🔓SUMMARY REFLECTIONS ON LANGUAGE REVITALIZATION🧵
1⃣Root causes of language endangerment must be acknowledged.
2⃣Languages are endangered due to inequitable sociopolitical structures & deliberate processes of oppression, discrimination, and violence ⬇️

https://twitter.com/EuroDigitalLang/status/1572959706251132929?s=20&t=mHDqQlI-HA0izbsG6Ab9gg

3⃣Ideologies and policies still privilege dominant classes and languages at the expense of Indigenous and minoritized groups and languages ⬇️

https://twitter.com/EuroDigitalLang/status/1573103025778053121?s=20&t=mHDqQlI-HA0izbsG6Ab9gg

4⃣Top-down, government-led language planning and policy must be informed by community-led, bottom-up processes.

*⃣GÀIDHLIG, DÙTHCHAS, & CLIMATE CRISIS🧵*⃣
❤️The Outer Hebrides are heartlands of the now endangered Gàidhlig.
⚠️Uibhist is ⬆️ vulnerable to sea level rise.
🚨Gàidhlig, unique Machair coastal habitat, & ecosystems all threatened.
⚠️Indigenous languages vital to address threats. ✅Indigenous languages transmit highly-specialized place-based knowledges, such as Traditional Ecological Knowledge, & kincentric concepts.
🔹In Gàidhlig, Dùthchas is a millenia-old Gaelic kincentric concept, informing a Gaelic way of life that predates the formation of the UK.

✳️Somhairle MacGill-Eain (Sorley MacLean) was a Gàidhlig Bard, important for reinvigorating Gàidhlig ❤️
✳️"I have been very sceptical of what might be called received history..But we know now another set of words: clearance, empire, profit, exploitation"⬇️
"Ever since I was a boy in Raasay and became aware of the differences between the history I read in books and the oral accounts I heard around me, I have been very sceptical of what might be called received history the million people for instance who died in Ireland ...

*⃣ LANGUAGE REVITALIZATION IS MORE THAN WORDS 🧵*⃣
🔸Language revitalization is not just about learning isolated words or phrases.
🔹 Root causes of language oppression and endangerment must be addressed, such as discriminatory policies, land dispossession, destructive policies. 🔸Indigenous language revitalization, and Gàidhlig revitalization, is also about COMMUNITY revitalization.
❤️Languages thrive when people thrive.
*⃣Language revitalization involves all the factors that sustain and foster vibrant and dynamic communities.

*⃣ INDIGENOUS LANGUAGES AND LAND 🧵*⃣
🌍~75% of the world's ~7000 languages are Indigenous languages (ILs).
🌼ILs are inseparable from the local land, community, culture, & worldview.
✅ILs transmit highly specialized place-based knowledges about the local land & ecosystem. 🔸ILs are ecological encyclopedias & ancestral guides with profound knowledge cultivated over centuries.
♾ Examples:
🔹In Gàidhlig & in na h-Eileanan Siar, there's a stretch of water named Caolas bogadh na mara 🌊 (dipping narrows of the sea) & guides fishermen in daily work 🐟

✳️SEANCHAS | STORYTELLING✳️
♾There is a deep & rich storytelling tradition in Gàidhlig.
♾Ruairidh Maclean, who tells stories from Gaelic tradition, says Gàidhlig is
"Not only a tongue of land, people and nation, but indisputably a language of stories"⬇️
tracscotland.org/news-post/?new… 🔹Mar eisimpleir:
🔸Ruairidh Maclean and his son @caldamac set up a website, Sgeulachdan nan Gaisgeach.
🔹You can read & listen along to 20 stories in Gàidhlig about the Fianna and other heroes that belong to the oral tradition of the Gaels ⬇️
gaisgeach.com

*⃣ LANGUAGE ENDANGERMENT 🧵*⃣
🔸 Languages do not "die" or magically disappear.
🔹 All languages change over time, but language shift & loss is not "natural".
🔸Gàidhlig & its speakers have been subjected to discriminatory legislation, destructive policies, & classroom violence. Some examples:
🔸The Statutes of Iona (1609), forcing Highland clan chiefs to send their heirs to Lowland schools to speak English: randomscottishhistory.com/2020/05/09/sta…
🔹Gàidhlig and its speakers being categorized and dismissed as "barbaric", "uncivilized" (e.g. excerpt ⬇️ John of Fordun).

Some things about me:
I am 30 years old and I was born in Lleida, Catalonia. I am a native Catalan speaker.
How did I get to know Occitan? It was one of the subjects in my degree in Catalan Language and Literature. I chose it, it FASCINATED me, and I decided to specialise in it. In my hometown, Lleida, where I live, #Occitan isn't spoken. It is spoken in Val d'Aran, a mountain Valley north of Catalonia which has a specific autonomy & status.
The language is called 'aranés' there.
#Aranés has OFFICIAL status in Catalonia together with Catalan & Spanish.

Фи махуэ ф1ыуэ (Good day)
Today’s thread will wrap up the sociolinguistic situation of Circassian in Turkey and share some recent policy changes and I’ll also share about the sociolinguistic situation of Circassian in the North Caucasus of Russia. 🧵 1/ As the official language ideologies translated into oppressive educational policies in Turkey, the linguistic human rights of Circassians along with the other ethnolinguistic minorities have been neglected by the state for decades.

Udmurts have a population of 552 299 people, according to the 2010 census. Udmurts live in Udmurt Republic and in neighboring regions of Tatarstan, Bashkortstan, Perm kray, Kirov oblast, Mari El and Sverdlovsk oblast in compact groups. The number of Udmurts is declining for the last 3 census: in 2002 there were 636 906 people, in 2010 the number declined by 13,28%.

My language is Udmurt. It is an Indigenous language of the Russian Federation and the official regional level of Udmurt Republic, a national autonomy within the Russian Federation. Udmurts are Uralic people, they share the common origin with other Uralic nations like Finns, Estonians, Hungarians and ethnic groups like Mari, Moksha, Erzya, Komi, Nenets, Saami, Karelians and other peoples. There are approx 25 ethnic groups scattered in the vast area from Sayan mountains in the Eastern Siberia to Norway in the north and Hungary in the south.

Hello everyone! @Afuk_ Mirjam tige tank for passing a word to me. I am humbled to be the next host of EuroDigital Lang and I will introduce you with Udmurt language, indigenous Uralic language of the Russian Federation, and will provide you insights about our struggle Ӟечбуресь! I am Artem Malykh, Jorgi Ortjomi in Udmurt, and I am Udmurt language activist. You can follow me at @ortjomi. Nice to meet all of you!

1-6 My last day today tweeting for @EuroDigitalLang! I'm going to finish this week telling you a little bit about our projects for young children and parents. Starting with our magazine and platform @HeitenMempuntnl 2-6 The magazine @HeitenMempuntnl is a free bilingual magazine for parents in Fryslân. It aims to make (prospective) parents aware of the multilingual environment and the opportunities for a multilingual development, and to encourage them to raise children multilingually.

1-5 This morning I'm going to tell you a little bit more about the #WikiWomen project we've just started. It is an @EUErasmusPlus project aimed at secundary school students and teachers. @euwikipedia @WikimediaIE @MercatorCentre @FryskeAkademy @Afuk_ 2-5 Schools, education organisations and Wikimedia foundations from Fryslân, Basque Country and Ireland are committed to using Wikipedia in minority language areas in Europe as a tool for teaching digital literacy, social engagement and language skills.
mercator-research.eu/en/projects/wo…