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Revivalistics: From the Genesis of Israeli to Language Reclamation in Australia and Beyond, Oxford University Press, 2020

Revivalistics: From the Genesis of Israeli to Language Reclamation in Australia and Beyond is a scholarly book written by linguist and revivalist Ghil'ad Zuckermann. It was published in 2020 by Oxford University Press. The book introduces revivalistics, a trans-disciplinary field of enquiry exploring "the dynamics and problematics inherent in spoken language reclamation, revitalization, and reinvigoration".[1]: 86 

Summary

The book is divided into two main parts that match the book subtitle: From the Genesis of Israeli (Part One) to Language Reclamation in Australia and Beyond (Part Two). These parts reflect the author's “journey into language revival from the ‘Promised Land’ to the ‘Lucky Country’”.[2] "Applying lessons from the Hebrew revival of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to contemporary endangered languages, Zuckermann takes readers along a fascinating and multifaceted journey into language revival and provides new insights into language genesis."[3]

Part one

The first part of the book provides a radical analysis of the so-far most famous case of language revival: the reclamation of Hebrew, which took place in 1880s-1930s. This analysis contradicts the conventional accounts that the language of the Hebrew Bible is now miraculously re-spoken by modern Israelis. As Rokhl Kafrissen, the New York-based cultural critic and playwright, puts it: "Rather than being a continuation of ancient and mishnaic Hebrew", the result of the Hebrew reclamation according to Zuckermann is "a new language, one whose intrinsic character reflects the mother tongues of its creators."[4]

This part consists of Chapters One to Five:

Part two

The second part of the book applies lessons from the Hebrew reclamation to language revival movements in Australia and globally. It describes systematically the why of language revival by proposing ethical, aesthetic and utilitarian reasons for language revival. It also describes the how of language revival, offering practical methods for reviving tongues.

According to Professor Joseph Lo Bianco (2020), "Zuckermann expands from the often celebrated case of the revival of the Hebrew in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries to discuss what can be learned and applied, and what does not lend itself to such cross-context application, for other endangered languages."[1]: 86  "Revivalistics expands the scope of what is aimed for in reversing language shift to contemplating questions beyond revival potential to compensation for acts of historic linguicide and contemporary neglect."[1]: 86 

According to the Māori Professor Hēmi Whaanga (2020), “there are many insightful lessons that can be garnered from this book to assist and guide our Māori language communities. For individuals and groups involved in language planning, language revitalisation, Māori-medium education contexts, I would definitely recommend the second part of this book. In particular the concept of native tongue title and the notion of seeking compensation for linguicide, and the correlation between language revival and wellbeing, are two areas worthy of further exploration in an Aotearoa New Zealand context. As noted in many places throughout this fascinating book, language is the vehicle that carries our deepest thoughts, our ideas, customs, genealogy, history, mythology, songs, prayers, dreams, hopes, desires, frustrations, anger, knowledge, and identity. It is at the core of our existence.” [9]

This part consists of Chapters Six to Nine:

  1. A book written in 1844 to assist a Lutheran Christian German missionary to introduce the “Christian light” to Aboriginal people is used 170 years later by a secular Jew to assist the Barngarla Aboriginal people to reconnect with their own Aboriginal heritage, which was subject to linguicide conducted by Anglo-Celtic Australians.[10]
  2. Technology that was used for colonization (such as ships and weapons) and Stolen Generations (such as governmental black cars kidnapping mixed-race (“half-caste”) Aboriginal children from their mothers to forcibly assimilate them) is used (in the form of a mobile app) to assist the Barngarla to reconnect with their cultural autonomy, intellectual sovereignty and spirituality.[10]

Reception

The volume was listed as No. 7 in The Australian's ranking of "Australia’s top 10 academic books" for 2021.[12] It has been described by scholars as a "brilliant",[13] "very important",[14]: 1  "bold",[15] "trailblazing", "seminal", "groundbreaking",[16] "magnificent",[17] "exuberant"[18] "milestone book",[19] “which will be referred to for many years to come".[20]

