Editing Lists of endangered languages

{{Short description|None}}
{{Language Endangerment status}}
'''Lists of endangered languages''' are mainly based on [[Endangered language#UNESCO definitions|the definitions used by UNESCO]]. In order to be listed, a language must be classified as "[[Endangered language|endangered]]" in a cited academic source. Researchers have concluded that in less than one hundred years, almost half of the languages known today will be lost forever.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/19/science/19language.html|title=Languages Die, but Not Their Last Words|last=Wilford|first=John Noble|date=2007-09-19|newspaper=The New York Times|access-date=2017-02-10|issn=0362-4331}}</ref>
The lists are organized by region.

== Africa==
* [[List of endangered languages in Africa]]

==Asia==
* [[List of endangered languages in Asia]]
* [[List of endangered languages in Bangladesh]]
* [[List of endangered languages in China]]
* [[List of endangered languages in India]]
* [[List of endangered languages in Indonesia]]
* [[List of endangered languages in Nepal]]

==Europe==
* [[List of endangered languages in Europe]]
* [[List of endangered languages in Russia]]

==North America==
* [[List of endangered languages in North America]]
* [[List of endangered languages in Canada]]
* [[List of endangered languages in Mexico]]
* [[List of endangered languages in the United States]]

==Central and South America==
* [[List of endangered languages in Central America]]
* [[List of endangered languages in South America]]
* [[List of endangered languages in Brazil]]
* [[List of endangered languages in Colombia]]

==Oceania==
* [[List of Australian Aboriginal languages]]
* [[List of endangered languages in Papua New Guinea]]
* [[List of endangered languages of Oceania]]

==Discussion==
[[SIL Ethnologue]] (2005) lists 473 out of 6,909 living languages inventorised (6.8%) as "nearly extinct", indicating cases where "only a few elderly speakers are still living"; this figure dropped to 6.1% as of 2013.<ref>{{cite book|editor1-last=Lewis|editor1-first=M. Paul|editor2-last=Simons|editor2-first=Gary F.|editor3-last=Fennig|editor3-first=Charles D. Fennig|date= 2013|title= Ethnologue: Languages of the World|edition= Seventeenth |location= Dallas, Texas|publisher= SIL International}}</ref><ref>{{cite book|editor1-last=Lewis|editor1-first=M. Paul|editor2-last=Simons|editor2-first=Gary F.|editor3-last=Fennig|editor3-first=Charles D. Fennig|date= 2013|title= Ethnologue: Languages of the World (Sumnmary by language status)|edition= Online version of Seventeenth  |location= Dallas, Texas|url=http://www.ethnologue.com/statistics/status |publisher= SIL International}}</ref>

When judging whether or not a language is endangered, the number of speakers is less important than their age distribution. There are languages in [[Indonesia]] reported with as many as two million native speakers alive now, but all of advancing age, with little or no transmission to the young. On the other hand, while there are only 30,000 [[Ladin language|Ladin]] speakers left, almost all children still learn it as their mother tongue; thus Ladin is not currently endangered. Similarly, the [[Hawaiian language]] has only about 1,000 speakers, but it has stabilised at this number, and there is now school instruction in the language, from preschool through the 12th grade; thus the language is classified as merely vulnerable.

While there are somewhere around six or seven thousand languages on Earth today, about half of them have fewer than about 3,000 speakers. Experts predict that even in a conservative scenario, about half of today's languages will become extinct within the next 50 to 100 years.{{Citation needed|date=July 2019}}

== See also ==
* ''[[Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger]]''
* [[Language family]]
* [[Language policy]]
* [[Linguistic rights]]
* [[Lists of extinct languages]]
* [[List of languages by time of extinction]]
* [[List of revived languages]]
* [[Minority language]]

== References ==
{{reflist}}

== External links ==
* {{cite web |url=https://unesdoc.unesco.org/ark:/48223/pf0000187026/PDF/187026eng.pdf.multi |website=UNESCO |title=Atlas of the World's Languages in Danger}}
* [http://www.endangeredlanguages.com/ EndangeredLanguages.com]
* {{cite web|url=http://www.nationalgeographic.com/mission/enduringvoices/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20100708132439/http://www.nationalgeographic.com/mission/enduringvoices/ |url-status=dead |archive-date=2010-07-08 |website=National Geographic |title= Enduring Voices}}
* {{cite book|url=http://www.ethnologue.com/nearly_extinct.asp|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120720043239/http://www.ethnologue.com/nearly_extinct.asp|url-status=dead|archive-date=2012-07-20|publisher= [[SIL International]]|title=Ethnologue report of endangered languages|date=2005|isbn=1-55671-159-X}}

{{list of lists|language}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Endangered languages}}
[[Category:Lists of endangered languages| ]]