Sometimes though, changes can be too fast. A language or dialect may disappear, swamped by an invading culture. Even forcibly eradicated, as has often been the case, as the rush to a modern “civilized “ world is considered the best option for a populace.

It is obvious though that for many societies this enforced change is not welcome and is resisted. The remnants of a dialect or language may linger on, but the education of the younger generation in the incoming language can often lead to disdain for the older mother tongue, sounding less refined and cultured, or even just plain ugly!

If changing language were just a case of swapping one word for another, perhaps it would not matter so much. But languages and dialects contain whole phrases and meanings for which there is no suitable translation. Within those phrases are the keys the environment, practices and beliefs that shaped that people.

There is a saying in South Wales: you can take the boy out of the valley, but not the valley out of the boy. Although most people in South Wales now speak English as their main language, many phrases and terms survive from the old Welsh speakers and still shape its people. A people born in a wet, mountainous region, with sheep-farming, mining and fishing as the old industries, are going to have a very different set of terms to describe their world than those of the flatter, drier South East of Britain where arable farming and cross Chanel trade are major influences. In recent years there has been a big movement to reintroduce Welsh as a first language in these parts, Welsh language schools are over-subscribed. The more homogenized we become the more our roots seem to matter. We are tribal creatures.

All over the world heritage is being lost, has been lost. Think how much more would we have known about the Celts, for example, if they had wrote down their beliefs in their own language? But theirs was an oral tradition, left in stories, finally recorded and often Christianized by monks, or their lifestyles documented by writings of politically motivated observers of the Roman world. More modern offshoots of their language, Cornish (now officially dead, according to UNESCO), Breton, Welsh and Gaelic are also fighting for survival. The Inuit languages and cultures are disappearing. The damage done to the Aboriginal culture and that of the Native Americans is well known.

Each language lost takes with it vital clues as to how many previous generations survived, and possibly has clues from even older cultures locked within them. Skills, abilities, trades, histories, climate conditions, cultures are encoded in language, transmitted down to each new generation in stories, songs, anecdotes, even gossip. All this is being lost in age of the laptop and the Big Mac.

Are we so sure we don't need those clues, those ancient echoes in our world of fast dwindling resources?

Some of these languages, some of the ramifications of their loss, are what we hope to explore here. Hopefully you may want to contribute your thoughts, ideas, long lost words or phrases in our forum section, so we can all learn more.