The Business of Life with Dr King
Dr Ariel Rosita King brings on a variety of International guests from various countries, cultures, organisations, and businesses to talk about turning
problem into possibilities! Let's turn our challenges in opportunities together!
The Business of Life with Dr King
Max Tuana: The Battle to Save Dying Languages and Preserve Cultural Heritage
What happens to our cultural identity when the languages we speak start disappearing? Join us as we welcome Mr. Max Tuana, an eloquent advocate for linguistic diversity, who shares his captivating journey growing up in a multilingual household. Max provides an insightful perspective on the alarming decline of the world's languages, predicting that globalization and state policies could potentially erase half of them within the next century. Through his personal experiences and poignant anecdotes, he underscores the vital connection between language and cultural heritage, drawing attention to the challenges faced by regional languages like Basque and Breton in France.
Together, we embark on an exploration of how language shapes not just our communication but the very fabric of our identities. From the challenges of translating culturally rich concepts to the joys of learning through immersion, Max and our discussion bring to light the profound impact language has on our lives. We highlight inspiring initiatives, like those in Hawaii, which are breathing new life into native languages through education and community engagement. Tune in to be inspired to reconnect with your linguistic roots and appreciate the deep ties between language and personal identity.
The Business of Life
Dr Ariella (Ariel) Rosita King
Original Song, "Teach Me to Live one Day At A Time"
written, guitar and vocals by Dr. Ariel Rosita King
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Teach me to live one day at a time, with courage, love and a sense of pride, giving me the ability to love and accept myself so I can go and give it to someone else, to the business of life. My name is Dr Ariel King and today we welcome you. We have a very special guest today, a young person, mr Max Tuana, and he's going to be speaking about the importance of language. Sir Max, welcome.
Sir Max Tuana:Thank you, dr King. Thank you for having me. Yeah, it's an honor to be here and I think that language is a very important topic that a lot of people just aren't very knowledgeable about. I think that I mean there are currently 7,000 languages in the world, which is already a great decrease from the past 500 years due to colonization and other reasons. But right now, experts say that within the next 100 years, we are on track to lose half of the current languages that we have in the world, and that can be due to globalization, due to states that are aggressive to languages that are present within their borders, that are aggressive to languages that are present within their borders.
Sir Max Tuana:But let me think I didn't really prepare a presentation, but it's a topic that I am very passionate about Personally. I'll give some background about where I come from and why this is important to me. I was born and raised in New York, new York City, and my parents come from diverse origins. My mother is from Barcelona and my father is Italian-American, and at home, my parents really stress the importance of maintaining and learning different languages. So at home I speak Catalan with my mother and brother. That's my first language, the first language that I learned and throughout the years, I've learned other languages. I currently speak five languages. I speak French, spanish, italian, catalan and English. I'm very fortunate to speak those languages and I think that it's important to dive into the history of indigenous languages and why some people speak certain languages, why some people don't speak the language that their, why some people don't speak the language that their parents or grandparents once spoke. But, yeah, I think that language is the basis of identity.
Sir Max Tuana:Without language, it's very hard to feel like you belong to a certain culture or to a certain nation. And today, if you pull up a world map and you see the borders of the different states of the world, you realize that these are artificial borders created by these states, and that within these borders, within these lines on the map, there are a plethora of indigenous languages, nations, communities, and we can, anywhere in the world, we can point to examples of this. If we go to Europe, for example, let's pick France, let's pick France. When we think of France, we think of one uniform culture, one French language, but in reality, historically, there have been many languages within the borders that we know of France today. We know of Basque, breton, catalan, occitan, just to name a few Basque, breton, catalan, occitan, just to name a few. And you know, the reason why a lot of these languages are in a very tough situation today is not an accident. It's completely on purpose.
Sir Max Tuana:Many states, such as France, have engaged in a systematic repression and annihilation of regional cultures and languages, press any people having ties to a different identity than the national one. The first thing they have to do is get rid of the language. But yeah, I mean, there was a. I remember this quote from a. There was a linguist, I think his name was Max Weinreich. He said that a language is a dialect with an army and a navy. So what does that mean? That's fabulous. Yeah, so a lot of. For example, just to keep on this example of France, france denominates the other cultural languages within its territory as a quote-unquote patois, which is a kind of a derogatory term. It implies that they are not proper languages or their dialects or derivatives of the proper language, which is French. And yes in.
