Topic: Preservation of Endangered Languages
Country: Brunei
Delegate Name: Danielle Falling
School: Forest Hills Northern High School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Brunei position papers GLIMUN 2013 committees
Language is one of the major distinguishing characteristics of culture, culture is what makes us human. Brunei Darussalam has a distinct and rich culture. In Brunei Darussalam there are two national languages, standard malay and English. Aside from these two standard languages spoken there are numerous smaller dialects throughout the country. The majority of the population speaks another form of malay called Brunei-Kadaian or Brunei malay. That form of malay is almost entirely dis-cohesive with the standard form. It is a language that represents Brunei and its culture. Farmers, people by the sea, and those inhabiting the river area near the capitol all speak completely different forms of the malay language, in total there are 11 minority languages.
Of all aspects of human culture, it seems that language is one of the first and foremost things to disappear from our memory, to become constant and uniform with the greater mass. This has been proven by the number of languages disappearing each year. There are approximately 6,000 languages are spoken worldwide. Foundation for Endangered Languages states that of that number 1,000 of them are spoken only by a handful of people, of those 25 languages will disappear each year. Brunei Darussalam has attempted to save such languages and others like them from an untimely execution by publishing informational texts in the national daily newspaper and by exposing the younger generations to the extremely diverse dialects that still even though with difficulty barely survive today. Through the education, recording, and publication of these endangered languages, society will keep an important resource.
It is important to preserve languages because when a language disappears the ideas and stories of the people who spoke it disappear also. Brunei Darussalam wants to preserve endangered languages not only because language is a almost uniquely human trait, but also that in our words holds our culture, our history, and our legacy.
