As for Homng, it is my understanding that it was not a written language prior to France's colonizing Indochina. Is that so?
There are two different orthographies for Hmong, as far as I know. One was devised by some missionaries who worked with them, and the other was devised by a strange fellow who was a self-proclaimed messiah.
Somehow I don't think 75million Tamil speakers are languishing as their language is 'perhaps even being killed off' LOL. It would be interesting to know how much the internet is used by everyday people in Tamil, Gujurat, etc areas.
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Most of the people I met in Tamil Nadu (the state where Tamil is spoken)were internet savvy and had computers in their homes with dialup or DSL connections. There are internet cafes available in most areas. I'd say the poor probably don't have internet access, but then they lack a lot of things.
Tamil is the only official language of Tamil Nadu. English is also in common usage as an official language of India. When India adopted national standards, Tamil was the very first language to be recognised as a classical language of India.[51] The Tamil people regard their language a very important part of their cultural identity.
I can't see a dearth or otherwise of websites in Tamil causing problems with the survival of the language, especially given the large number of native speakers and the fact it has survived for so long alongside English already. The same goes for the other languages spoken on the Indian subcontinent, probably all of those mentioned.
As well as internet cafés the use of mobile (cell) phones is expanding quickly in the Third World countries. Even in the poorest villages there is now generally one person with access to such a phone. They don't, of course, have the same infrastructure difficulties attendant on land lines. Although many phones will be basic, a lot are smartphones with internet access.
Build a man a fire and he's warm for a day. Set a man on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Tamil, Telugu are all official languages of India, are spoken by huge numbers of people, have their own writing systems and literary histories. In no way are they endangered. Tamil is also spoken in Sri Lanka and Singapore.
A search for தமிழ் (Tamil) gets me 76,500,000 ghits. ಕನ್ನಡ (Kannada) gets 40,400,000. A lot less endangered than my favourite novel, Titus Groan (304,000).
Originally posted by Kalleh: Interesting, the city with the largest number of Hmong people...is???? Wausau, Wisconsin! There are also huge numbers in Minnesota.
Are they teaching them to speak with a Norwegian accent?
It is no measure of health to be well adjusted to a profoundly sick society. -J. Krishnamurti
Interesting, the city with the largest number of Hmong people...is???? Wausau, Wisconsin! There are also huge numbers in Minnesota.
Yes, most Hmong speakers came from Laos and were evacuated to various parts of the USA after the Fall of Saigon. They were helping us against the Viet Cong.