Dr Ariel King:Haiti, excuse me, Haiti, don't they call that language patois.
Sir Max Tuana:Yes, in Haiti excuse me, haiti, don't they call that language Patois? Yes, patois Creole, because I think in Haiti I'm not 100% very well versed in the situation in Haiti, but I think that it was also a mix of other languages that people. I think there might be some Spanish, some other indigenous African languages as well within that. But yes, I mean, I'm curious, what would you like to hear more about?
Dr Ariel King:I was going to ask you some questions. I mean, what you're saying is so amazing, and what's amazing to me is that you're a young person speaking about the importance of language, which is actually the key to culture and identity, which means that the first way to keep or lose a culture and identity is through language. So I'm wondering you said that right now there are 7,000 languages how many were there before? And the other question I had for you, because, as I said, we work with a lot of young people literally all over the world, and many people can speak the language, but they can't read and, most importantly, they can't write the language. So usually we insist on reports being written in their native tongue, even if they have to get help from family members. So I'm just really curious about that.
Dr Ariel King:How many did it start with and how many are we down to now? And what do you think we can do about it, especially with young people? I know we have the same situation in Hawaii. The legislature put time, energy and money to making sure that there was a kindergarten and there was Hawaiian language directly, but also Hawaiian culture, because language, of course, mixes with culture. You can't just have the language without the culture, and so there was an effort put with time, energy and money to make sure that the Hawaiian language didn't die. So I would love to understand more about what you know about this, because the truth is it's such an important topic but I know very little about it.
Sir Max Tuana:Yeah, so I think that throughout history, I think that the complete number of languages that we know of that have existed, I think we've had 31,000 languages throughout humanity. I think that's the figure that I last read about, but you know, maybe there are other figures, but you know, maybe there are other figures and I think that pre, I guess, the discovery of the New World, there were around 15,000 languages in the world. Through, whether it's disease or other factors, a lot of the arrival of these people in the New World really contributed to the decline. Now, I think right now, 2022 to 2032, we are in the UN International Decade indigenous languages, I think. So there are efforts to, I guess, spread awareness and, you know, educate people on this topic.
Sir Max Tuana:Um, but, um, I think it's something that, yeah, a lot of, uh, it's, it's worth um, you know, knowing, because even when I, you know, I asked myself like what, what is it that we can do? Um, on an individual level? Um, and that's it's kind of kind of abstract. Uh, I mean we can, I mean I I think that the main way is to learn, learn the language, enroll in a language class that you, that that speaks to you, learn about your own cultural roots, your own heritage. Just be very cognizant of that and and and and. Maybe trace your ancestry and think, ok, my ancestors you know for, for us, in america, for example, where a lot of people are monolinguists and only speak english, maybe do a little searching in your um, your family tree and say maybe, uh, I don't know my, uh, some of my ancestors came from, uh, you know, uh, wherever the basque country country. So let me, let me.
Dr Ariel King:Right, basque is a whole different other language, right, exactly Nothing like Catalan. It's not even close.
Sir Max Tuana:No, no, it's its own family of languages and I think, yeah, I mean maybe promoting awareness. But maybe, to harp back to the example of Catalonia and what you were saying about how a lot of people maybe speak the language who don't know, there was a dictatorship in Spain from 1939 to 1978, more or less, and a large repression of the languages that made up the current Spanish state. So that includes Basque, that includes Galician, that includes Catalan, aranese, just to name a few. And so my grandparents, at home and in their private lives, they've always spoken Catalan, but at schools, when Catalan was just prohibited to be taught at schools, prohibited in public life and legal life, they never learned how to properly uh or read it. I mean, they have some notions now, but, um, um, you know, even when when we text, or you know they make a lot of mistakes, or but however they, you know. My grandpa, for example, he, he reads, he has to read his newspaper in, uh, in Castilian Spanish, because that's how. That was just his whole life he was educated in that way.
Dr Ariel King:Um, his whole life he was educated in that way, but can I ask you a question for that? That's really interesting. As a grandchild of grandparents that brought up like that, what do you think was lost for them in terms of cultural? Was anything lost and if so, what do you think was lost? And, as a result, what do you think was lost being passed down between on the side of your Spanish parent, your parent and yourself as a result of it being lost from your grandparents?
