It takes WORK to overcome the communications barriers between languages: either individual language learning, or the use of translators and interpreters.

Individual language learning can be something that you yourself do (learning a second or third language in order to be able to communicate with people outside your native language community) or something that other people do to accommodate you. Whoever learns a second language, it’s work. An investment of time and energy.

Ditto employing a translator or interpreter. The translator/interpreter puts in the effort to learn another language and then uses that ability for the benefit of friends and relatives, or for pay. If paid, the translator/interpreter gets some return on the work of learning the language, and someone else has to foot the cost of that work.

I think that until quite recently, it was generally the people with power (either an elite with political power, or the power of the majority) who forced the powerless to learn another language, or to pay for an interpreter. This imposed a continuing cost on the powerless. Under these circumstances, it is rational for the powerless to adopt the language of the empowered. It isn’t necessary to forbid the speaking of the smaller languages in order to slowly kill them; it’s only necessary to force the speakers of those languages to bear all the costs of crossing communication barriers.

In the last fifty years, the elites and the majorities of the developed countries have been shamed, even pushed, into taking on more of the burden of language accommodation. In large part, this has meant money poured into developing multi-lingual publications and hiring interpreters. (Social welfare agencies here in Honolulu have to present materials in Japanese, Korean, Mandarin, Cantonese, Vietnamese, Tongan, Samoan, and Marshallese — or perhaps even more languages; I didn’t take careful note). I suspect that you’re just not going to see this degree of consideration for minorities in poorer countries. The governments simply can’t afford all the translation and interpretation required.

That’s why Greg’s analysis of language diversity versus wealth is misleading. That conflates diversity in poor countries (largely rural populations, preservation of smaller languages thanks to isolation and neglect) and diversity in rich countries (governments spend money to preserve minority languages).

Note that at a certain point you’re going to have to start asking hard questions about how many language speakers are necessary before you start hiring translators and interpreters. My condo association sends out notices in English, Mandarin, Korean, and Japanese. My next door neighbors, a Vietnamese-Mexican couple, are left out. Should we hire an interpreter when there’s only one owner who speaks that language? I don’t think so. Governments have to make those cost-benefit analyses, and will end up ruling against extreme minorities. Is that oppression? Again, I don’t think so.

All this would change if we had good computer translation, so that there were no language barriers at all. We’re not there yet.

Someone, somewhere, must have said all of this already. I can’t find any references. I would appreciate any comments pointing me to more nuanced considerations of the previous basic points. That is, if anyone is still reading this thread