According to sociolinguist Bernard Spolsky, the "brilliance" in the book "is the wide range of detailed knowledge Zuckermann displays. In discussing Modern Israeli Hebrew, he provides numerous examples which reveal not just his full control of the language and of Yiddish and other relevant languages, but an original understanding of the use and history of the items he discusses."[13] Professor Joseph Lo Bianco says that "Zuckermann aims to ground Revivalistics in an ethics of wellbeing, and hence a utilitarian case for revival, linked to methodological practices of bottom-up community led but expert-supported, activity.[1]: 86  "Ideological considerations [...] are inextricably bound up in all the processes he discusses, from the secular/religious/national debates related to Hebrew [...] to the linguicide (language killing) and glottophagy (language eating) relations of domination in settler colonial history, both part of an historically extended set of linguistic injustices that colonisation wreaked upon the Indigenous populations of Australia."[1]: 86  "These two cases, Hebrew and Barngarla, underscore the critical need for historicization of the circumstances of languages weakened by political events and the ideologies that produced those events."[1]: 86 

Anthropologist Dr Timothy Haines states that "Revivalistics is a masterpiece that is both scholarly and social‐minded."[7] Haines says that this "groundbreaking linguistic manuscript is wide‐ranging in its scope, covering specifically Hebrew, Israeli and Barngarla but with references to Chinese, Russian, German, Italian and many other languages."[7] Rokhl Kafrissen suggests that “Zuckermann is a polyglot polymath and Revivalistics is an ambitious volume" that is "solidly aimed at an audience comfortable with linguistic theory" but that "also offers much to anyone interested in the question of language revival, as well as modern Hebrew and Yiddish.”[4] She adds that “Zuckermann is an irrepressible punster, which makes reading him both very fun and very challenging." For example, "he writes ‘Israeli is not רצח יידיש rétsakh yídish (Israeli for ‘the murder of Yiddish [by Hebrew]’) but rather יידיש רעדט זיך yídish rédt zikh (Yiddish for ‘Yiddish speaks itself [beneath Israeli]’)."[4]

According to Professor Norman Simms, Revivalistics is “a very important technical and contentious book, yet it is also a very funny, punny tome.”[14]: 1  “What [Zuckermann] is doing is to save the crazy world from itself, give back a mentality to those who have been pushed or slid off the edge, and that makes him a mensch, a proper human being.”[14]: 4  "Zuckermann tells a lot of jokes because that is how languages, spoken, written and felt deep in the kishkas, work: through puns, calques, portmanteau words, borrowings from other languages, playfulness and wit. It is not just that ambiguities and ambivalences can be pinned down by context and analogy, but that the plasticity of speech, emotional expressions, intimate whisperings on the pillow, infantile rage and political necessity require ambiguity and ambivalence. Otherwise nobody ever could get along with anyone else and especially not with oneself."[14]: 2 

The book was also commended by actor and writer Stephen Fry, Nobel Laureate J. M. Coetzee, cultural historian Peter Burke, and linguistics author and Foundation for Endangered Languages chairman Nicholas Ostler.[21]

Key concepts introduced in the book

The book introduces various revivalistic concepts such as the following:

Revivalistics (in diametric opposition to documentary linguistics)

Zuckermann’s term, revivalistics, refers to a trans-disciplinary field of enquiry[22] surrounding language reclamation, revitalization and reinvigoration from any angle, for example law, mental health, psychology, health, linguistics, anthropology, sociology, geography, politics, history, biology, evolution, genetics, genomics, colonization studies, missionary studies, media, animation films, technology, talknology, art, theatre, dance, agriculture, archaeology, music, education, games (indirect learning), pedagogy and architecture.[23]

The book makes a strong case for a clear professional distinction between "revivalistics" and documentary linguistics (the established field recording endangered languages before they fall asleep). "Where documentary linguistics puts the language at the centre, Zuckermann posits that revivalistics should put language custodians, its speakers, at its centre.”[15]

Zuckermann argues that "a revivalist is not only a linguist but also a teacher, driver, schlepper, financial manager, cook, waiter, psychologist, social worker, babysitter, donor etc. A language revivalist must have a heart of gold, 'balls' of steel and the patience of a saint."[24]

The book promotes a revivalistic revision of the following two fields:

  1. grammaticography (writing grammars)
  2. lexicography (writing dictionaries)

It proposes that grammars and dictionaries ought to be written for language reclamation in a user-friendly way, accessible to lay communities, not only to professional linguists. For example, highfalutin, flowery, often Latin-based, grammatical terminology should be avoided. User-friendly spelling should also be employed.[25]

Reclamation, Revitalization and Reinvigoration

The book identifies three types of processes on the revival continuum:

Revival Language (Revlang)

The book recommends to regard a language emerging from a successful revival as a Revival Language (revlang). According to the book, revival languages share many common characteristics; and they should therefore be classified under the “revival language” “family” rather than under a specific family tree language family.

