Noam Chomsky Quotes
Welsh is now almost a national language in Wales. The Scottish dialects are reviving to some extent. I don't think it's a major thing, but it's there, and it's happening elsewhere.
Chomsky, Noam. Understanding Power: The Indispensable Chomsky. Edited by Peter R. Mitchell and John Schoeffel, The New Press, 2002, p. 320.
Kenya and a number of other countries of the world were made up of regions and tribes who spoke many languages, Kenya, India and many others chose English and most people speak their tribal or regional language and English. In some countries French was chosen. Typically, the language selected for unity was the language of the colonizers of the area.
This was another of the radical reforms of Queen Victoria. Most counties were terribly sensitive about the language used by their citizens. Where there were different ethnic language groups, the dominant group tended to make the use and teaching of other languages illegal. So it was in Great Britain where Gaelic, traditionally spoken in Scotland and Welsh, spoken in Wales, were discouraged and not taught in the schools. The Queen shocked the right wing language nationalists with this letter making a major language and cultural reform in Great Britain. Victoria herself had learned a number of languages when she was a young girl and realized that the schools were the ideal place to develop multiple language facilities. Lansdowne promptly instituted the queen’s desired language reforms to the delight of the Scots and the Welsh. Rather than create disunity, the Scots and Welsh became more loyal to the Nation that recognized them, their culture and their rights.
Avram Noam Chomsky is an American linguist, philosopher, cognitive scientist, historian, social critic, and political activist. Sometimes called "the father of modern linguistics", Chomsky is also a major figure in analytic philosophy and one of the founders of the field of cognitive science. He is Laureate Professor of Linguistics at the University of Arizona and Institute Professor Emeritus at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), and is the author of more than 150 books on topics such as linguistics, war, politics, and mass media. Ideologically, he aligns with anarcho-syndicalism and libertarian socialism.
