
The three speakers represent two of the dialects, with the most common one - the middle dialect spoken in Riga and central parts of Latvia - not featured in the film. In intimate surroundings, a farmer, a schoolteacher, and a herder of ostriches talk about perceived differences between Latvian speakers, and about language policy and their lives.
0.0For 50 years, controversial ethnographer John Peabody Harrington crisscrossed the United States, frantically searching and documenting dying Native American languages. Harrington amassed over a million pages of notes on over 150 different tribal languages. Some of these languages were considered dead until his notes were discovered. Today tribes are accessing the notes, reviving their once dormant languages, and bringing together a new generation of language learners in the hope of saving Native languages.
10.0There are over 6,000 languages in the world. We lose one every two weeks. Hundreds will be lost within the next generation. By the end of this century, half of the world's languages will have vanished. Language Matters with Bob Holman is a two hour documentary that asks: What do we lose when a language dies? What does it take to save a language?
0.0"If a person doesn't go to church anymore, then the church should go to them," says Rinalds, a calm, smiling, young man with a good sense of humor. He is a priest from a small village in Latgale, Latvia's easternmost and poorest region, and the documentary Prīsters (The Priest) follows the routines of his daily life, his thoughts of life and religion and why he chose this path for himself.
8.5The movie explores the origin of the Ukrainian language and persecution of those who defended its authenticity. Using examples of other countries, creators of the film prove that a nation cannot exist without a language.
10.0The Cherokee language is deeply tied to Cherokee identity; yet generations of assimilation efforts by the U.S. government and anti-Indigenous stigmas have forced the Tri-Council of Cherokee tribes to declare a State of Emergency for the language in 2019. While there are 430,000 Cherokee citizens in the three federally recognized tribes, fewer than an estimated 2,000 fluent speakers remain—the majority of whom are elderly. The covid pandemic has unfortunately hastened the course. Language activists, artists, and the youth must now lead the charge of urgent radical revitalization efforts to help save the language from the brink of extinction.
Linguist-philologist Mark Janse discovers speakers of the Cappadocian language – previously assumed extinct, linguists worldwide are exhilarated at the discovery, but Janse realizes the rediscovered language is doomed to die anyway.
0.0For some time now, The State Commission of the Lithuanian Language is at the center of tough discussions. For some, it’s an institution which safeguards the most important principles of the language, but for others, it’s an anachronism of the Soviet regime. This film offers a first-time glimpse into the commission’s work
A TV-hour length documentary film depicting the relationship between language, culture, place, music, tradition, and magic on an active volcano, in the Pacific nation of Vanuatu, on the island of Ambrym.
The filmmaker traces the loss of her ancestral language over three generations of her family, and her own desire to recover it.
7.0The world's largest island has been part of Denmark since 1721, but a significant majority of the 56.000 inhabitants now want independence. They feel their culture and language is threatened and is the main reason for the many suicides among young people. But the Danish speaking Greenlanders feel discriminated and want to keep the ties to Denmark. The film follows four strong young Greenlanders, who each in their own way insist on taking responsibility for the future of their country. The documentary explores the difficult balance between the right to self-determination and xenophobic nationalism. Between traditional culture and globalization.
0.0CREE CODE TALKER reveals the role of Canadian Cree code talker Charles 'Checker' Tomkins during the Second World War. Digging deep into the US archives it depicts the true story of Charles' involvement with the US Air Force and the development of the code talkers communication system, which was used to transmit crucial military communications, using the Cree language as a vital secret weapon in combat.
0.0In this film a young man and his curmudgeonly grandfather are going 1,800 km to northern Russia in an old Zhiguli car, hoping to find the grave of their great-grandfather, who was deported. The grandfather Andris is sceptic over the lofty quest, initiated by his grand-son, as it’s not known what awaits them at their destination. Andris thinks they won’t find anything and will come back to Latvia without ever learning what happened to his father. However ever-optimistic Kārlis wants to use the journey not only to find answers about the past but also become closer to his grandfather who raised him. They both lost their parents as children.
8.0Three Alaska Native women work to save their endangered language, Kodiak Alutiiq, and ensure the future of their culture while confronting their personal demons. With just 41 fluent Native speakers remaining, mostly Elders, some estimate their language could die out within ten years. The small community travels to a remote Island, where a language immersion experiment unfolds with the remaining fluent Elders. Young camper Sadie, an at-risk 13 year old learner and budding Alutiiq dancer, is inspired and gains strength through her work with the teachers. Yet PTSD and politics loom large as the elders, teachers, and students try to continue the difficult task of language revitalization over the next five years.
0.0This short documentary examines an innovative educational program developed by John and Gerti Murdoch to teach Cree children their language via Cree folklore, photographs, artifacts, and books that were written and printed in the community. Made as part of the NFB’s groundbreaking Challenge for Change series, Cree Way shows that local control of the education curriculum has a place in Indigenous communities.
4.0Whether in rock, pop, rap or slam: the people of Bern have dominated the dialect music scene in German-speaking Switzerland for many years. Why does Bern rock Switzerland?
9.0The documentary proposes a unique meeting with the speakers of several indigenous and inuit languages of Quebec – all threatened with extinction. The film starts with the discovery of these unsung tongues through listening to the daily life of those who still speak them today. Buttressed by an exploration and creation of archives, the film allows us to better understand the musicality of these languages and reveals the cultural and human importance of these venerable oral traditions by nourishing a collective reflection on the consequences of their disappearance.
10.0WORDS FROM HOME is a poetic documentary that explores the kinds of affection and identity in the portuguese language spoken in Brazil. Through migrants' stories and their reflections, the movie reveals how expressions, accents and memories form emotional and cultural bonds, showing how speaking connects us, differentiates us and, above all, brings us closer together.
0.0She was born in a cave, more than 60 years ago. Now she lives in a village, with many children and grandchildren to look after. Sometimes, she dreams of her dead mother calling her home – to the cave.
0.0Be. Belonging. Words on vintage flash cards shuffle past in a stream-of-consciousness that shows the mind working, assigning labels and names to things through love and language. In the space of a moment, perception embarks on an epic journey of tongues, through Cantonese and English sounds and Ektachrome memories that form the characters and identity of this American-born Asian filmmaker.
In 1989, Tabinda Sheikh immigrated from the Dominican Republic and got a job in a New York City hotel as a housekeeper. It was there that she caught the eye of a fellow employee who was working behind the hotel’s front desk—Tariq Sheikh. This is the story of how they fell in love.
