#62: Tìpängkxo Lelì’fya

Tìpängkxo Lelì’fya means “Language Discussion” in Na’vi, the native tongue of the inhabitants of Pandora in the 2009 science fiction epic Avatar written and directed by James Cameron.

It could easily be argued that Star Trek’s Klingon, the Elvish tongues of Tolkien, and Na’vi are not real languages.  All were created to add depth to works of fiction in the entertainment industry.  None were ever spoken naturally by any society of human beings.  Yet they have virtually all the other characteristics of so-called “real” languages: speech, writing, grammar, etc.  Indeed, linguists often struggle or disagree as to a common and precise definition of the word “language”.  Note the irony that we who created these methods of communication cannot adequately describe them.

There are an estimated 7,000 languages in use in the world right now.  Interestingly, this number is almost exclusively sourced to the research of one organization: an evangelical Christian nonprofit called SIL Global which maintains the Ethnologue database of languages.  There is naturally much debate among scholars regarding the potential downsides of relying upon a single religious entity for data that is regularly used in scientific research.  The question of the distinction between dialects and languages is also not universally answered.  In any case, the figure of 7,000 languages, however arbitrary it may or may not be, is quickly broken down to more manageable and realistic statistics:

• 90 percent of the languages in the world are spoken by only 10 percent of its inhabitants
• Nearly half of all languages have fewer than 1,000 speakers remaining
• The ten most common languages are spoken by two-thirds of the world’s population

One in six people on the planet speak English, as it is considered the global common language.  Slightly fewer people speak Mandarin Chinese (one in seven), but due primarily to the population of China there are more native Mandarin speakers compared to English.  Rounding out the top ten are Hindi, Spanish, Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), French, Bengali, Portuguese, Indonesian, and Urdu.  Fun fact: despite having approximately 335 million speakers, MSA is not the primary language of any society because native Arabic speakers first learn one of about 30 different dialects before MSA.

A basic understanding of linguistics, including historical and social aspects of modern communication, is essential for anyone with a career involving frequent overseas travel.  As a tourist it is possible to get by with a smartphone translation app and a hope that hotel and restaurant employees are among the 1.5 billion English speakers in the world.  Interaction in a professional setting, however, requires an elevated level of attention and dedication.  In the United States, a country notorious for the resistance of its citizens to learn multiple languages, institutions with international portfolios may decide to fund training for their employees.  The U.S. government naturally has its own language schools.  Independently, there are an estimated 2,500 colleges with foreign language programs in the United States.  Some employers are content with basic knowledge gained from programs such as Babbel, Duolingo, or Rosetta Stone.  The majority of the time, native-level fluency in a foreign language is not required for work.  But whether a given employer is seeking someone with basic, intermediate, or advanced foreign language proficiency, the learning process takes time.

Nobody has ever really said that learning a new language is an enjoyable experience.  Exciting, sure, and interesting of course, but not fun.  Granted, getting paid a handsome salary and daily per diem while living in a furnished high-rise apartment just to be a full-time student is surely a safer experience than what some of my colleagues and I are now facing overseas as various conflicts rage on.  But unfortunately for me, the longer I was in language training, the more I became filled with regret.  Originally the idea naïvely sounded great and was even a major factor in several career decisions.  That was before the burnout and noticeable increase in grey hair.  Before my government-funded apartment became littered with flashcards and grammar books.  Before being able to sleep for 10 or more hours at a time – without the aid of medication – due to sheer mental exhaustion.  And before wishing I was there to fix every problem on the world stage instead of being stuck in a classroom the size of a walk-in closet, fumbling (and failing) to string enough syllables together to make a sentence. 

In the end, it could have been worse.  I managed to barely achieve a passing score for my language in the allotted timeframe (some of my coworkers weren’t so lucky).  The training will benefit my career as well as my passion for travel.  Perhaps in the future I will look back on the experience of [partially] learning a new language and feel less bitter and negative about it.  There will surely be more than one bad day in the years to come where I will wish I was safely back in the United States, roaming the halls of language school listening to the flurry of foreign words emanating from the innumerable classrooms.  In the meantime, I will continue my futile attempts at remembering the upsides rather than the downsides of my time as a professional student.