Today – February 21st – is Unesco’s International Mother Language Day. It’s a day to celebrate the linguistic diversity and richness of the nearly-7,000 languages spoken around the world.
The Martyrs Memorial at Dhaka University, commorating the 1952 protests.
The day has been celebrated since a UN resolution in 1999, but the history goes back much further. In 1949, Urdu was declared the national language in Bangladesh (then East Pakistan). Bangla (Bengali) speakers, eager to maintain their own linguistic identity, protested. Mother Language Day’s date comes from the crisis point reached on February 21st 1952, when students involved in a protest were killed by police. Their deaths are remembered in Bangladesh on this day every year.
Bengali is now one of the most widely spoken languages in the world. But many languages communities, whose languages are not used as widely, still suffer discrimination and oppression. International Mother Language Day calls for respect for all languages:
‘Mother languages, along with linguistic diversity, matter for the identity of individuals. As sources of creativity and vehicles for cultural expression, they are also important for the health of societies…. Mother language instruction is a powerful way to fight discrimination.’ Unesco Director-General speaking last year.
Photo from Unesco
This year’s theme for the day is mother-tongue education. Most people can’t learn to read and write in a language they don’t know; not providing education first in the mother-tongue before in secondary languages prohibits many people – usually those speaking minority languages – from advancing in literacy and other education.
People’s heart languages are central to culture, community, education and identity. All Wycliffe’s work seeks to promote the use and love of people’s own language, whether through Bible translation, literacy work, mother-tongue education programmes or encouraging use of the Scriptures in the mother-tongue.
We want to celebrate mother languages in practical ways. Find out how you could join Wycliffe in supporting minority languages around the world.
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- Go to main Wycliffe UK site.
Translation is embedded in Christian history. From the very start, as the apostles wrote of Jesus’ ministry, they translated his words into Greek as they wrote, and those words have been shared since then in translations. In fact, translation is even more fundamental – as Kenney points out, “Jesus’ incarnation was an act of translation, and translation work is the means by which he will be incarnated into every language and culture.”
Far and near
