How to Speak New York纽约话的奥秘

In Language City， the linguist Ross Perlin chronicles some of the precious traditions hanging on in the world’s most linguistically diverse metropolis.

在《语言之城》一书中，语言学家罗斯·佩林记录了在世界上语言最多元化的大都市中保留下来的一些珍贵传统。

“Up on the sixth floor of an old commercial building along the sunless canyon1 of 18th Street， there is a room where languages from all over the world converge.” It makes sense that the Endangered Language Alliance， the only organization in the world focused on “the linguistic diversity of cities，” lives here， in a donated office in the most linguistically diverse metropolis on earth. It is also here that Ross Perlin begins Language City， his gorgeous new narrative of New York， as told through the hundreds of languages spoken in its five boroughs.

“两边高楼耸立的第18街照不到阳光，临街一栋老旧商业大楼的6层有一个房间，那里汇集了来自世界各地的语言。”濒危语言联盟是全世界唯一聚焦于“城市语言多样性”的组织，驻扎在地球上语言最多元化的大都市中一间捐赠的办公室里——这不无道理。也正是在这个房间里，罗斯·佩林动笔写就《语言之城》。在这本书中，他通过纽约5个区的数百种语言，从崭新的视角对纽约展开了宏大的叙事。

On any given day， the E.L.A.’s cramped office bursts with people singing in Bishnupriya Manipuri （originally from Bangladesh）， writing in Tsou （Taiwan， China） and recording in Ikota （Gabon）. A caller from the Bronx， with a voice “full of longing，” seeks recordings of the language he left at the Mali-Burkina Faso border when he was 7.

联盟狭小的办公室里，每天都挤满了用毗湿奴布里亚-曼尼普尔语（源自孟加拉国）唱歌的人，用邹语（中国台湾）写作的人，还有用科塔语（加蓬）录音的人。一通电话从布朗克斯区打来，对方用“充满渴望”的声音，询问能否找到他7岁那年在马里-布基纳法索边境留下的语言录音。

Perlin， the co-director of the E.L.A. and an accomplished linguist himself， explains that up to half of the world’s 7，000 languages are likely to die over the next few centuries. But his book is less a lament for the deaths of endangered languages than an account of how， like their speakers， they have built new lives in a place where half the residents speak a language other than English at home.

佩林不仅是濒危语言联盟的联合主席，也是一名颇有建树的语言学家。他解释道，世界上有7000种语言，其中多达一半的语言很可能会在接下来的几百年间消亡。但他的《语言之城》与其说是对濒危语言消亡的哀叹，不如说是一份记录——记录濒危语言如何像它们的使用者那样，在一个半数居民在家不说英语的地方焕发新的活力。

Perlin retells the familiar story of the city through the lens of its exceptional linguistic history， beginning with Indigenous languages like Lenape （in which Manaháhtaan means “the place where we get bows”）. Early settlers included the first 32 Walloon2 families to live permanently in New Amsterdam3 and enslaved Kikongo speakers from the Kingdom of the Kongo4.

佩林以独特的语言史视角，从莱纳佩语（曼哈顿得名自这种语言，名字的原义为“我们得到弓的地方”）等原住民语言写起，重述了人们耳熟能详的纽约故事。纽约的早期定居者包括最先在新阿姆斯特丹永久居住的32个瓦隆家族，以及来自刚果王国的说刚果语的奴隶。

While Massachusetts and Virginia were “fanatically intolerant English-only colonies，” New Amsterdam did not seem to care; in 1643， a priest wrote of finding 18 languages among just a few hundred men. New York soon boasted not just languages like English， Spanish， French and Russian， but also Basque5 and Breton6， Catalan and Maltese. Some 200 years later， the Hart-Celler Act of 1965， which ended longstanding national-origin immigration quotas7， helped make Bengali and Urdu two of the city’s most widely spoken languages.

当时的马萨诸塞州和弗吉尼亚州还是“坚决只许讲英语的殖民地”，而新阿姆斯特丹似乎对人们说什么语言毫不在意——1643年，一位牧师写道，仅在几百个人中就发现了18种语言。很快，除了英语、西班牙语、法语、俄语，纽约还出现了巴斯克语、布列塔尼语、加泰罗尼亚语和马耳他语。大约200年后，1965年的《哈特-塞勒法案》结束了过去长期存在的民族来源移民配额制，促使孟加拉语和乌尔都语进入纽约使用最广泛的语言之列。

Throughout， Perlin never misses the chance to reinforce a key point： The history of New York’s lesser-known languages is also that of the traumas of many speakers. Some fled genocide （as in the cases of Western Armenian and Judeo-Greek）， others mass deportation （languages of the North Caucasus）， racial violence （Gullah， an English-based Creole） or starvation （Irish）. Linguistic minorities “have been overrepresented in diaspora，” Perlin points out， because they are “hit hardest by conflict， catastrophe and privation and thus impelled to leave.”

