Welcome to week 4, in which we shall look at linguistic revitalization. Up to now, we've focused more on descriptions, but this week we'll look at a sample of what is actually done to promote threatened languages. For centuries, the vast majority of the world's language communities maintained and transmitted their respective languages, thanks to all kinds of social inertias. It was mainly the formation of nation states, at least in Europe, and the establishment of worldwide empires that brought about the progressive linguistic homogenization of minorities. Many of these attempts at homogenization or uniformization, if they have not yet succeeded, have led to contrary revitalization movements. That is, attempts at the social recovery of the language, for example during the romantic age also rooted in Europe. Language revitalization movements in their struggle against the state or hostile market tend to be short of financial, temporal, and human resources. So if they want to succeed, such movements need to choose with great care the priorities of intervention, so as to avoid acting erratically like kids trying to break a dangling pot with a stick and their eyes covered. In this section of the MOOC course, we shall look at some examples of language revitalization movements, sometimes through the privileged eyes of their initiators. As we shall see, their main priorities tend to be the following three: Firstly, stopping the severe drainage in the number of speakers caused by the break in intergenerational language transmission. Secondly, overturning the feeling of being relatively deprived by delegitimizing the discourse typical of assimilating ideologies. Thirdly, and perhaps above all, showing in practice that the language to be revitalized is or can become a socially living, useful, thriving, and creative language for a whole human community as deserving of healthy future as any other. Some questions may guide you in analyzing examples of language revitalization movements, whith a view to seeing how they could be made more effective. Here are three questions. In what social fields is a particular language, that you are interested in revitalizing, a tool for creative and productive social activities? Secondly, what can be done to promote the recovery of intergenerational transmission, if it has been previously lost? For example, how can the elderly that kept the language but did not pass it on, be brought into contact with young people who have lost it and may want to learn it? Thirdly, what assimilationist ideologies need to be countered and, in turn, what ideas need to be disseminated in order to strengthen such language revitalization movements? As in previous weeks, feel free to use all the resources, audiovisual, and written to feed into your knowledge and experience and please explain particular cases you are familiar with. See you again in a week's time.