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The Last Speakers: The Quest to Save the World's Most Endangered Languages
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The Last Speakers: The Quest to Save the World's Most Endangered Languages

Part travelogue and part scientist's notebook, The Last Speakers is the poignant chronicle of author K. David Harrison's expeditions around the world to meet with last speakers of vanishing languages. The speakers' eloquent reflections and candid photographs reveal little-known lifeways as well as revitalization efforts to teach disappearing languages to younger generation ...more
Hardcover, 304 pages
Published September 21st 2010 by National Geographic (first published January 1st 2010)

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Showing 1-30
Average rating 3.87  · 
 ·  416 ratings  ·  50 reviews


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Start your review of The Last Speakers: The Quest to Save the World's Most Endangered Languages
Pattie
Mar 01, 2011 rated it really liked it
Shelves: non-fiction
What do you call someone who speaks 3 languages?
Trilingual
What do you call someone who speaks 2 languages?
Bilingual
What do you call someone who speaks only 1 language?
American

As English, Spanish and Russian seep into every last corner of the globe, "Last Speakers" is an excellent argument that languages encode different ways of thinking about and viewing the world, and that the loss these languages in the face of more dominant languages will result in the a loss of those unique perspectives.

The
...more
Annelise
Aug 20, 2012 rated it did not like it
Shelves: language
No information that was of any particular interest or use to someone with even a modest linguistics background like myself, just vague descriptions that didn't even make all that much sense without examples. And the author could not get over himself. He actually devoted half a chapter to discussing a meme he started and how many facebook friends he has. That was his most egregious act of self-promotion, but the rest of the book was sprinkled well enough to taint. ...more
Dree
I did enjoy this book--actually, it's fascinating. It is also all over the place.

I was expecting some straight-up nonfiction (languages that are dying out, what is unique to each, etc etc). This book is more of a memoir: Harrison's experiences with last speakers, the difficulties of traveling to them, logistics, why they are the last speakers, etc etc. I love me a memoir, but it was so not what I was expecting. I would rather read about the languages than about the problems of traveling with cam
...more
Wesley  Gerrard
I found this an absolutely fascinating, inspiring tale that truly opened my eyes to one of the planet's scariest phenomena... We hear of endangered wildlife and how our modern industrial society is harming the environment. We hear of other worrying global issues. But, often neglected and hardly publicised, is the very real situation of the reduction in global language diversity. (Minor) languages, often spoken by marginalised tribespeople in remote areas of the Earth, are disappearing into the a ...more
Holly
Oct 06, 2010 rated it liked it
This book is a non-fiction account of the author's journeys around the world recording dying languages. The stories of the people he encounters and the languages and how they work is very interesting, and I loved that part of the book. However, he does a lot of preaching and teaching about linguistics in general, which made parts of the book read like a Masters Thesis. It wasn't thick, just kind of boring. I think it would have been a better book and reached a bigger audience if he had written m ...more
Laura
Oct 19, 2010 rated it it was amazing
Fantastic book for anyone interested in language, oral storytelling, environmentalism, and the impact of colonialism and globalization. The tragedy of the rapid loss of linguistic diversity is slightly off-set by the important work that Harrison and other scholars are doing, not to mention tribal people themselves who are rallying to preserve their languages. This book offers an especially important message for those who arrogantly believe that literacy and knowledge are the the same thing or th ...more
Craig Rowland
Mar 13, 2018 rated it liked it
I saw The Last Speakers: The Quest to Save the World's Most Endangered Languages by K. David Harrison while visiting a public library during a visit last month to Los Angeles. I noted the title and requested it via interloan when I got home. The fabulous dedicated staff of my library system's Interloans Department found the book--and I had it in my hands--within four days of my original request. Talk about speedy service.

My armchair education experience involves studying endangered languages, sp
...more
Ann
Jan 09, 2015 rated it really liked it
Shelves: language-books
This fascinating book, sponsored by the National Geographic Society, describes the plight of a number of threatened languages in various corners of the world, as well as efforts to save them.

