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The Last Language on Earth is the story of Eskayan, a constructed language from the Philippines. Unlike better-known invented languages such as Esperanto or Klingon, Eskayan has now been transmitted from generation to generation within its community for over a century and has come to be regarded by its speakers as the true indigenous language of the island of Bohol. The book considers the form of language itself as a point of departure, and analyzes the
historical circumstances and ideological motivations that brought it into being and which continue to sustain it today.
About the author
Piers Kelly is a linguistic anthropologist whose research centers on the varied uses of writing and graphic codes in non-state societies, especially in West Africa, Southeast Asia, and Australia. He has previously worked as a linguist with the National Commission on Indigenous People, Philippines, and is currently affiliated with the Centre for Australian Studies at the University of Cologne, the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History in Leipzig, and the University of New England in Armidale, Australia. He is a co-editor of Skin, Kin and Clan: The Dynamics of Social Categories in Indigenous Australia (ANU Press, 2018).
Summary
The Last Language on Earth is an ethnographic history of the disputed Eskayan language, spoken today by an isolated upland community living on the island of Bohol in the southern Philippines. After Eskaya people were first 'discovered' in 1980, visitors described the group as a lost tribe preserving a unique language and writing system. Others argued that the Eskaya were merely members of a utopian rural cult who had invented their own language and script. Rather than adjudicating outsider polemics, this book engages directly with the language itself as well as the direct perspectives of those who use it today.
Through written and oral accounts, Eskaya people have represented their language as an ancestral creation derived from a human body. Reinforcing this traditional view, Piers Kelly's linguistic analysis shows how a complex new register was brought into being by fusing new vocabulary onto a modified local grammar. In a synthesis of linguistic, ethnographic, and historical evidence, a picture emerges of a coastal community that fled the ravages of the U.S. invasion of the island in 1901 in order to build a utopian society in the hills. Here they predicted that the world's languages would decline leaving Eskayan as the last language on earth. Marshalling anthropological theories of nationalism, authenticity, and language ideology, along with comparisons to similar events across highland Southeast Asia, Kelly offers a convincing account of this linguistic mystery and also shows its broader relevance to linguistic anthropology. Although the Eskayan situation is unusual, it has the power to illuminate the pivotal role that language plays in the pursuit of identity-building and political resistance.
Additional text
This book is excellent for linguists interested in learning more about artificial languages and the context in which one such language can establish itself securely within a community. It is also intended for those interested in learning about the different peoples and cultures in the world that do not receive as much media attention as larger communities and nations.
