The native american tongues are not really dying.  I live in New Mexico, USA (for those of you who do not know that it is part of the country, which there are more than you, the educated peoples, would think, trust me).  There are twelve tribes (I have friends in several of them including Pueblo and Apache) in the state and there are "scribes" who are taking serious documentations of the languages.  If you wanted to learn Navajo, for example, go to the University of New Mexico you can major in it if you want.  If you want to talk about CHANGING languages ALL of them are.  Many linguists believe that I- mutation is still going on in modern english, which is important especially for those learning "old" germanic languages since it has been going on for the better part of a thousand years.  So it seems that, maybe, the discussion of fictional languages might be relevant to the progression of our own germanic languages.  I am not trying to be condescending but I think you are being overzealous.  There is really no such thing as a dead language, only a changed one.  The Phrase "dead language" kind of offends me as a student of language.  Sorry if i sound aggrivated I just take the progression of language seriously because it effects not only our speech but our culture.

 

Jarrod Clark

Mark Hall <markhall@...> wrote: