How to Kill a Language

‘Punchy and persuasive … speaking an endangered language is an act of defiance and connection – of love’ SUNDAY TIMES
‘Moving, beautiful and important … The narrative grips from the outset … The driving spirit of How to Kill a Language is, despite its title, not death, but life’ FINANCIAL TIMES
‘A rallying cry against linguistic extinction … This is a necessary book, with a message that English speakers need to hear’ NEW STATESMAN
‘Urgent and timely … what animates it above all is the curiosity and pleasure of language learning – a curiosity that is its own form of hope’ THE TELEGRAPH
‘An essential voice’ THE GUARDIAN
‘Galer casts a bright light on the massive linguistic diversity that the world seems set to lose … Every language that dies takes with it such fascinating stories’ NEW YORK TIMES
’[A] deep dive into 10 of the 7,000 languages predicted to be extinct by the turn of the century … a fascinating account’ THE i PAPER
‘Everyone should read this book. Impressively researched, full of empathy and a page-turner to boot’ OLIA HERCULES
‘An extremely moving, passionate plea. This fascinating book digs down into what it really means to translate, conserve, comprehend, colonise’ CAL FLYN, author of Islands of Abandonment
‘I have long marvelled at the work of Sophia Smith Galer … she is a passionate advocate for language diversity – most recently in her fascinating new book’ PANDORA SYKES
‘Beautiful, thought-provoking and compelling’ SUSIE DENT
‘Erudite, heart-wrenching … a spirited reconsideration’ PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
‘Shines an intimate light on a pressing issue … revealing the powerfully human stakes behind language death and revitalization’ ADAM ALEKSIC, author of Algospeak
‘Hits the intersection of language and power as few other books have’ ROSS PERLIN, author of Language City
‘This is the best book on language endangerment I have ever read. A love letter to languages … both intellectually rigorous and yet profoundly moving’ DAVID CRYSTAL, author of Language Death

Sophia is a reporter, writer, and documentary maker with the BBC World Service, specializing in religion and digital culture. She is the first BBC journalist to be on TikTok and has accrued over 200,000 followers across social media. Sophia was named a ‘Voice of Change’ in the TikTok 100 best of 2020 and sits as an inaugural member of the TikTok Creator Council. She was also selected as a One to Watch by the Edinburgh Television Festival in 2020 and has a Webby in Social Media for Arts and Culture. This will be her first book.

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