University of Hawaii linguists have helped compile a catalog of the world’s endangered languages.

It was also compiled by the Institute for Language Information and Technology at Eastern Michigan University.

The Endangered Languages Project launched last week as a website developed by Google and backed by the Alliance for Linguistic Diversity. The website is sponsored with a grant from the National Science Foundation.

According to the website, Hawaiian is considered “severely endangered.”

Experts estimate that only 50 percent of the languages that are alive today will be spoken by the year 2100.

UH linguistics professor Lyle Campbell said the catalog calls attention to languages in most need of conservation.  

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For more information:

The Endangered Languages Project is at http://www.endangeredlanguages.com