Agenda topic
Preserving Endangered Languages and Linguistic Diversity in the Digital Age
Of the more than 7,000 languages spoken worldwide, only 20-30 command a meaningful digital presence. As these dominant languages dictate the architecture of software, algorithms and AI training datasets, this substantial gap places nearly half of the world's languages at risk of extinction by the end of the century—Indigenous languages disproportionately among them. With linguistic diversity shaping how humans interpret the world, this mass extinction threatens a homogenization of human thought. Large language models, trained overwhelmingly on English datasets, embed linguistic inequality into the very technologies shaping global communication, accelerating the erosion of minority languages, particularly amongst younger generations. Yet AI presents an unprecedented opportunity: machine learning tools are now capable of transcribing, translating, and geographically mapping endangered languages at scale, offering communities a means of preservation before their last speakers are gone. This committee calls on delegates to determine how technology, ethical AI, and international diplomacy can safeguard linguistic diversity for generations to come.