What we lose when we let languages and cultures die | Bruno Beidacki | TEDxKentState — Transcript

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1. 0:01The day I moved to the US to attend
2. 0:03college back in 2014,
3. 0:05I met a girl. She was cute, and being a
4. 0:08young single guy I was at the time, I
5. 0:10used my charm.
6. 0:12I even exaggerated my accent a little
7. 0:14bit so she would notice I was foreign.
8. 0:17But don't judge me though, I was
9. 0:19excited. I thought, "If every American
10. 0:21girl is like this, I'm going to have a
11. 0:23blast in college."
12. 0:27However,
13. 0:28things didn't go as planned cuz my
14. 0:30perspective changed quickly after she
15. 0:32asked me where I was from.
16. 0:33"I'm from Brazil," I said, excited to
17. 0:35overshare about my country like I always
18. 0:38do.
19. 0:39But then, she replied with the words
20. 0:41that would feel like a dagger to my
21. 0:42heart, the end of my 15-minute
22. 0:45infatuation.
23. 0:46"What? No way, you're too white to be
24. 0:49Brazilian."
25. 0:52You see, the reason I tell this anecdote
26. 0:54is not to shed light on the ignorance of
27. 0:56certain people because trust me, there
28. 0:57are plenty of those out there. But
29. 0:59rather to explain how that situation
30. 1:02could have affected me.
31. 1:03I told her, "My family is originally
32. 1:05from Europe. They're Polish and Belgium
33. 1:07immigrants, and that's why I'm white.
34. 1:10But what if I didn't know where my
35. 1:12family was from? What if I didn't have
36. 1:14this much information about my own
37. 1:16roots?
38. 1:17I'll probably have an identity crisis.
39. 1:20I'll probably start questioning myself,
40. 1:22even though there's no such thing as
41. 1:24being too white or too black to be from
42. 1:27a certain region of the world."
43. 1:29It made me think,
44. 1:31"How would she react if I told her that
45. 1:33her skin was too orange for her tan not
46. 1:36to be fake?"
47. 1:39But jokes jokes aside, imagine being in
48. 1:43a situation in which you're part of a
49. 1:45minority and you have that
50. 1:46characteristic challenged and
51. 1:48questioned. How would that make you
52. 1:50feel?
53. 1:52So, fast forward to 2017 when I I to
54. 1:55Macau in Asia to spend the summer as a
55. 1:57Pulitzer Center Reporting Fellow, where
56. 2:00the topic of my research was cultural
57. 2:02preservation and the importance of not
58. 2:04letting languages die.
59. 2:06One day, I was just doing some
60. 2:08sightseeing and I went to a local
61. 2:09cemetery and I ended up meeting Keong
62. 2:12Sang, the man who'd become the center
63. 2:14character of my whole project.
64. 2:17Sang was born in Macau, but he was
65. 2:20adopted by mainland Chinese parents at
66. 2:22the age of two. He never cared much
67. 2:24about learning about his biological
68. 2:26family, though. But once he finally did,
69. 2:28he went to the local agency only to find
70. 2:31out that there were no more records of
71. 2:33his adoption.
72. 2:34And the reason for that is that the
73. 2:36documents were originally in Portuguese
74. 2:38because Portugal colonized Macau at the
75. 2:41time of his birth.
76. 2:43In the late '90s, though, when these
77. 2:45documents were being digitized, the
78. 2:47agency lacked qualified employees who
79. 2:50could translate and preserve these
80. 2:52documents. So, they ended up just being
81. 2:54thrown away.
82. 2:56In other words, due to insufficient
83. 2:58efforts to preserve a language that was
84. 3:00once of extreme importance in that area,
85. 3:04Sang and many other Macanese citizens
86. 3:06are now unable to learn about their past
87. 3:09and maybe even reconnect with traditions
88. 3:11that were once a major part of their
89. 3:13lives.
90. 3:14And that's only one region in our entire
91. 3:17pale blue dot.
92. 3:21Oops.
93. 3:22The numbers are shocking.
94. 3:24More than half of the world's 7,000
95. 3:27languages are in danger of extinction
96. 3:29and will most likely disappear in this
97. 3:32century.
98. 3:33What this means is not only a cultural
99. 3:35loss, but a historical one, as well.
