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The variety of languages ​​of the world and their classification. Functional (social) typology of languages ​​Russian language teacher Fayzrakhmanova I.V. 2017

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The classification of languages ​​is the distribution of the languages ​​of the world into groups based on certain characteristics, in accordance with the principles underlying the study.

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Classification of languages ​​V.I.Kodukhov - genealogical - typological - functional - areal A.A. Reformatsky genealogical typological T.I. Vendina genealogical typological geographical functional cultural-historical

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Genealogical classification The goal is to determine the place of a particular language in the circle of related languages, to establish its genetic links. The main research method is comparative-historical. The main classification categories are family, branch, language group.

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Basic principles of genealogical classification The principle of the “genealogical tree” - each family of languages ​​originates from dialects of the proto-language that have diverged from each other; proto-language - the language-basis of the historical community of related languages; within the same family of languages ​​"branches of languages" are distinguished; branches of languages ​​are subdivided into smaller groups. "Theory of waves" (I. Schmidt) the importance of the geographical contiguity of languages; each new phenomenon has its own focus and spreads in damped waves; we should not talk about intermediate proto-languages, but about a continuous network of transitions from one language to another.

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The general picture of the genealogical classification of languages, which continues to be refined, is as follows: Indo-European family of languages. It includes more than ten groups ("branches") of languages, among which there are both living and dead languages: Hittite-Luwian or Anatolian group; Indian or Indo-Aryan group; Iranian group; Tocharian group; Illyrian group; Greek group; italic group; celtic group; German troupe; Baltic group; Slavic group.

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Uralic family of languages. Includes two groups: Finno-Ugric: a) Baltic-Finnish languages: Finnish, Izhorian, Karelian, Vepsian, which make up the northern group, and Estonian, Livonian, Vodian, which form the southern group; b) Volga languages: Mari and Mordovian languages ​​(Erzyan and Moksha); c) Permian: Udmurt, Komi-Zyryan, Komi-Perm languages; d) Ugric: Hungarian, Khanty, Mansi; e) Sami; 2) Samoyedic group: Nenets, Enets, Nganasan and almost disappeared Selkup (south Krasnoyarsk Territory) languages;

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Afrasian (or Afro-Asian) family: 1) Semitic languages: a) northeastern, which includes the dead Akkadian language b) northwestern, which includes the dead Ugaritic, Eblaitic, Amorite, Hebrew (or Canaanite), Finnish-Punic and Aramaic, as well as living Hebrew and Assyrian; c) central, which includes Arabic with many dialects and Maltese; d) southern, including unwritten languages mehri, shahri and sokotri, as well as jibbali, tigers, Amharic, harari and the dead languages ​​of the Menaian, Sabean, Kataban, Ethiopian, hafat; 2) Egyptian languages: dead from the 5th century ancient Egyptian, Coptic, Arabic. 3) Berber-Libyan (numerous languages ​​and dialects of the Berber peoples of North Africa and the Sahara); 4) Chadian (the largest of them is Hausa); 5) Kushite: Somali and Oromo;

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Caucasian languages ​​uniting three families of languages: 1) West Caucasian family: Abkhazian, Abaza, Adyghe, Kabardino-Circassian and Ubykh languages; 2) the East Caucasian family, which is divided into five groups: a) Nakh (Chechen, Ingush and Batsbi language in Georgia); b) Avar (Avar, Andean, Tsez); c) Lak (Lak language in Dagestan); d) Dargin (Dargin language in Dagestan); e) Lezgin (Lezghin and Tabasaran languages); 3) South Caucasian (Kartvelian) family: Georgian, Zan with Chan and Megrelian dialects, Laz, Svan languages.

