Status
Much effort has been made since 1974 to protect and promote Asturian. In 1994, there were 100,000 first-language speakers, and 450,000 second-language speakers able to speak or understand Asturian. However, the situation of Asturian is critical, with a large decline in the number of speakers in the last 100 years.
At the end of the 20th century, the Academia de la Llingua Asturiana made efforts to provide the language with most of the tools needed by a language to ensure its survival: a grammar, a dictionary, and periodicals. A new generation of Asturian writers have also championed the language. These developments give the Asturian language a greater hope of survival.
Read more about this topic: Asturian Language
Famous quotes containing the word status:
“What is clear is that Christianity directed increased attention to childhood. For the first time in history it seemed important to decide what the moral status of children was. In the midst of this sometimes excessive concern, a new sympathy for children was promoted. Sometimes this meant criticizing adults. . . . So far as parents were put on the defensive in this way, the beginning of the Christian era marks a revolution in the child’s status.”
—C. John Sommerville (20th century)
“A genuine Left doesn’t consider anyone’s suffering irrelevant or titillating; nor does it function as a microcosm of capitalist economy, with men competing for power and status at the top, and women doing all the work at the bottom.... Goodbye to all that.”
—Robin Morgan (b. 1941)
“At all events, as she, Ulster, cannot have the status quo, nothing remains for her but complete union or the most extreme form of Home Rule; that is, separation from both England and Ireland.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)