UNESCO International Mother Language Day

November 10, 2023

The tenth UNESCO International Mother Language Day will be celebrated on the 21st of February 2009. It provides us with an opportunity to recall the objective of this celebration which was the recognition of linguistic diversity and the importance of multilingual education.
“Only if multilingualism is fully accepted can all languages find their place in our globalized world”. Mr Koïchiro Matsuura. (Director General of UNESCO)

As busuu.com was one of the projects of the UNESCO 2008 International Year of Languages, we are taking a look back at our contribution to the celebration. Remember the busuu.com initiative to promote endangered languages such as Silbo Gomero? Well, it was a huge success. Over 15,000 of our users checked out our Silbo Gomero learning content and there are in total over 30,000 views of our Youtube videos in English, French, German and Spanish. So a big thank to all of you for your participation in the promotion and protection of this charming but endangered language.

The world’s nearly 7,000 languages will be celebrated on International Mother Language Day. Ensuring that these languages can continue in use alongside the major international languages of communication is a genuine challenge to countries and cultures worldwide.

So on that note, in my native language (which is Irish/Gaeilge), I will sign off today and remind you to celebrate your mother language on the 21st of February…Slán agus ná dermad do teanga dúchasach.

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