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The Dravidian family of languages. It includes the Telugu, Tamil, Kannada, Malaya Lamas and other languages. The Yukagiro-Chuvan family of languages. The only representative of this family of languages ​​is the Yukaghir language in the basins of the Kolyma and Alazeya rivers. The Kolyma and Tundra dialects have also survived. The Altai family is a macrofamily of languages, uniting on the basis of the alleged genetic belonging: 1) the Turkic group: Chuvash, Tatar, Bashkir, Kyrgyz, Uzbek, Kumyk, Karachay-Balkar, Crimean Tatar, Karaim, Nogai, Karakalpak, Kazakh, Yakut Altai, Khakass, Tuvinian, Tofalar, Shor, Chulym, Kamasin, Uyghur, Turkmen, Turkish, Azeri, Gagauz, as well as dead Bugar, Pechenezh, Polovtsian, Khazar, etc .; 2) the Mongolian group: Mongolian, Buryat, Kalmyk, Dagurian, Mughal, Duneian and other languages; 3) Tungus-Manchu group: Evenk, Udege, Nanai, Manchu, etc.

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Chukotka-Kamchatka family of languages ​​(spoken by indigenous population Chukotka and Kamchatka), uniting the Chukchi, Koryak, Alyutor, Itelmen and other languages. The Yenisei family of languages ​​(spread along the banks of the Yenisei and its tributaries), including the living Ket and Sym languages, as well as the dead Kott, Aryan, Assan languages. The Sino-Tibetan family of languages ​​Traditionally, two branches are distinguished: 1) the eastern one, which unites the Chinese and Dungan languages; sometimes this group includes the Karen languages ​​spoken on the border of Thailand and Burma; 2) Western (Tibeto-Burmese languages: Tibetan, Newari, Tripuri, Manipuri, Nizo, Kachin, Burmese).

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The Austro-Asian family, in which there are eight language groups, each of which is represented by numerous dialects. On the Andaman Islands, linguists have recorded a genetically isolated Andaman language, the genealogical roots of which are being studied. Austronesian family of languages ​​of Indian and Pacific oceans, which includes four groups of languages: 1) Indonesian (including more than three hundred languages, including Indonesian, Filipino, Tagalog, Malagash, Malay-Javanese, etc.); 2) Polynesian (Tongan, Maori, Samoan, Tahitian, Hawaiian and nuclear-Polynesian languages); 3) Melanesian (uniting more than four hundred languages: Fiji, Rotum, Solomon Islands, New Caledonia); 4) Micronesian (languages ​​of Nauru, Kiribati, Ponape, Marshall, etc.). Papuan family, uniting about a thousand of the numerous and genealogically heterogeneous languages ​​of New Guinea of ​​the nearby islands of the Pacific Ocean.

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Typological classification The goal is to group languages ​​into large classes based on the similarity of their grammatical structure, to determine the place of one or another language, taking into account the formal organization of its linguistic structure. The main research method is comparative-comparative. The main classification categories are type, class of languages.

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The most famous of the typological classifications is the morphological classification of languages. According to this classification, the languages ​​of the world are divided into three main types: 1) isolating (or amorphous) languages: - the absence of forms of inflection and, accordingly, formative affixes; - the word in them is "equal to the root", therefore such languages ​​are sometimes called root languages; - the relationship between words is less grammatical, but the order of words and their semantics are grammatically significant; - words devoid of affixal morphemes, as it were, are isolated from each other as part of a statement, therefore these languages ​​are called isolating; - in the syntactic structure of a sentence of such languages, word order is extremely important;

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2) affixing languages, in the grammatical structure of which affixes play an important role. In affixing languages, there are: a) inflectional languages ​​are languages ​​that are characterized by - the polyfunctionality of affixal morphemes; - the presence of a fusion phenomenon, i.e. interpenetration of morphemes, in which drawing the border between the root and the affix becomes impossible; - "internal inflection", indicating the grammatical form of the word; - big number phonetically and semantically not motivated types of declension and conjugation. b) agglutinative languages ​​are languages ​​that are a kind of antipode of inflectional languages. - there is no inner inflection in them; - there is no fusion, therefore morphemes are easily isolated in the composition of words; - formats are transmitted one at a time grammatical meaning; - in each part of speech, only one type of inflection is presented; - a developed system of inflectional and derivational affixation; - a single type of declension and conjugation.