A revlang is a language derived from an evolved language that stopped being used natively but which is being proposed for a return to use, usually by descendants of the original speakers.

The book suggests that there are various similarities between revlangs and conlangs (constructed languages).[26]

Conlangs are subdivided into artlangs (artistic languages, such as Klingon and Quenya) and auxlangs (International auxiliary languages such as Esperanto and Volapük).

Similarly, the book proposes a subdivision of revlangs into reclangs (reclaimed languages, which have ceased to be spoken entirely) and reinlangs (reinvigorated and revitalized languages, both of which are endangered but still spoken).

Founder Principle and Congruence Principle

The book suggests that a successful “revival language” is characterized by two principles: the Founder Principle and the Congruence Principle:

Founder Principle

According to the Founder Principle, an emerging revival language is predetermined by the characteristics of the languages spoken by the founder population. In the context of Israeli, “Yiddish is a primary contributor to Israeli because it was the mother tongue of the vast majority of revivalists and first pioneers in Eretz Yisrael (“Land of Israel”, Palestine) at the critical period of the beginning of Israeli”.[27]

Zuckermann theorizes the Founder Principle works because by the time later immigrants came to Israel, Israeli had already consolidated the fundamental parts of its grammar. Thus, Moroccan Jews arriving in Israel in the 1950s had to learn a fully-fledged language. [27]

Congruence Principle

According to the Congruence Principle, the more contributing languages a linguistic feature occurs in, the more likely it is to persist in the emerging revival language. [6]

Zuckermann argues that the principle works inadvertently, regardless of whether or not the revivalists want that.[6]

Zuckermann has already applied the Congruence Principle to lexicon, when he explored phono-semantic matching in the book Language Contact and Lexical Enrichment in Israeli Hebrew.[28] However, in Revivalistics, he applies it further, to grammar and to the analysis of the genetics of the entire language.

Linguicide and Native Tongue Title

Zuckermann models the term “Native Tongue Title” on Native Title. Native Tongue Title is compensation for linguicide (language killing). Native Tongue Title is the enactment of an ex gratia compensation scheme for the loss of Indigenous languages.

According to Zuckermann, although some Australian states have enacted ex gratia compensation schemes for the victims of the Stolen Generations policies, the victims of linguicide are overlooked. The book argues that existing competitive grant schemes by the Australian government to support Aboriginal languages should be complemented with compensation schemes, which are based on a claim of right rather than on competition.

Nonetheless, Timothy Haines argues that "Zuckermann's remarkable achievement" of reclaiming the Barngarla language "arguably assisted in the process of the recognition of the Barngarla people's native title. Indeed, the Federal Court judge presiding over the Barngarla's native title hearing, Justice John Mansfield noted that the Barngarla's active pursuit of language revival — empowered by Zuckermann's renewed "revivalist" efforts — was a clear indication of their continued connection with their land and culture. This was despite the separation that many had endured as “Stolen Generation” children of the 1960s and 70s, when they were forcibly removed by the State to homes in Adelaide, far distant from their native Eyre Peninsula in South Australia's west."[7]

Sleeping Beauty and Dreaming Beauty

The book introduces the metaphor sleeping beauty to describe a no-longer natively spoken language such as Hebrew and Barngarla. According to Zuckermann, the term “sleeping beauty” is a positive and poetic way to champion and celebrate dormant tongues. The term avoids the negative connotations of alternatives such as “dead” or “extinct”, which are often rejected or rebuked by indigenous people all over the globe.

The book also proposes the metaphor "dreaming beauty"[29] to describe specifically an Australian Aboriginal sleeping beauty. The reason is the Australian Aboriginal concept known in English as The Dreaming – see the words jukurrpa in Warlpiri and altjira in Arrernte.

Ethical, aesthetic and utilitarian reasons for language revival

The book identifies three main types of reasons for language revival:[30][31]

Langue, land and lens

The book describes the importance of the “trinity” langue-land-lens (which is an alliteration) for any group of people seeking a modern nationhood:

Tarbutomics

Tarbutomics is Israeli culturomics, the latter being a trans-disciplinary form of computational lexicology that studies human behaviour, language, and cultural and historical trends through the quantitative analysis of texts. Zuckermann's term is based on תרבות (tarbút), the "Israeli word" for “culture”. It is therefore a calque (loan-translation) of the term culturomics.