The book’s author, David Harrison, is a young linguist whose focus is on documenting, recording and studying (and possibly saving) endangered languages. He does this by traveling to the furthest reaches of Mongolia, Siberia, Papua New Guinea or Paraguay, tracking down the (often octogenarian) last surviving
...more
Nathan Albright
Jan 30, 2017 rated it really liked it
Shelves: challenge2017
My feelings about this book are somewhat complicated, but not because of anything that is in the book itself. The book itself is an excellent one, but the context that book is in is a troubling one. For one, this book is a somewhat obvious cash grab on the part of National Geographic to take advantage of the unexpected popular success and critical acclaim of the documentary film The Linguists, which explored the author and some of the speakers of nearly extinct languages he sees around the world ...more
Christopher
The linguist K. David Harrison has been one of the most tireless activists for protecting the world's diversity of languages, some 7,000 or so by his count, but disappearing at a rapid rate through globalization. He wrote an impassioned argument for language preservation in WHEN LANGUAGES DIE, and the recent documentary film THE LINGUISTS about his work has won great praise. Harrison's new book THE LAST SPEAKERS is something of a combination of these two previous accounts written for a very broa ...more
Yaaresse
This is an introduction to the work of field linguists who specialize in documenting endangered languages. The author is a professor at Swarthmore College, affiliated with the National Geographic Enduring Voices Project, and director of the Living Tongues Institute. He is often credited with spurring the revival of field work (as opposed to theoretical study) in linguistics.

The book is an easy read and contains some amusing and interesting stories about Harrison's travels around the world to fi
...more
Jacob
Oct 25, 2012 rated it really liked it
Shelves: languages
Really should be more like 3.5 stars.

The stories are interesting, and I like the message the author is trying to promote.
The writing is less than stellar. Somewhat condescending and self-aggrandizing at times.
Linguistically, there hints of information, and conflicting traces of various theories, but not much of either.

Still I like the message that we should value diversity and promote languages, including the small, nearly extinct, languages.

I like India's model of most people learning a local
...more
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Katie
Oct 18, 2013 rated it it was ok
Recommends it for: linguistics nerds
Shelves: linguistics
**2.5 stars**

This book was an interesting read but not as compelling as I expected it to be.

I enjoyed reading about Harrison's travels to the world's "language hotspots," (where there is a high level of language diversity as well as a high threat of language extinction), and about his interactions with speakers of dying languages. However, lot of the other material relied more heavily on the author's opinions rather than facts (in the intro, he does refer to this book as an extended op-ed on th
...more
Sarah
Jul 03, 2014 rated it liked it
The preachy, vague writing in the first section annoyed me... until the author admitted he's just trying to write an extended op-ed piece on why we should save languages. That explains it.

After the author set forth his purpose, I enjoyed the book much more. Especially when he started talking about Siberian folk-tales and vowel harmony. I wanted to read more about the Tuvan heroine Bora, who doesn't have strength or a sense of direction at first, but ends up whooping the butts of tons of warriors
...more
Annette
Feb 13, 2016 rated it it was amazing
I think it is fascinating that there are individuals who love and understand linguistics, languages and cultures, and are making it point to study languages, and determine which languages are on the verge of extinction.
The fact that these individuals are going out of their way to discover and archive what is left, and to create a database, that may be used in the future for understanding the world we sometimes take for granted.
I like how the author pointed out that when a language is lost, so
...more
Ashur
Aug 03, 2011 rated it really liked it
Shelves: language
This was an enjoyable pop-linguistics book that as others have noted, reads like a half-travelogue. I have some background in linguistics but still found the material relevant and important, particularly as endangered languages and their preservation is important to me.