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3) incorporating (or polysynthetic) languages: - incompleteness of the morphological structure of the word; - the word "acquires structure" only as part of a sentence, i.e. there is a special relationship between a word and a sentence: outside the sentence there is no word in our understanding, sentences constitute the main unit of speech, in which words are "included";

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Functional (social) classification. In the sociolinguistic “questionnaire” of languages, it is advisable to take into account the following features: 1) the communicative rank of the language, corresponding to the volume and functional diversity of communication in a particular language; 2) the presence of a written tradition; 3) the degree of standardization (normalization) of the language; the presence and nature of the codification; type of standardized (literary) language; its relationship with non-standardized forms of language existence (dialects, vernacular, etc.); 4) the legal status of the language ("state", "official", "constitutional", "title", etc.) and its actual position in conditions of multilingualism; 5) the confessional status of the language; 6) educational and pedagogical status of the language: language as academic subject; as the language of instruction; as a "foreign" or "classical" language, etc.

POSSIBLE WORLD LANGUAGE CLASSIFICATIONS

Linguistic diversity of the world

Principles of language classification

About the status different classifications

Linguistic diversity of the world

The language arose before such important events in the history of mankind as art (decorated wooden and bone objects - more than 25 thousand years, rock art - about 14 thousand), as the domestication of animals and the domestication of plants (this happened 10-6 thousand years ago ). About 6 thousand years ago, pictography and hieroglyphics appeared, 5 thousand - sound writing. Apparently, the original human language existed as one (single) language. About 30 thousand years ago, people settled in Western Eurasia. In the period between the 20th and 10th millennia before our time, the human language was divided into several linguistic macrofamilies (such as the Nostratic family of languages), from which later arose language families existing in our time. Total number languages ​​in modern world determined in the range from 2.5 to 5-6 thousand. Such huge discrepancies in assessments (more than 100%) are caused by the difficulties in distinguishing between language and dialect, especially for the non-literate state. Researchers of languages ​​in certain regions of the Earth name figures that, in total, significantly exceed 5-6 thousand languages. For example, in sub-Saharan Africa there are approximately 2,000 languages. V South America at least 3000 native languages; in three states of Oceania - Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and the Republic of Vanuatu - more than 900 languages: in Indonesia - 660. The number of Australian languages ​​is sometimes estimated at 500 - 600; Austronesian languages ​​- about 800. India, the most multi-ethnic and multilingual country in the world, has 1652 languages ​​4; in Nigeria, the most multi-ethnic country in Africa, - about 300. In modern Russia- about 150 languages.

The structural diversity of the world's languages ​​is striking. There are languages ​​in which neither names nor verbs change, but there are languages ​​where, on the contrary, there are about 40 cases. There are languages, (for example, Slavic), where nouns are divided into three grammatical classes (gender), in the language nasioi(New Guinea) there are over 40 noun classes, and in many languages ​​there are no noun classes at all. Some Turkic languages ​​have 12 moods, but there are languages ​​not only without moods, but also without grammatical number, without verb tense. There are languages ​​in which there are only 10 phonemes, and in others there are more than 80 phonemes. A language with only one vowel is possible (and there are three such languages), and in some Caucasian languages ​​there are 24 vowels. There are languages ​​with very rare and therefore strange sounds, - like clicks, like the sound of "extinguishing a candle", like "clearing the throat". But the sounds [t], [p], [j] or [s] will not seem strange to anyone - they are in any language. There are almost no languages ​​without nasal consonants ([n] or [m]), while nasal vowels are rare. The apparent diversity of languages ​​has long also led to questions about the cause and effect of differences between languages. What is the perfection of the language? To what extent can different languages ​​be a catalyst or, on the contrary, a brake in the history of knowledge and culture? What do languages ​​define in the differences between peoples? Do they influence the fate of peoples? What determines the fate of the languages ​​themselves? They seek to answer questions of this kind social typology of languages, philosophy of language, philosophy of history.

