Rusi Jaspal (London) and Adrian Coyle (Surrey): Language and Perceptions of Identity Threat. As English spreads, Indonesians fear for their language (and a response). English still straddles the globe, but triumphant talk of a world language is still babble. Cantonese cultural warriors fight back: How do you stop 50 million people from speaking in their native dialect? Because of the visual complexity of Arabic orthography, the brain's right hemisphere is not involved in decoding the text in the first stages of learning to read. Elias Muhanna on why the death of Arabic is greatly exaggerated. Why we need Akkadian: A review of An Akkadian Lexical Companion for Biblical Hebrew: Etymological-Semantic and Idiomatic Equivalents With Supplements on Biblical Aramaic by Hayim ben Yosef Tawil. The "revival" of Yiddish is over — let’s talk continuity (and more and more). Linguist Stephen Pax Leonard is on mission to save Inughuit, an Inuit "fossil language" disappearing with the ice (and more). In Alaska, a Frenchman fights to revive the Eyak's dead tongue. From Himal Southasia, the "ideal Sinhalese": Sinhala-language literature remains in a crippling relationship with nationalism; and Syed Yusuf Hasan, a renowned Urdu-language scholar, finally gets his due in Bangladesh. The Internet is changing the way many people learn languages — books, tapes and CDs are being replaced by e-mail, video chats and social networks. Notes on the back of a 400-year-old letter have revealed a previously unknown language once spoken by indigenous peoples of northern Peru. A review of German: Biography of a Language by Ruth H. Sanders. A review of Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World by Nicholas Ostler. More and more and more and more on Globish by Robert McCrum.
