The rarest languages of Russia were named in the Russian Academy of Sciences

The rarest languages of the peoples of Russia include, for example, the Wilta, Negidal, Udege, Itelmen and Mednovsky Aleut languages. This was announced on May 1 by Olga Kazakevich, Head of the Laboratory for the Study and Preservation of Small Languages at the Institute of Linguistics of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

"Several languages have less than 10 native speakers. These are the Wilta (Orok) language on Sakhalin, the Negidal and Udege languages in the Khabarovsk Territory, the Southern Kagir language in Yakutia, the Southern Selkup language in the Tomsk Region, the Vodsky language in the Leningrad Region, the Yokang Sami and Babin Sami in the Murmansk Region," Kazakevich said in an interview with RIA Novosti reporters.

The expert also said that there are languages that have only one competent speaker. We are talking about the Itelmen and Mednovo Aleut languages.

Kazakevich noted that languages with fewer than 10 speakers are on the verge of extinction, as well as those with fewer than 50-100 speakers (Izhorsky, Ketsky, Chulymsky‑Turkic, Sakhalin‑Nivkh, Amur‑Nivkh, Northern Kagir, Tundra and forest Enetsky, Middle Amur Nanai, Karagash).

According to her, the growing number of language activists gives hope for the preservation of endangered languages. She also stressed that parenting in a bilingual or multilingual environment accelerates a child's development, facilitates learning and enriches life, so it is important to develop rather than lose languages.

Six-seven times measure: memes kill proverbs and sayings

Linguists create an applied dictionary to preserve folk wisdom — it will explain situations of using stable expressions.

Kazakevich said on March 7 that Tatar, Chechen and Ukrainian were included in the list of the most widely spoken languages in Russia, in addition to Russian. Kazakevich added that the list of the most widely spoken languages also includes Avar, Armenian and Kabardino-Circassian languages.