The diversity of the destinies of languages, the differences in their communicative roles, functions, social statuses, legal ranks - all this is an important part of the reality in which the linguistic existence of mankind takes place. Without the sociolinguistic panorama, our knowledge of man and society would be incomplete. Relationships between individual languages, on the one hand, and some other social parameters of man and humanity, on the other, are extremely diverse. Among such basic parameters ("measurements"), following the language, they usually name ethnicity (nationality), citizenship (citizenship), and religion. It is easy to see the cardinal disproportions between the main dimensions of humanity: if there are 5-6 thousand languages ​​on Earth, then there are about 1300 ethnic groups; states - about 220, including UN member states - about 200; the number of individual confessions, if we include in it the innumerable cults and beliefs in the countries of the Third World, is indefinitely large. These digital "breaks" indicate that on the world map the geographical boundaries of languages, ethnic groups, states and religions do not coincide at all. However, the configuration of four geographic maps of the world - linguistic, ethnic, political and confessional - are interdependent and correlated, especially in historical explanations. The closest to each other is the map of languages ​​and the map of the peoples of the world, since both of them are based on the genealogical classification of languages.

The communicative and functional diversity of languages ​​is no less striking than their structural diversity. There are no two identical linguistic situations on Earth, no two languages ​​with an equal volume of communication, with the same history and with the same future. There are languages ​​spoken and written by millions of people in different countries on all continents, and there are languages ​​native to only a few hundred people in a single village. There are languages ​​whose written history goes back thousands of years - these are Vedic language and Sanskrit(varieties of the ancient Indian language, the beginning of the literary tradition - 15th century BC), Hebrew(the time of the addition of the "Torah", the first five books of the Old Testament, - XIII century BC), wenyan(literary ancient Chinese, the beginning of hieroglyphic writing - IX century. BC.). And there are languages ​​that emerged in the 19th and 20th centuries. in a matter of years, and arose in the usual way for languages ​​- by themselves, spontaneously (not "in the office"), as a result of long-term contacts of multilingual people and the mixing of their languages. it pidgins and creole languages, and about 100 of them are known. Out of 5-6 thousand languages ​​of the Earth, only about 600 languages ​​have writing systems, but only about 300 of them are actually used in written communication. There are languages ​​that, although they had a written language and a literary tradition, have lost the collective of native speakers, and therefore have become dead languages. These are ancient egyptian language (the earliest hieroglyphic records in the history of mankind have been preserved, dating back to the 4th millennium BC), Avestan(texts from the 10th century BC), Latin(actually Latin writing - from the IV century BC), Old Church Slavonic language (first monuments - 863). And there is a language revived, after two and a half thousand years again became a means of living communication of the people - this happened with the Hebrew language ( Hebrew). There are languages ​​in which literary ("correct") speech is still almost indistinguishable from dialectal. And in Icelandic this opposition is absent for another reason: it simply does not have dialects. Known literary languages ​​that are not used in informal, private, friendly-familiar communication - for example, literary Arabic. Each language has a unique social and cultural history, its place in its society, its own prospects for the future. However, the uniqueness of fate a separate language doesn't mean no general patterns, typical lines of development, typologically similar destinies. That is why for social linguistics there is not enough a list of individual striking cases: typological coverage of the entire variety of languages ​​is required. This is the content of the social (functional, or sociolinguistic) typology of languages.

Population of the Earth - 7 billion people

Number of languages ​​- 2.5-5 thousand (up to 6-7 thousand)

Once the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) published the data at its disposal: there are 2,796 languages ​​in the world. Linguists usually prefer to give approximate numbers. The reasons for the discrepancy are as follows.

1) Difficulty distinguishing between language and dialect.

2) Insufficient knowledge of languages. We live in a world where, it would seem, everything is already open and mapped. However, from time to time from newspapers or television broadcasts it becomes known that somewhere in the jungles of the Amazonian lowlands or New Guinea, modern travelers managed to find a tiny lost tribe that avoids contact with other people and speaks a language unknown to any of the specialists.

3) Finally, languages ​​can die. In Russia, for example, the Kerek language literally died out in Kamchatka, the languages ​​of such peoples as the Itelmens, Yukaghirs, and Tofalars are disappearing. These are tiny peoples, only a few hundred people each, many of whom, especially young people, no longer know their language ... Only in the 20th century, dozens of languages ​​disappeared from the face of the earth. With the development of communications, the number of living languages ​​is decreasing at an average rate of 1 language every two weeks.

