江西 侯昌玮
每种语言都能表现使用者所在民族的世界观、思维方式、社会特性以及文化、历史等，都是人类珍贵的非物质文化遗产。
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1A new study warns 1,500 endangered languages could no longer be spoken by the end of this century. The study, led by the Australian National University (ANU), identified predictors that put endangered languages at high risk.
2Co-author Professor, Lindell Bromham, said that of the world's 7,000 recognized languages, around half were currently endangered. “We found that without immediate intervention (干预), language loss could triple in the next 40 years. And by the end of this century, 1,500 languages could cease to be spoken.”
3Their study found the widest range of factors ever putting endangered languages under pressure. One finding was that more years of schooling increased the level of language endangerment. The researchers said it showed that we need to build curricula that support bilingual education, promoting both native language proficiency as well as use of regionally-dominant languages. “Across the 51 factors or predictors we investigated,we also found some really unexpected and surprising pressure points. This included road density,” Professor Bromham said. “Contact with other local languages is not the problem—in fact, languages in contact with many other native languages tend to be less endangered. “But we found that the more roads there are, connecting the country to cities,and villages to towns, the higher the risk of languages being endangered. It's as if roads are helping dominant languages replace other smaller languages.”
4Professor Bromham said the study's findings were a vital reminder that more action was urgently needed to preserve at-risk languages. He added,“When a language is lost,or is ‘sleeping’ as we say for languages that are no longer spoken, we lose so much of our human cultural diversity. Every language is brilliant in its own way. Many of the languages predicted to be lost this century still have fluent speakers, so there is still the chance to invest in supporting communities to bring native languages back to life and keep them strong for future generations.”
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Language Study
Difficult sentence in the text
One finding was that more years of schooling increased the level of language endangerment. 研究发现，受教育的年限越长，语言濒危的程度越高。
【点石成金】句中的that引导的是表语从句。 如：
One advantage of solar energy is that it will never run out. 太阳能的其中一个优点是它永远也不会耗尽。
