The Importance of Language

From the fabled Tower of Babel of Mesopotamia to the Sears Tower in Chicago there has been a singular issue; that of language. At first glance, or in this case first sound, language is just a tool of communication, but it is far more. Language is the center of culture, growing and developing as people do, it is an expression of who the speakers are. A street painter in Brooklyn greets passer-bys in a different manner than a baker from Los Angles even though they both speak English. But whose English is it? Its definitely not the Queen’s English, or the Founding Fathers’ English, or even the neighbors’ English. Yet it is not just limited to English, is Spanish the Prime Minister’s Spanish, the old Conquistador’s Spanish, or the blue collar worker’s Spanish. One would think that with a such a wide variety of languages out there, nothing would get done on a global level. Therein is the key idea that the creators’ of international auxiliary languages, such Esperanto, had in mind when they decided to create a language without any native speakers, to create a language which every person has the same potential to learn and speak fluently. At the heart of things is the question what is more important the individuality of a native language or the greater community of a global language?

Culture is the center of everything and at the center of culture is language. As a child grows up their first glimpse at the world is through language, a language which is unique to their culture and one that can never be replicated by anyone else. When the same child begins school and integrates the culture of the school into their own, and in doing so their language grows and develops into something even more unique. As time continues the process continu...

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...n international auxiliary language would solve so many issues at the moment it is nothing more than just a band-aid solution. After all eventually it will develop into numerous dialects that will cause the same issues to arise. Thinking back to the Tower of Babel perhaps it was just a metaphor of the first global language splitting off into foreign dialects as the generations built upon the works of previous ones. A native language is not just a tool for communication but it is an extension of the culture that speaker comes from. In a world where people can talk to a person half way across the world at a push of a button is it not important to preserve at least modicum of the culture they come from? In an every growing global community it is important to keep the culture of native languages alive instead of killing it with the introduction of a global language.