So it is very difficult to establish the exact number of languages ​​in the world, if not impossible to say.

The most common languages ​​(by the number of speakers):

Chinese

As of January 2012 - 1,349,718,000 people, more than 885 million people speak the Mandarin dialect.

English, Spanish, Hindi (vying for second place)

English is the national language not only of the British and Americans, but also of Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders .. It is one of the official languages ​​of India and 15 African states (former British colonies), it is also spoken in other countries.

English is the international language. One and a half billion people around the world speak this language. It is native to 400-500 million in 12 countries, and a billion and a half use English as a second language.

English is the language of business and politics. It is one of the working languages ​​of the United Nations. The world of information technology is also based on English. More than 90% of all information in the world is also stored in English. This language is defined by the primary language of the Internet. Television and radio broadcasts of the largest companies in the world (CBS, NBC, ABC, BBC, CBC), reaching an audience of 500 million people, are also performed in English. More than 70% of scientific publications are published in English. They sing songs and make films in this language.

Arabic, Bengali, Portuguese, Russian, Japanese, German, French, etc.

Language map of the world (kart of the languages ​​of the world)

Is a map of families and groups of languages, as well as their individual representatives. The area of ​​distribution of languages ​​is indicated by a certain color.

Less common languages

Currently, there are just over 400 languages ​​that are considered endangered. They are spoken by a very small number of mainly elderly people and, apparently, these languages ​​will disappear forever from the face of the Earth with the death of these "last of the Mohicans." Here are some examples:

Russia: Kerek (2 people) and Udege (100 people) languages;

Africa: Bikia (1 pers.), Elmolo (8 pers.), Goundo (30 pers.), Cambap (30 pers.);

Australia: Alaua language (about 20 people);

North America: Chinook languages ​​(12 people), Kansa (19 people), Kaguila (35 people);

South America: languages ​​tehulche (about 30 people), itonama (about 100 people).

In 1996, a man named Red Thundercloud died in the United States ... He was the last who knew the language of the Catouba of the Sioux tribe. True, before his death, he managed to record speech samples and ritual songs of his language for the Smithsonian Institution, which rendered a huge service to science. Unfortunately, this rarely happens, most often the language dies quietly and imperceptibly along with its last speakers ...

Every two weeks somewhere in the world, along with its last speaker, a language dies, and with it a picture of the hopes, beliefs and views of an entire ethnic group. The loss of each language, therefore, always means the loss of the culture of its native people. These languages ​​cannot leave behind even exhibits for the museum, since most of them have no written traditions. So with the death of their last speaker, the language disappears without a trace and forever. Languages ​​die along with the last carrier, and therefore the danger threatens, first of all, peoples who do not use writing.

According to scientists, half of the currently existing languages ​​will disappear in 50-100 years. In order for the language to be preserved, about 100 thousand native speakers are required.

In 2009, UNESCO recognized 136 languages ​​in Russia as endangered.

Languages ​​have always died. As a result of wars, natural disasters, epidemics, the enslavement of one people by another, but never before has the disappearance proceeded at such a rapid pace. It is estimated that over the past 500 years, humanity has lost about half of all languages ​​that it owned, half of all remaining languages ​​will disappear by the end of this century. There are many reasons leading to the death of the language, but the main ones that play a decisive role at the moment can probably be called economic and political factors: globalization, modernization, industrialization and urbanization, entailing the transformation of the world, which once consisted of a motley collection of relatively self-sufficient individuals peoples, into one "global village".

As a rule, "strong" languages, like, say, English, Russian, French, Arabic or Chinese, all without exception with a large number of speakers and a developed written tradition, have been studied quite well by linguists. This is opposed by thousands of practically unexplored and rapidly disappearing languages, which raises the question of their study and description among the most urgent and topical problems of modern linguistics.

Many languages ​​are disappearing due to the fact that their speakers come into contact with a stronger linguistic environment, therefore languages ​​of small nationalities and languages ​​of peoples without statehood are under the threat of extinction in the first place. If less than 70% of children learn a language, it is considered endangered. According to the UNESCO Atlas of Endangered World Languages, approximately 50 languages ​​are currently threatened with extinction in Europe.

