there also became extinct.

“Biologists estimate annual loss of species at 1,000 times or more greater than historic rates, and linguists predict that 50-90 per cent of the world's languages will disappear by the end of the century,” they said.

The 'BBC' quoted lead author Larry Gorenflo as saying, “We used improved language data to really get a more solid sense of how languages and biodiversity co-occurred and an understanding of how geographically extensive the language was.”

The researchers said their study achieved this by also looking at smaller areas with high biodiversity, such as national parks or other protected habitats.

“When we did that, not only did we get a sense of co-occurrence at a regional scale, but we also got a sense that co-occurrence was found at a much finer scale. We are not quite sure yet why this happens, but in a lot of cases it may well be that biodiversity evolved as part-and-parcel of cultural diversity, and vice-versa,” he said.

In their study, the researchers pointed out that, more than 4,800 out of the 6,900 or more languages spoken on Earth,occurred in regions containing high biodiversity.

Dr Gorenflo described these locations as “very important landscapes” which were “getting fewer and fewer” but added that the study's data could help provide long-term security.

“It provides a wonderful opportunity to integrate conservation efforts you can have people who can get funding for biological conservation, and they can collaborate with people who can get funding for linguistic or cultural conservation,” he added. The findings have been published in the 'Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences' journal.

Decline of languages and culture linked to loss of Biodiversity

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