Sir Max Tuana:Sure. So I mean, thankfully, my grandparents passed on the language to their children, my mother, mother included, and she made an effort to pass that language to me, uh, when she didn't have to you know, living in in new york, she didn't have to, she didn't have to do that um, it was lost to them, I think, was a wide array of uh, like, uh, I guess, the perception that that their language, which is carlan, is just as important as any other language and not something that you know to be relegated to the home or something to be ashamed of. You know where, in this case, uh, spanish castilian was, uh, was uh thought of as the um, as the uh, I guess, language of prestige, the, the language where the language of, you know exactly, learning of culture, of the TV programs, documentaries, books, knowledge, art. So their, their language, their maternal language, was one that was, you know, wasn't allowed to take up that much space and maybe wasn't one where they could feel creative in Even spoken word.
Dr Ariel King:We have today a lot of young people like spoken word right, and that's usually passed down. That's really, that's truly amazing. As a young person yourself, who speaks five languages and most likely understands more languages personally, why is this so important to you? Why is this topic about language, the dying of the language and also being able to keep that language important to you as a young person?
Sir Max Tuana:Sure, well, because I think, very simply, I'm terrified at the prospect of these languages being forgotten or erased. Um, I mean, because it's not. It's not just, uh, a method of communication. It's, it's, it's a culture, it's a, it's a perspective, a way to see things. It's, it's so much more than just let's find, you know, let's find the quickest way to communicate. You know, if you want to do that, let's just why. Why doesn't everyone? Let's, let's just make everyone in the world speak english or mandarin.
Dr Ariel King:You know, um, exactly, start with the billion people.
Dr Ariel King:Let's do mandarin exactly, and even in china, they have, uh, they have, I won't say sub languages, but languages that are important to cultures. That's really good as someone who um grew up with english and um also French, because when my mother went to get a doctorate, a PhD back then, it was required to have a second language. So I was taught a second language from a very early age and also I had the privilege of growing up in New York, which makes it a lot easier to get to know people in other languages. But what I found as an adult is when I started to learn language mostly from living in places not sitting in a classroom, but actually living in the country where the native language is spoken I started to realize that even the main language, the little town I would live in, would say words differently. And I also started to realize that not everything can be translated from one language to English or English to one language, and there are times that I was trying to explain a concept that I knew in another language through this one word and I couldn't for the life of me find the word in English because English didn't have the description. So that also taught me at a very late age that you can't necessarily translate one word into another, because language is more than just a description. It's an understanding of a cultural idea that doesn't necessarily transfer to another language.
Dr Ariel King:And I'll just give you one small example. You know, when I was in Germany, I know that people used to say kinder. I thought but this person is 40, 50 years old. What do you mean kinder? Kinder means child. They're adults. What do you mean children?
Dr Ariel King:And then I understood that, culturally, anybody within your family that's younger than you and you have wisdom, and you are the person who is the matriarch or the patriarch of that family, they're a kinder. So in that culture and it's not in a negative way, like you don't know anything, it's more in a I want to pass on to you, I want to give you wisdom, I want to make sure that you're taken care of, that you can take care of yourself. So it's in a very kind and loving way, and I want to make sure that you're taken care of, that you can take care of yourself. So it's in a very kind and loving way. And you would only know that if you understood the language and the culture. So that's just one example of many, and I'm sure you have many more, but this is quite important. May I ask do you know how to write? Reading is important, but write in these various languages and if not, which?
Sir Max Tuana:language. Would you like to know how to write in? Of the five languages that you know? Now I'm fortunate enough to read and write in all of them.
Sir Max Tuana:So, actually, I mean, I think my love for languages and it really stems from my mother's emphasis on them, and she actually used to be, um, a school teacher in, uh, in southern france. So, in southern france there's a, a part called the roussillon, or roussillon, which is, uh, known as northern catalonia, where, where this people and the culture of the people there historically speak conlon. So she, she worked at this school, um, you know, trying to, where the mission of the school was to, you know, preserve their culture and language. And I think that that experience made her realize how important it was and that's why she made sure that my brother and I knew how to read and write. I mean, she was the one who taught us and, yeah, yeah, and that's why she made us go to French immersion, because immersion is the best way to learn a language group singing, so we sang all kinds of things and it relaxes and it allows the brain to pick up much more than just writing and reading.
Dr Ariel King:I mean most children. When they learn a language, they don't start with reading and writing or learning to conjugate verbs, do they? They learn one word at a time. No, mine, chocolate give me demands and I think that easily to learn demands is the way to start a language, but I did the same. Did you have any cultural immersion in any of the languages that you know now or any of the languages that you are learning?
