Spoken Here: Travels Among Threatened Languages

In Spoken Here, Mark Abley takes us on a world tour, from the Arctic Circle to Oklahoma to Australia, in a fervent quest to document some of the world's most endangered languages.

Abley delves deep into why some languages are fading into oblivion, while some endangered languages continue to thrive. His mission in Spoken Here is urgent: Of the six thousand languages spoken in the world today, only six hundred may survive into the next century.

Abley visits the exotic and frequently remote locales that are home to fading languages and constructs engaging and entertaining portraits of some of the last living speakers of these tongues. Throughout this exhilarating travelogue, he points out that the same forces that put biological species at risk—development, globalization, loss of habitat—are also threatening human languages, and with them, something very basic about their speakers' cultures.

"This generous, sorrow-tinged book is an informative and eloquent reminder of a richness that may not exist much longer." Publishers Weekly

"A humanistic approach to linguistics and a scintillating read." Kirkus Reviews

"Weaving its way with grace and lucidity through a tangle of political, economic and technologcial factors, Spoken Here is a must for anyone concerned with the survival of Earth's cultural eco-system." TimeOut New York

"Abley...does his research and writes with the passion and understated eloquence of a concerned citizen of the world..." The San Francisco Chronicle