Please subscribe to Hay Festival Anytime for access to this content (more details)
Subscribe for £20.00 or log in if you already have a subscription
Nicholas Ostler
The Last Lingua Franca - The Rise and Fall of World Languages
Hay Festival 2012,
In their time, Greek, Latin, Arabic, Sanskrit and Persian have each been world languages, sweeping the globe for centuries at a time. And yet they have all been displaced, just as the linguist predicts English will be. With a working knowledge of twenty-six languages, Nicholas now runs an institute for the protection of endangered languages.