Sir Max Tuana:So, yes, so from a very young age, my brother and I had French immersion, and I had French immersion. We went to a French speaking school in New York where the vehicular language was French. At home I was speaking Catalan. I mean, living in New York, we're immersed in English, and so that already built my knowledge of, of, of romance languages. So Latin, uh, languages that stem from Latin, and I think that I mean, once you learn one of them, you have a very good base and advantage to learn another Latin based language. That's that's what happens in language groups and um.
Sir Max Tuana:So when I was in college, I became interested in in my Italian heritage, because my um, my, uh, my on my father's side, uh, his, uh, his uh family came from Italy, but he, they never passed down the, um the language to him. So there was a there's a gap between uh great grandparents and and and me, who don't, who didn't speak Italian. So I became interested in that and I, uh I started taking classes and at my school I went to Middlebury college and uh I there was a very um interesting way to learn where you can choose to live in what's called the house, or, in my case, the Italian house, where you sign a contract, where, when you live in there, you have to, you have to only speak the language of the house, so Italian Wow that's fabulous.
Sir Max Tuana:Right. So for almost two semesters I lived, and when I was in my house I had to communicate with my other roommates only in Italian, so that really helped.
Dr Ariel King:Wow, but that's fabulous, because that means that you didn't just speak in italian, but you listen to italian, most likely italian radio television, um also, uh, music yeah, I think that the vast majority of the learning is outside of the classroom.
Sir Max Tuana:It's a constant um, uh, maybe, effort, but but it's a pleasant effort if you enjoy it and you know you have to. I don't know. In your free time, explore music, just listen to music, you know. If you're doing your laundry and you want to learn a language, you know, put some music on. Put some in this case, italian music on, or watch shows, read books.
Dr Ariel King:Makes a difference, doesn't it? Remember, neti percaso, that they were one of my favorite italian groups, that I would learn, uh, italian, or even, I guess, sometimes being with a host family or, um, you know, being with somebody or being around somebody that knows the language. That's really fantastic, and I think middle prairie university or college is very unusual in that, but I think that's so two years of italian uh, two semesters, I was two, I was there two semesters, and that was a few years ago.
Sir Max Tuana:So my, my italian it's probably not, uh, as fluent as it was then, but I'm, uh, I still. You can remember myself, yeah, thiseing myself fluent, yeah.
Dr Ariel King:This has been such a wonderful conversation about language and culture. May I ask, as a young person, can you tell I would say young people, because I think sometimes the older people can learn language and at times do, but we think you know if I speak English or I speak French or I speak one of the UN six languages, right, which is English, french, spanish, russian, arabic, or what is the last one, english, french, russian.
Sir Max Tuana:Arabic or.
Dr Ariel King:Chinese, right, chinese is the last one, then somehow you don't need to speak other languages, but so much is lost. So what would you say to young people about learning another language?
Sir Max Tuana:I would say, I would say, if we're all connected to other languages I mean, like you said, there are six main languages. Main languages that is such a small proportion of the languages of the world and the languages that we've had historically that chances are that if you look within your family, if you look within your ancestry, you're very, very likely to have ancestors that spoke different languages than you spoke today. And I would say, I would say I mean interest, interest yourselves in it, incorporate it into your, into your daily life. You know, try to read, write, but I mean even people who, let's say, you think of yourself as someone who's not linguistically inclined, which I think that everyone is. But promote awareness, I mean educate yourself, promote, go to cultural events. There are so much is going on everywhere. There's, you just have to look for it.
Sir Max Tuana:I was part of the, the Catalan Institute of America, pretty much my whole life. I was part of the Catalan Institute of America pretty much my whole life. It's like a volunteer organization based in New York where the goal is simply to promote Catalan culture but at the end of the day, you're just hanging out with other people speaking a different language and it's a nice community. But I think that exists with you should be able to find some community with, whatever language it is, even if it's a more obscure indigenous language, because they are. I think these are priceless, intangible human capital that is cannot be lost at any cost.
Dr Ariel King:Oh, thank you. That's so passionate. I really want to thank you for speaking with us today about language so insightful and interesting. Thank you for that and, to our audience, thank you so much for joining us on the Business of Life and we look forward to seeing you again. Thank you.
Sir Max Tuana:Thank you so much, Dr King.