When the 7.8 magnitude earthquake tore through southeastern Turkey in 2023, the government posted that it would provide translation support in seven languages: Turkish, Arabic, Persian, English, Russian, German, and Pashto. Kurdish, spoken by fifteen million people in the affected region, was not on the list. Elderly Kurdish speakers cried out for help in their mother tongue and could not be understood. Women were afraid to speak Kurdish for fear of not being rescued. Two days later, the government shut down Twitter entirely. A Kurdish educator named Zara Mohammadi had already been jailed for ten years in Iran for the crime of teaching Kurdish to village children for free. Turkey had banned the letters q, w, and x for eighty-five years because they appeared in the Kurdish alphabet and not in Turkish.

Today's guest is Sophia Smith Galer, author of *How to Kill a Language: Power, Resistance, and the Race to Save Our Words*. We discuss how up to half of the world's 7,000 languages will disappear within the next century, and why this isn't natural attrition but the result of ten distinct weapons of linguicide that Smith Galer traces across the globe. We look at how the United States spent $180 million on revitalization since 2005, and how Ladino songs written inside Auschwitz document a language shift happening in real time, and why Smith Galer describes her own journey with her grandmother's dying language from the Italian Apennines as "palliative care."

When the 7.8 magnitude earthquake tore through southeastern Turkey in 2023, the government posted that it would provide translation support in seven languages: Turkish, Arabic, Persian, English, Russian, German, and Pashto. Kurdish, spoken by fifteen million people in the affected region, was not on the list. Elderly Kurdish speakers cried out for help in their mother tongue and could not be understood. Women were afraid to speak Kurdish for fear of not being rescued. Two days later, the government shut down Twitter entirely. A Kurdish educator named Zara Mohammadi had already been jailed for ten years in Iran for the crime of teaching Kurdish to village children for free. Turkey had banned the letters q, w, and x for eighty-five years because they appeared in the Kurdish alphabet and not in Turkish.
Today's guest is Sophia Smith Galer, author of *How to Kill a Language: Power, Resistance, and the Race to Save Our Words*. We discuss how up to half of the world's 7,000 languages will disappear within the next century, and why this isn't natural attrition but the result of ten distinct weapons of linguicide that Smith Galer traces across the globe. We look at how the United States spent $180 million on revitalization since 2005, and how Ladino songs written inside Auschwitz document a language shift happening in real time, and why Smith Galer describes her own journey with her grandmother's dying language from the Italian Apennines as "palliative care."

For history lovers who listen to podcasts, History Unplugged is the most comprehensive show of its kind. It's the only show that dedicates episodes to both interviewing experts and answering questions from its audience. First, it features a call-in show where you can ask our resident historian (Scott Rank, PhD) absolutely anything (What was it like to be a Turkish sultan with four wives and twelve concubines? If you were sent back in time, how would you kill Hitler?). Second, it features long-form interviews with best-selling authors who have written about everything. Topics include gruff World War II generals who flew with airmen on bombing raids, a war horse who gained the rank of sergeant, and presidents who gave their best speeches while drunk.

A show about American history, world history, World Wars 1 & 2, the Civil War, and much more.

History Unplugged Podcast

History Unplugged is one of the longest-running history podcasts of its kind, with over 1,000 episodes covering everything from Alexander the Great's plans for European colonization to the untold story of Alabamians who fought for Sherman deep inside Confederate territory. Topics range from the Bronze Age Collapse to the naval campaigns of the Barbary Wars to Daniel Boone's forced adoption by a Shawnee chief. Guests on the show include history professors, Pulitzer Prize winners, consultants for historical films, and outsiders like Joakim Brodén from Sabaton. The show is hosted by Scott Rank, a history professor specializing in the Ottoman Empire and author of 12 books. And for those who love to spin the wheel of what-if, the show regularly ventures into alternate history, exploring questions like what the USSR's victory in the Cold War would have meant for the modern world, or how our current map might look if the Confederacy had survived the Civil War.

 

History Unplugged is one of the longest-running history podcasts of its kind, with over 1,000 episodes covering everything from Alexander the Great's plans for European colonization to the untold story of Alabamians who fought for Sherman deep inside Confederate territory. Topics range from the Bronze Age Collapse to the naval campaigns of the Barbary Wars to Daniel Boone's forced adoption by a Shawnee chief. Guests on the show include history professors, Pulitzer Prize winners, consultants for historical films, and outsiders like Joakim Brod&eacute;n from Sabaton. The show is hosted by Scott Rank, a history professor specializing in the Ottoman Empire and author of 12 books. And for those who love to spin the wheel of what-if, the show regularly ventures into alternate history, exploring questions like what the USSR's victory in the Cold War would have meant for the modern world, or how our current map might look if the Confederacy had survived the Civil War.
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