02857nam a22003977a 4500 20231120100046.0 161118s2017 enka b 001 0 eng c 2016960177 9780198724995 0198724993 (OCoLC)ocn966398472 YDX eng YDX rda NLE OCLCO OCLCF INU YDX CHVBK OCLCO L2U BD-DhBPA P115 .M35 2017 306.446 MAM 2017 Maher, John C., 1951- author. Multilingualism : a very short introduction / John C. Maher. First edition. Oxford : Oxford University Press, 2017. xix, 148 pages : illustrations ; 18 cm. Very short introductions Includes bibliographical references (pages 133-141) and index. The languages of the world can be seen and heard in cities and towns, forests and isolated settlements, as well as on the internet and in international organizations like the UN or the EU. How did the world acquire so many languages? Why can't we all speak one language, like English or Esperanto? And what makes a person bilingual? Multilingualism, language diversity in society, is a perfect expression of human plurality. About 6,500-7,000 languages are spoken, written and signed, throughout the linguistic landscape of the world, by people who communicate in more than one language (at work, or in the family or community). Many origin myths, like Babel, called it a 'punishment' but multilingualism makes us who we are and plays a large part of our sense of belonging. Languages are instruments for interacting with the cultural environment and their ecology is complex. They can die (Tasmanian), or decline then revive (Manx and Hawaiian), reconstitute from older forms (modern Hebrew), gain new status (Catalan and Maori) or become autonomous national languages (Croatian). Languages can even play a supportive and symbolic role as some territories pursue autonomy or nationhood, such as in the cases of Catalonia and Scotland. In this Very Short Introduction John C. Maher shows how multilingualism offers cultural diversity, complex identities, and alternative ways of doing and knowing to hybrid identities. Rasal Multilingualism. 9971 Bilingualism. 40132 Sociolinguistics. 141835 Language and languages Political aspects. 141836 Bilingualism. fast 40132 Language and languages Political aspects. fast 141836 Multilingualism. fast 9971 Sociolinguistics. fast 141835 Mehrsprachigkeit gnd 141837 17.23 multilingual sociolinguistics. nbc 141838 Very short introductions ; 525. ddc BK 50452 50452 0 0 ddc 0 0 BPATC BPATC CHILD 2 3 306.446 MAM 2017 107187 2025-04-07 15:30:33 2024-11-07 2018-05-28 BK 0 0 ddc 0 0 BPATC BPATC CHILD 0 306.446 MAM 2017 107188 2018-05-28 00:00:00 2018-05-28 BK