Think about this: Anthropologists and linguists say that every two weeks a unique language disappears with its last surviving speaker. As we celebrated our entrance into the 21st century, about half of the world's 7,000 human languages were not being spoken or taught to younger generations. Can you imagine this happening to your own language -- to your own people or culture? But that's just the tip of the iceberg. Along with language, also disappearing are the arts, crafts, vocational skills, folklore, and customs of many traditional and indigenous peoples. National Geographic Society's Explorer-in-Residence Wade Davis calls this the "erosion of the ethnosphere." Today, the world seems to be on a runaway train fueled by consumption and production. As indigenous languages and lifestyles become obsolete at an alarming rate, modernization is transforming the landscape of the planet, globalization is altering our cultural attitudes, and digital communications are changing our conceptions of time and space. It's all moving so fast it feels rather reckless, but what are the alternatives? We're married to progress at all costs, and yet we find ourselves with strange new problems. Energy use, land use, agricultural practices, the population explosion, climate change, cultural erosion, pollution, even international relations seem to be standing on shaky legs. How sustainably are we living in our hyper-connected, mechanized, digital lives? Most indigenous cultures around the world were able to live sustainably for centuries, even millennia. Will we be able to do the same? As Wade Davis said, "All these peoples' cultures teach us of other ways of being, other ways of thinking, other ways of orienting yourself in the earth. And this is an idea, if you really think about, that can only fill you with hope." Even in these industrialized, modern times, the lifestyles and traditions of the past are precious to us. Our hope is to help indigenous people protect not only their language and culture, but also retain ownership of their own future, and for the world to acknowledge the contributions these communities can make to humanity. Nina Wegner, co-founder of Vanishing cultures https://www.instagram.com/p/B4CLc5nBfuM/?igshid=2uautxipluj4