References

  1. ^ a b c d e f Lo Bianco, Joseph 2020, “Ideologies of sign language and their repercussions in language policy determination”, Language & Communication 75: 83-93.
  2. ^ Zuckermann 2020, p. xxi.
  3. ^ LINGUIST List 31.1672, Books: Revivalistics: Zuckermann, 18 May 2020, Issue Editor: Jeremy Coburn.
  4. ^ a b c d "Yiddish in Israel / Rokhl Kafrissen, Tablet". 7 April 2020. Retrieved 6 August 2020.
  5. ^ Zuckermann 2020, p. xxv.
  6. ^ a b c Zuckermann 2020, p. 15.
  7. ^ a b c d e f g Timothy Haines (11 July 2020). "Book Review". The Australian Journal of Anthropology. doi:10.1111/taja.12354. S2CID 225550368.
  8. ^ Zuckermann 2020, p. xxvi.
  9. ^ Whaanga, Hēmi 2020. Review of Zuckermann (2020), Te Reo - Journal of the Linguistic Society of New Zealand, Volume 63, Issue 1, pages 38-41.
  10. ^ a b Zuckermann 2020, p. xxix.
  11. ^ Hallett, Darcy, Michael J. Chandler & Christopher E. Lalonde. 2007. “Aboriginal language knowledge and youth suicide”, Cognitive Development 22.3, pp. 392-9.
  12. ^ See page 50 of "Research Magazine 2021", The Australian, November 10, 2021.
  13. ^ a b Spolsky, Bernard 2021, Review of Revivalistics, Hebrew Higher Education 23.
  14. ^ a b c d Simms, Norman 2020. Review of Ghil‘ad Zuckermann, ‘‘Revivalistics: From the Genesis of Israeli to Language Reclamation in Australia and Beyond’’. New York: Oxford University Press, 2020; Mentalities/Mentalités 34.1.
  15. ^ a b Nash, Joshua 2021, Review article: Stop, revival(istics), (linguistic) survival(istics): Zuckermann's Revivalistics and Giacon's Yaluu. Language Documentation and Description 20, pp. 352-358.
  16. ^ "How Yiddish influenced Modern Hebrew: yes, you read it correct! / Avi Kumar, The Times of Israel". 29 June 2020. Retrieved 21 July 2020.
  17. ^ Raghunathan, Arathi 2021. Sociolinguistic Studies 15.2-4 2021: 361–366.
  18. ^ Smith, Hilary 2021, Review of Revivalistics, TESOLANZ (Teachers of English to Speakers of Other Languages Aotearoa New Zealand) News, Volume 37, Issue 1, Autumn 2021, p. 23.
  19. ^ Desiatnik, Shane "Milsteone book opens new linguistic doors" Australian Jewish News, p. 20, July 3, 2020.
  20. ^ Historian Gil Robertson in "Revivalist book incorporates Barngarla language efforts / Jarrad Delaney, Port Lincoln Times". 16 July 2020. Retrieved 21 July 2020.
  21. ^ Revivalistics, Oxford University Press.
  22. ^ Alex Rawlings, March 22, 2019, BBC Future, The man bringing dead languages back to life ("Ghil'ad Zuckermann has found that resurrecting lost languages may bring many benefits to indigenous populations – with knock-on effects for their health and happiness"), accessed August 6, 2020.
  23. ^ Zuckermann 2020, p. 204.
  24. ^ Zuckermann 2020, p. 207.
  25. ^ Zuckermann 2020, p. 210.
  26. ^ Zuckermann 2020, p. 164.
  27. ^ a b Zuckermann 2020, p. 17.
  28. ^ Zuckermann 2003.
  29. ^ Israel’s Hebrew Revival A Potential Model To Save Languages: Australian Aboriginals and other cultures could re-learn their mother tongues, by Avi Kumar, TheJ.ca - Canada's Jewish News, 15 April 2021.
  30. ^ Why we should revive dead languages, by Ghil‘ad Zuckermann, OUPBlog, June 20, 2020.
  31. ^ Babbel: Why Revive A Dead Language? - Interview with Prof. Ghil‘ad Zuckermann.

Bibliography[edit]

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