Dynamic Models of Language Survival and Language Death: The Economic Perspective

Andrew John ()
Additional contact information
Andrew John: Melbourne Business School

Chapter Chapter 3 in The Palgrave Handbook of Economics and Language, 2026, pp 73-94 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract The emerging literature that combines economics and linguistics has demonstrated that linguistic factors affect economic decisions and also suggested ways in which economic forces affect language phenomena. This two-way interaction makes the economics of language a rich area of study. The present chapter explores what we can learn from economic models of language dynamics, particularly concerning the survival and extinction of languages. From the perspective of economics, the phenomenon of language death is unsurprising: network externalities and strategic complementarities provide strong incentives to teach, learn, and use majority rather than minority languages. Yet some minority languages are still thriving. The economic literature offers some explanations based on choices about language use, language acquisition by adults, language transmission across generations, and migration between linguistic regions. Economists and linguists have also explored how economic forces may have influenced language birth and death over the very long run. While the chapter focuses on economic models—which are distinguished by optimizing decisions—researchers from the fields of mathematics, computer science, physics, and biology (as well as, of course, linguistics) have explored related questions. The chapter briefly discusses these contributions and notes some examples of independent discovery from different disciplines, suggesting there is scope for productive interdisciplinary research.

Keywords: Language survival; Language death; Language use; Language dynamics; Minority languages; Network externalities; Bilingualism; Language transmission; Historical linguistics; Linguistic diversity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2026
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

There are no downloads for this item, see the EconPapers FAQ for hints about obtaining it.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-031-88240-1_3

Ordering information: This item can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/9783031882401

DOI: 10.1007/978-3-031-88240-1_3

Access Statistics for this chapter

More chapters in Springer Books from Springer
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().