Scientists and politicians have long sounded the alarm. The UN proclaimed 1994-2004 the decade of the world's indigenous peoples, and UNESCO and the Council of Europe have set before scientists the task of creating the Red Book, a worldwide database and atlases of endangered languages.

So languages ​​are divided into

There are about 3 thousand different languages ​​on the globe. It is difficult to establish the exact number of languages, since there are still areas that are poorly studied linguistically (for example, some areas of Australia, Oceania).

In addition, it is not always possible to distinguish between independent languages ​​and dialects - variants of languages, the allocation and existence of which is explained by the territorial or social isolation of any groups of people.

During historical development the number of languages ​​is changing. Some languages ​​die when the social communities that used these languages ​​disintegrate. Such are, for example, ancient Greek, Latin, as well as numerous languages ​​common in antiquity on the territory of Asia Minor and Asia Minor - the cradle of human civilization: Sumerian, Elamite, Hittite, Aramaic, Lycian, Phrygian, etc. Some of these dead languages remained for a long time as the languages ​​of worship and the languages ​​of science: such was, for example, the role of the Latin language in medieval Europe... Yes, and now the ancient Greek and Latin languages nourish the terminology of many sciences, created on the basis of Greek and Latin words and roots.

New languages ​​are also being formed. For example, Russian, Ukrainian and Belarusian languages ​​emerged in the XIV-XV centuries. from a single Old Russian language; modern Italian language formed on the basis of Tuscan dialects and Latin; in our time, there is a separation and isolation from the single English language of some of its territorial variants: such are, for example, the variants of the English language functioning in the USA and Australia.

Languages ​​vary in number of speakers, prevalence, social function, and prestige. The first place in all these properties is occupied by the so-called world languages. These include Chinese (native to more than 1 billion people), English (350 million native speakers), Russian (190 million native speakers), Spanish (150 million), French (80 million). human). These languages ​​(except Chinese) are widespread not only in the territory of their formation and primordial existence, but also in other regions (cf. English and Spanish languages common in North and South America; in a number of Asian and African countries, in addition, French is widespread); people of other nationalities are also actively mastering them - for example, Russian is the language interethnic communication the peoples of our country.

The functions of world languages ​​are as diverse as possible: these are the languages ​​of science, education, state and administrative office work, literature, means mass media(radio, television, press), cinema; they are accepted as working languages ​​in most international organizations, at world congresses and conferences.

On the other hand, there are many languages ​​spoken by a small number of people. In Africa, for example, along with Swahili, which is spoken by over 50 million people, there are many languages, each of which is spoken by several thousand people. In our country, small languages ​​exist in the Caucasus, in some regions of the North and Siberia. Such are, for example, the Abaza, Rutul, Selkup, Sami languages, which are spoken by 2 to 10 thousand people; Only a few hundred people speak the Yukaghir language (north of Yakutia).

What Academician I. Meshchaninov talks about

On the globe, people speak almost two thousand different languages. The science of languages ​​- linguistics - is of great importance in our country. Its problems are being worked out in five research institutes of the USSR Academy of Sciences. The works of Soviet linguists occupy a leading place among the works of scientists in other countries. A lot and fruitfully works in the field of studying the problems of the language Hero socialist labor Academician Ivan Ivanovich Meshchaninov.

The specialty I chose, naturally, put me in front of the need to know a large number of languages, - says Academician I. I. Meshchaninov. - My acquaintance with languages ​​began in early childhood. In addition to my native Russian language, my family taught me to speak German. Later, at school and at university, I studied English and French. These languages ​​are usually required by anyone who has decided to devote himself research activities about any field of science. Without them, it is impossible to follow the scientific literature that appears in other countries. One or two of the most common foreign languages are needed by people of different professions. Seamen, for example, absolutely need knowledge of the English language, because international maritime radio communications are carried out in English. As you know, three languages ​​are now accepted for diplomatic communication: English, Russian and French.

