Headline undercutting the text

[redbird]

There's an article in today's NY Times Magazine arguing that we shouldn't worry about languages dying out. I disagree with the author, in part because we disagree over the accuracy of translation. The odd thing is that I think an editor there agree with me: the headline is "If all languages are equal, why does it matter when one of them dies?" and my immediate reaction was to substitute "men" for "languages" in that question.

Comments

[calimac.livejournal.com]

Somebody once said that he wasn't bothered by nuclear holocaust, because we've all got to die some time anyway. Same fallacy.

[kalmn.livejournal.com]

equal is different than equivalent, says the former linguistics major.

(recent conversation with someone at my house, near a bookshelf. "um, does that book really say '201 dutch verbs'?" "yes! and here is my turkish phrase book, and here is the french verb book, and and and... " there was some rolling of eyes on their part. :)

[callunav.livejournal.com]

Hear hear.

Although - I'm sorry, I can't help it - strictly speaking it's 'different from' not 'different than.'

Sorry. You know how these things are.

[avram]

Not “different to”?

[calimac.livejournal.com]

equal is different than equivalent

Thank you. Thomas Jefferson is often, nowadays, mocked for having written "all men are created equal." But the mocking actually assumes that by "equal" he meant "equivalent."

[lyonesse.livejournal.com]

i think i agree with you. if nothing else, every language is a unique exemplar of the possibilities of human language. there's three-valued logic in aymara, click-language phonology (which still sound to me, a native english speaker with a few years' linguistic education, like somebody making funny noises with their mouths), tactile languages such as tadoma, osv syntax from the amazonian basin, and lack of color and counting words in piraha. without these, our ideas about what language *can* be is impoverished. i think your analogy to individuals is very apt.