佩林在书中始终强调一个核心观点：纽约鲜为人知的语言的发展史也是众多语言使用者的创伤史。他们当中的一些人为躲避种族灭绝而逃难（例如西亚美尼亚语和犹太-希腊语的使用者），另一些人则因惨遭大规模驱逐（北高加索诸语言的使用者）、种族暴力（格勒语使用者，格勒语是基于英语的克里奥尔语）或饥荒（爱尔兰语使用者）而流亡。佩林指出，语言少数族裔“在流散人口中占绝大部分”，因为他们“受冲突、灾难和贫困的影响最大，所以被迫背井离乡”。

Perlin’s excellent account of the present-day city chronicles six New Yorkers all working， in some way， to extend the lives of their languages. This includes Rasmina， who takes Perlin to “380，” a six-story apartment building in Flatbush that has housed over 100 of the world’s 700 speakers of Seke， a Tibetan-Burman language. Ibrahima runs a website in N’ko8， a West African alphabet created in 1949， and Irwin writes poetry in Nahuatl， an indigenous language he absorbed while listening in at his grandfather’s grocery store in Mexico.

佩林对现代纽约的精彩描述记录了6个纽约人的故事，他们都在以自己的方式努力延长他们语言的生命。拉斯米娜就是其中之一，正是她把佩林带到了弗拉特布什380号。那是一栋6层公寓楼，里面住着100多个说塞凯语（属于藏缅语族）的人，而全世界仅有700人使用这种语言。易卜拉希马运营着使用恩科字母的网站，这套西非字母创造于1949年。欧文则用纳瓦特尔语写诗，这种土著语是他在墨西哥祖父的杂货铺里偷听学到的。

Husniya plans children’s books in Wakhi， a Pamiri language spoken where Tajikistan， Pakistan， Afghanistan and China meet. Dianne， probably the last native speaker of Lenape， tells Perlin wistfully， “Now there’s nowhere to hear the language outside the walls of my head.”

胡斯尼亚计划出版瓦罕语童书，这种帕米尔人使用的语言分布在塔吉克斯坦、巴基斯坦、阿富汗、中国的交界处。戴安娜可能是最后一个母语为莱纳佩语的人，她伤感地对佩林说：“除了我的脑海里，其他地方再也听不到莱纳佩语了。”

It’s hard to be hopeful. Intergenerational transfer of endangered languages is particularly difficult. Still， Perlin builds a compelling case for why preserving them matters not just for the speakers， but for humanity itself. It’s an argument he lives in his own life. But change is inevitable. As Perlin says， “Someday English， too， will be down to its last speaker.”

情况不容乐观，因为濒危语言的代际传承尤其困难。尽管如此，佩林依然提出了一个令人信服的理由，说明保护濒危语言不仅关乎使用者，更关乎全人类。这也是他在生活中践行的信念。然而，变化不可避免，正如佩林所说，“终有一天，说英语的人也会只剩最后一个。”

About halfway through reading Language City， I reached for the Bible， looking for the story of the Tower of Babel. I knew the basics of the Genesis story： At a time when the world had “one language and a common speech，” the people of Babel decided to build a city， with a tower reaching to heaven. God disapproved and “confused” their language “so they would not understand each other.” Work on the city—and the tower—halted.

《语言之城》大约读到一半，我伸手拿起《圣经》，翻找巴别塔的故事。我大致知道《创世纪》的情节：曾经，世界上“只有一种语言，一种口音”。人们决定建一座巴别城，并在城中造一座通天高塔。上帝对此不悦，于是“搅乱”了人们的语言，“使他们无法理解彼此”，城市和高塔的建设也因此中断。

But I’d forgotten what happened next： God scattered the people of Babel over the face of the earth. Language City is a deft refutation of this parable’s moral. Far from scattering， people have instead converged on the city， bringing their words with them. And New York’s towers have never risen higher.

但我忘了后面的故事：上帝把巴别城的人分散到了世界各地。如今，《语言之城》巧妙地反驳了这个故事原本的寓意。人们非但没有分散，反而带着各自的语言汇聚于纽约，而纽约的大厦从未像今日这般高耸。

［译者单位：中国石油大学（北京）］

1 canyon（两边大厦耸立的）都市街道。

2西欧比利时王国的民族之一。" 3 1626年荷兰人以低价从印第安人手中购得曼哈顿岛，将其命名为“新阿姆斯特丹”。1664年，英国夺占该地，改名“纽约”。" 4约14世纪出现在非洲中南部、由刚果人建立的国家，19世纪末被欧洲殖民者瓜分。首都在今安哥拉北部的姆班扎。

5欧洲巴斯克人的语言，是欧洲大陆唯一至今仍然系属不明的语言。" 6法国布列塔尼半岛的一种少数民族语言，属印欧语系凯尔特语族。" 7根据移民的种族和祖先决定是否接受其移民的制度。

8 1949年，来自几内亚康康的语言学家苏莱曼·坎泰（Souleymane Kanté）发明了N’ko字母，主要供几内亚、科特迪瓦和马里的马林克人、班巴拉人、迪尤拉人拼写各自的语言。