Gradually I mastered Italian, Serbian, Bulgarian, Polish, Turkish so much that I could read scientific literature... Already at the beginning of my scientific work I was convinced that it is a fascinating and useful activity - the study of even such ancient, long forgotten languages, such as the Chaldian language, which was spread on the territory of Armenia in the 6th-7th centuries BC. Reading the ancient Chaldian inscriptions, discovered by archaeologists, resurrects before us the history of Transcaucasia.

A special task stood before me in the study of the national languages ​​of the peoples of the Soviet Union. The population of our country speaks almost 160 languages. Many of them have been little studied and are of great interest to the researcher. Some nationalities did not even have their own written language before the revolution. Soviet linguistics helps the development of national languages, enriches them. Here is an example of how, with the introduction of writing, the entire structure of syntax and a series of sequential simple sentences is gradually replaced by a developed system of complex composition and submission. Let's take a literal translation of the Khanty (Ostyak) fairy tale: “There is summer. One day has come. I took my nets. I went fishing. I set up my nets. I got the fish. I went ashore. He began to cook the food. The fire is kindled. I hung up the boiler. " With the introduction literary language this tale sounds differently: “One day he took his nets and went fishing. Putting the nets, he got fish and went ashore. He began to cook food, lit a fire and hung up the cauldron. " Our scientists, studying national languages, develop scientific grammars for them, compose new dictionaries.

Of the languages ​​spoken by the peoples of the Soviet Union, I first studied Azerbaijani, Kazakh, Kazan-Tatar and Gilyak. The latter has no writing, and I had to memorize it directly by ear. In order to be able to compare the languages ​​of different systems, I got acquainted with the group of North Caucasian languages: Adyghe, Kabardian, Avar, Lezgin, Lak. The languages ​​of the peoples of the North that I have studied are of exceptional interest: Nenets, Selkup (Ostyak-Samoyed), Yukaghir, Aleut, Yuitsky (Eskimo), as well as the languages ​​of the African Bantu tribe. Comparing the structure of different languages, we find out the basic principles of constructing sentences and the design of words, which is very important for clarifying the question of their origin.

I am sometimes asked: how can you keep in your memory a large number of languages ​​that are so little alike? I believe that this is achieved by systematic memory training and as professional as, say, the memory for numbers in accountants. For people assimilating new language, it is very important to practice frequently in speaking and reading literature. More often than not, language acquisition takes place without any particular difficulty. I recall a conversation with a young Armenian who worked in citrus plantations. It was ten years ago, in the Armenian village of Esheri, in Abkhazia. It seemed strange to the young man that I could speak four Western European languages ​​fluently. But it immediately turned out that he himself, in addition to his native Armenian language, knows Abkhaz, which is spoken by the local population, in addition, he is fluent in Greek, since Greeks live nearby, Russian, which is familiar to almost the entire urban population of Abkhazia, and, finally, can be explained in Turkish, for I have often met with the Turks in the bazaars. Knowing so many different languages became natural for him, because the need to communicate with the environment pushed him to this.

Studying the diversity and richness of human speech, scientists have made an interesting calculation of the number of people who speak a particular language. Our Russian language, for example, is widespread in Europe, Asia and America. It is spoken by up to 200 million people in total, while it is native to 90 million people.

The growth of the international significance of the USSR aroused an extraordinary interest in the Russian language in all countries. Our young people hardly know that Russian is the most difficult for foreigners studying languages. And nevertheless, abroad - in America, England, France and especially in the Slavic countries - a large number of people take possession of it.

Widespread across the globe English, which is spoken by at least 250 million people, including 106 million Americans and 47 million English people to whom it is native. French 107 million people use this language, 45 million of them speak this language as their mother tongue.

In the East, the first place in terms of prevalence is occupied by the Chinese language. It is spoken by over 500 million people.

Along with the living languages ​​that people use as colloquial speech, there are many dead languages. Their number, according to scientists, exceeds the number of living people. It is customary to call dead languages ​​those languages ​​that are no longer spoken. Many of them nonetheless have a rich literature. An example is Latin, the language of the ancient Romans. Their cultural and scientific significance is very high.

Gain international relations between The Soviet Union and other countries awakened in our youth an understandable desire to learn foreign languages. People who really want to know the language, with systematic studies, master it within two to three years.