International Mother Language Day: A Reminder of the Wonder of Language

A few weeks ago, I wrote a post about World Endangered Writing Day, and mentioned other international days devoted to celebrating language. One such day is International Mother Language Day, started by UNESCO in 2000 and held every year on 21st February. Which is today!

This year also marks a special milestone, the 25th anniversary of International Mother Language Day. To celebrate this occasion, UNESCO is hosting a two-day event of talks and events, recordings of which can be accessed here.

With language death sadly prevalent in the world today, celebrations of language like this are more important than ever. The worrying state of language can be seen through the following statistic from the UN website: of the approximately 7,000 languages in use today, “less than a hundred are used in the digital world”.

No matter where you are, or what language(s) you speak or sign, let International Mother Language Day serve as a reminder to treasure language; after all, it’s probably the most interesting part of being human.