Harrison's descriptions of his time spent with speakers of Siberian languages was the most interesting to me, in terms of explaining how different languages encode different ways of knowing. However, I enjoyed them all and feel t
...more
Joanne-in-Canada
Aug 09, 2014 rated it really liked it
Shelves: language
A balanced blend of theory, research, anecdote and passion about the value of all human languages no matter how few their speakers. Harrison is particularly humourous at describing his first field experience. When he offers to help the people he is observing, he is deemed to be competent only to collect frozen yak manure patties and feeding the fire. (This, however, does involve him learning a lot of new vocabulary!) Throughout the book, he describes many different languages and cultures that he ...more
Airi
Sep 02, 2014 rated it liked it
I've read a couple other books on the language extinction crisis, and this is my favorite so far because it give s me the sense of a travelogue that I'm into reading lately while providing insights into the scholarly world of ethnolinguistics. It isn't burdened by jargon, which is what makes some of those other books so dry to read. It is a bit repetitive at times in terms of the overall thesis of the book, but then so are many other books on academic topics. It is a champion not only for lingui ...more
Neill
Nov 20, 2014 rated it really liked it
This is a thought-provoking book about languages on the brink of extinction, how knowledge is encoded in language, the relationship between language and culture, and what is being done to save endangered languages. The author is a passionate advocate for language diversity and for preserving and revitalizing languages on the brink of extinction. Although I agree with his viewpoint, he comes on a bit too strong. The book reads as a rebuttal which isn't the best tone to take with people who are ne ...more
Melissa
Jul 15, 2016 rated it it was amazing
Shelves: 24-in-48-2016
Many thanks to Kate and Tyler for repeatedly telling me to read this.

The idea that lies at the core of Harrison's book is that small languages, those that are poorly studied or documented and with dwindling fluent speakers, encode unique and specialized knowledge about human culture and history. Often these languages are spoken by people considered on the bottom of the class structure by the "dominant" culture and correspond to equally endangered biodiverse regions of the world. I can't say muc
...more
Kelli
Jan 18, 2012 rated it it was amazing
Shelves: esl
I found this a completley engrossing read. Harrison's love for languages and the knowledge they embody is contagious. Though I have read Harrison's critics, I would recommend this book to anyone interested in language and culture, even if you don't subscribe completely to the author's theories. Other than the times when Harrison toots his own horn, the book is delightful. It has informed my perspective as an ESL professional, as well. ...more
james
Sep 27, 2011 rated it liked it
This book deals with the author's quest to preserve some of the languages that are quickly disappearing from humankind. He travels from Siberia to Bolivia to Arizona. The author contends that more effort should be expended saving not only the languages but the vast knowledge that accompanies same with the indiginous speakers. ...more
Lisa
Oct 22, 2011 rated it really liked it
A really enlightening read - living in Australia I am aware of how the local Aboriginal language is rapidly disappearing and I am very interested in finding out if there are any fluent or partially fluent Bunjalung speakers living locally. K David Harrison made me realize how important it is to save the diversity we still have. 885 million people speak Mandarin and only 1 speaks Wichita - sad.
Brenna Swift
Jan 08, 2012 rated it liked it
Not quite what I expected. It was an eye-opening book, but I could tell the author is used to academic writing. He takes too much time differentiating himself and his work from predecessors. He doesn't do this subtly, either. I found myself wishing that he would let the facts speak for themselves without the preachiness. And the facts WOULD speak for themselves. ...more
Pedro Reynolds-cuellar
Oct 15, 2013 rated it it was amazing
Shelves: language
One of the greatest if not the greatest calls for action in terms of language endangerment. David Harrison's narratives, descriptions and analyses put on the table in a clear, transparent way the question for cultural endangerment and societal equality.
Along with the rest of the materials associated with this National Geographic project, this book is a highlight regarding endangered languages.
...more
Jason
Oct 22, 2013 rated it liked it
This is a nice memoir of field linguistics. I found it's rationale for preserving minority languages (1 - every language has an ineffable essence that will be lost if it goes extinct or 2- hidden in an indigenous language might be the knowledge to cure cancer, etc.) a bit preachy, even though I accept the rationale, so I felt he was preaching to a proverbial choir here. ...more
Aspasia
Jan 29, 2011 rated it it was amazing
Shelves: non-fiction
Harrison gives the non-linguist an inside look at the fieldwork required to document a hidden and endangered language. This book will open your eyes to languages and ethnic groups you never hear about on the news.
Cheryl
Jun 12, 2010 added it
chapter "How do Stories Survive?" ...more
Melanie  H
Dec 20, 2010 rated it really liked it

Interesting fast read. I learned a lot about the disappearance of languages. Reminds me (yet again!) that I need to get out into the world and experience it!
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K. David Harrison is a Canadian-American linguist, anthropologist, author, filmmaker, and activist for the documentation and preservation of endangered languages.

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