THEORETICAL ASPECTS IN THE FORMATION OF
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APPROXIMATION AND UNCERTAINTIES IN DEFINING THE
NUMBER OF WORLD LANGUAGES.
Babajanov Khusan
Uzswlu
Senior teacher of Department of English
Applied Disciplines
https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.15760878
Annotation
: The article is covered with the approximation and
uncertainties in estimating the number of world languages, and its main aim is
demonstrating the reasons, such as discoveries, living and dying languages ,
dialects, and last one, language names.
Key words:
the number of world languages, uncertainty, approximation,
alive and dead, dialect.
Although it is the 21st century, there is no agreed total and explicit
information for the number of world languages today. Some books give an
approximate figure of 4 000 to 5 000, while others estimate from 3000 to 10
000. According to the Ethnologue which is the research center for language
intelligence, there are 7 151 living world languages in the current
life(23Aug.2022) Also, another German Language Expert, Anna Klappenbach
determined that are more than 7 100 languages are spoken in the world today.
To see why there is such uncertainty, we need to consider the numerous
reasons, which linguists are facing when they wish to obtain accurate
information, and to find simple answers to the questions 'How many languages?'
and 'What is counted as a language?'
New discoveries.
One of the exact reasons for uncertainty is that discovering the new
languages and tribes are continued in the unexplored areas of the world -
especially in Central Africa, New Guinea and Amazon basin(as the
Transamazonica road system is extended). In fact, there are a lot of countries
where linguistic surveys are not studied or have not even begun because it is
accepted that people speak one of the known languages in their region, it looks
like they speak a dialect of one of these languages, but the investigations
demonstrate that their speech is completely different, so, it has to be recognized
as a new language.
Alive or dead
Discovering new language definitely increases the total, but, against of it,
there is a vital factor which decreases it, that is, dead languages. If there is no
one to speak in it or although native speakers are still alive, do not use their
THEORETICAL ASPECTS IN THE FORMATION OF
PEDAGOGICAL SCIENCES
International scientific-online conference
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own mother tongue frequently, that leads the language to die and it is not easy
matter to define. According to the article by Russ Rymer ( National Geographic.
July.2012) every 14 days one language dies, mainly, the death of languages'
speed is more rapid in smaller communities of the world, for example, the
Amazonian exploration invented many new languages, but they faced with a
death so fast.
Language names
It is a major problem which decides what kind of name to give to a language
and it appears particularly on lesser-known languages areas. Firstly, many small
tribes have no specific name for their language, so, they use a common word or
phrase, like the word 'our people' or 'our language'. For example, in Africa (
where name Bantu means simply 'people') and also in Meso and South America,
another examples as Carib='people', Tapuya='enemy'. Secondly, one tribe
whose language has so many names, for example, A South American Indian tribe
named itself, but adjacent tribes gived them a different name('Puelche' means
'people from the east' in Araucanian, and Portuguese explorers have given them
the name 'Coroado' (means 'crowded'). So, one language but having three names
originate hassles when defining world languages' number.
Language or dialect
The difference between language and dialect is really obvious for numerous
languages, for example, in the case of English have so many dialects such as
Cockney, Scottish, General American, RP(Southern British) and they can make
communication difficult at times. However, despite these dialects, English is
recognized as one language. But, in hundreds of cases, considerations of this
kind are in conflict, that is, two spoken varieties would be mutually similar, but
for political and historical reasons, they are referred to as different languages.
For example, Swedish, Danes and Norwegian people can understand each
other's speech, but it is accepted at least three different languages. Another
example is the language of Gagaus(type of Turkic languages family) is a little bit
similar with Uzbek language, but it is not true to say that Gagaus is a dialect of
Uzbek or Uzbek is a dialect of Gagaus. There is also an opposite situation which
spoken varieties are not similar, but for political, historical or cultural reasons
they are nonetheless called varieties of the same language. Chinese language, for
example, have hundreds of dialects and speakers may not understand each other
when using dialects, so, they share the same written language tradition. Despite
the linguistic differences, therefore, Chinese is considered a single language.
THEORETICAL ASPECTS IN THE FORMATION OF
PEDAGOGICAL SCIENCES
International scientific-online conference
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There will be no exact answer to the question 'How many languages?' when
all given factors are taken into account. There are over 20 000 language names
listed in the Voegelins' great Classification and Index of the World's Languages
(1977) which consists of dialects, alive and dead languages and living languages'
number about more than 7 000.
References:
1. Anna Klappenbach. Article 'The 12 most spoken languages in the world'
(January 7. 2022)
2. Hamroyev M. Duhamedova M. Ona tili. Toshkent 2007. 11, 59-betlar.
3. Russ Rymer. Article 'Vanishing voices' in National Geographic magazine ( July
2012)
4. https://blog.busuu.com/most-spoken-languages-in-the-world/
5.https://www.babbel.com/en/magazine/how-many-people-speak-english-
and-where-is-it-spoken
6. https://www.itbe.org/v_newsletters/article_13375691.htm
