PHNOM PENH, Jan 13, 2010 (IPS) - One of Cambodia’s oldest languages – S’aoch – appears headed for extinction in the next decade. Other languages spoken by its minority people are lining up to take the place of the 6,000-year-old language in the most endangered category.
Dr Jean-Michel Filippi, a linguist who has studied the S’aoch language for a decade, has recorded 4,000 words of S’aoch and is preparing to write a grammar for the language. But even he holds out no hope for it. That is because just 10 people in a small village in southern Cambodia speak S’aoch fluently, and none of them uses it in daily conversation.
Filippi says the imminent extinction of S’aoch means his efforts to preserve something of it are critical. "That is because a language is a unique vision of the world," he says. "It’s very specific and a very peculiar classification of reality."
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