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TECHNOLOGY Monday 24 april 2017

Icelandic language at risk; robots, computers can’t grasp it

EGILL BJARNASON ers were a nation.
Associated Press Since Iceland became fully
REYKJAVIK, Iceland (AP) — independent from Den-
When an Icelander arrives mark in 1944, its presidents
at an office building and have long championed
sees “Solarfri” posted, they the need to protect the
need no further explana- language.
tion for the empty premis- Asgeir Jonsson, an eco-
es: The word means “when nomics professor at the
staff get an unexpected af- University of Iceland, said
ternoon off to enjoy good without a unique language
weather.” The people of Iceland could experience
this rugged North Atlantic a brain drain, particularly
island settled by Norsemen among certain professions.
some 1,100 years ago have “A British town with a popu-
a unique dialect of Old lation the size of Iceland
Norse that has adapted to has far fewer scientists
life at the edge of the Arc- and artists, for example,”
tic. Hundslappadrifa, for he said. “They’ve simply
example, means “heavy moved to the metropolis.”
snowfall with large flakes The problem is compound-
occurring in calm wind.” In this photo taken Saturday, April 15, 2017, Salome Sigurjonsdottir, 10, tests a voice-controlled ed because many new
But the revered Icelandic television in an electronics store in Reykjavik. Sales assistant Einar Dadi said none of his TVs un- computer devices are de-
language, seen by many derstood Icelandic. The revered Icelandic language, seen by many as a source of identity and signed to recognize English
as a source of identity and pride, is being undermined by the widespread use of English both for mass tourism and in the but they do not understand
pride, is being undermined voice-controlled artificial intelligence devices coming into vogue. Associated Press Icelandic.
by the widespread use “Not being able to speak
of English, both for mass “Otherwise, Icelandic will being able to fluently read English as a universal com- Icelandic to voice-acti-
tourism and in the voice- end in the Latin bin,” she the epic tales originally municator and diminishing vated fridges, interactive
controlled artificial intel- warned. Teachers are al- penned on calfskin. the role of Icelandic, ex- robots and similar devices
ligence devices coming ready sensing a change Most high schools are also perts say. would be yet another lost
into vogue. among students in the waiting until senior year to “The less useful Icelandic field,” Jonsson said.
Linguistics experts, study- scope of their Icelandic read author Halldor Lax- becomes in people’s daily Icelandic ranks among the
ing the future of a lan- vocabulary and reading ness, the 1955 winner of life, the closer we as a na- weakest and least-support-
guage spoken by fewer comprehension. the Nobel Prize in literature, tion get to the threshold of ed language in terms of
than 400,000 people in an Anna Jonsdottir, a teach- who rests in a small cem- giving up its use,” said Eirikur digital technology — along
increasingly globalized ing consultant, said she of- etery near his farm in West Rognvaldsson, a language with Irish Gaelic, Latvian,
world, wonder if this is the ten hears teenagers speak Iceland. professor at the University Maltese and Lithuanian
beginning of the end for English among themselves A number of factors com- of Iceland. — according to a report
the Icelandic tongue. when she visits schools in bine to make the future of He has embarked on a by the Multilingual Eu-
Former President Vigdis Reykjavik, the capital. the Icelandic language three-year study of 5,000 rope Technology Alliance
Finnbogadottir told The As- She said 15-year-old stu- uncertain. Tourism has ex- people that will be the larg- assessing 30 European lan-
sociated Press that Iceland dents are no longer as- ploded in recent years, be- est inquiry ever into the use guages.
must take steps to protect signed a volume from the coming the country’s single of the language. Iceland’s Ministry of Educa-
its language. She is par- Sagas of Icelanders, the biggest employer, and an- “Preliminary studies sug- tion estimates about 1 bil-
ticularly concerned that medieval literature chroni- alysts at Arion Bank say one gest children at their first- lion Icelandic krona, or $8.8
programs be developed so cling the early settlers of in two new jobs is being language acquisition are million, is needed for seed
the language can be easily Iceland. Icelanders have filled by foreign labor. increasingly not exposed funding for an open-ac-
used in digital technology. long prided themselves of That is increasing the use of to enough Icelandic to fos- cess database to help tech
ter a strong base for later developers adapt Icelan-
years,” he said. dic as a language option.
Concerns for the Icelandic Svandis Svavarsdottir, a
language are by no means member of Iceland’s par-
new. In the 19th century, liament for the Left-Green
when its vocabulary and Movement, said the gov-
syntax were heavily influ- ernment should not be
enced by Danish, indepen- weighing costs when the
dence movements fought nation’s cultural heritage is
to revive Icelandic as the at stake.
common tongue, central “If we wait, it may already
to the claim that Iceland- be too late,” she said.q