100. 3:38Written records are one of the only
101. 3:40reasons we've been able to learn so much
102. 3:42about what has happened in the last few
103. 3:44thousand years. So, by letting a
104. 3:46language die, we are risking the
105. 3:48potential loss of significant historical
106. 3:51knowledge.
107. 3:52The identity issues will also only get
108. 3:55worse. Understanding where you come from
109. 3:58is a major part of understanding who you
110. 4:00are.
111. 4:01So, when I tell Americans that I'm
112. 4:02Brazilian, I'm not trying to impress the
113. 4:04cute girl who sits by me in my
114. 4:06investigative journalism class. I'm
115. 4:08trying to tell people a little bit more
116. 4:10about the lenses that shape my
117. 4:12perspective.
118. 4:14Not everything is lost though. There are
119. 4:16several ways that we can help this
120. 4:18problem be solved or at least prevent
121. 4:21prevent it from getting it worse.
122. 4:23And the main thing that we should do is
123. 4:25invest more in cultural preservation
124. 4:27efforts.
125. 4:28To start off, we need to offer more
126. 4:30affordable language learning classes.
127. 4:33Back in 2015, when I was in uh New York
128. 4:36City for the Polyglot Conference, I
129. 4:38walked in so proud of the three three
130. 4:41and a half languages I could speak, but
131. 4:43then I started looking around at other
132. 4:45people's badges, and some people listed
133. 4:4715, 16 languages that they could
134. 4:49converse in. And that got me thinking.
135. 4:52If a human being, even though an
136. 4:54extraordinary one, can learn 16
137. 4:56languages fluently, is it that naive for
138. 4:59me to think that we could have a society
139. 5:02in which virtually every person can
140. 5:04speak at least two?
141. 5:06I don't think so.
142. 5:08Secondly, we should promote more
143. 5:10artistic and cultural events.
144. 5:13Music festivals, film exhibitions, and
145. 5:16theater performances will not only help
146. 5:18us raise awareness to the potential
147. 5:20cultural loss of letting a language die,
148. 5:23but they might also inspire an
149. 5:24individual to dedicate their lives to
150. 5:26helping save that language.
151. 5:29We also need to stop forcing people to
152. 5:31assimilate and stop judging those who
153. 5:34choose to maintain their own beliefs and
154. 5:36traditions.
155. 5:38Immigration has become an intrinsic part
156. 5:40of our society. So, instead of expecting
157. 5:43the people who come to our countries to
158. 5:44fully transition into consumers of our
159. 5:47culture, we should embrace theirs as
160. 5:49well.
161. 5:51As individuals, finally, we should all
162. 5:53be a little more empathetic and
163. 5:55compassionate. So, the next time you see
164. 5:57someone wearing something that seems
165. 5:59strange or eating a food that you think
166. 6:02it's weird, just walk up to them and ask
167. 6:05why. What's the context behind this
168. 6:08behavior? You might learn something.
169. 6:10After all, exposure to diversity is the
170. 6:13main way that we can educate people into
171. 6:17the different cultures that exist in our
172. 6:19world.
173. 6:20Maybe through a little more exposure,
174. 6:23the girl from my freshman year wouldn't
175. 6:25have made such an insensitive and
176. 6:27uneducated comment. And while I'm not
177. 6:29100% sure what she's up to right now,
178. 6:32I'm pretty confident she's not a
179. 6:34geography major.
180. 6:39As for me,
181. 6:40I actually met a girl who even knew a
182. 6:42couple words in Portuguese. She made me
183. 6:44change my mind about American girls, and
184. 6:46now I don't even need to exaggerate my
185. 6:48accent anymore.
186. 6:51To finish it, I want you to know one
187. 6:53thing. A globalized world means a world
188. 6:56of cultural diversity and free
189. 6:58expression of traditions and beliefs.
190. 7:01Not a world that strives to reach a
191. 7:03singularity of opinions and behaviors.
192. 7:06We've all seen those societies in
193. 7:08dystopian movies and novels, and clearly
194. 7:11they don't work. So, let's just keep
195. 7:13them there.
196. 7:14The real world needs my culture just as
197. 7:17much as it needs yours.
198. 7:20Thank you.