The role of media in promoting and preserving languages

The media expands the scope of language use beyond the family and school. News, TV series, advertisements, and weather forecasts are all written in the language; each broadcast demonstrates to the audience that the language is suitable for any genre. Public use of a language influences its prestige, and prestige influences parents’ choice: to pass on the ancestral language to their children or to transition the family to the dominant language.

Each technology has its own mechanisms. Print set the standards for writing, radio created the environment for everyday listening, television established the status of a fully-fledged broadcast language, and the Internet opened up a low-cost, borderless distribution channel.

The UNESCO document "Language Vitality and Endangerment," published in 2003, assesses the state of a language. Of the nine assessment factors, one directly addresses the topic of how a community develops new spheres of use, naming employment, education, and media alongside others. According to the organization, at least 40% of the world’s approximately 7,000 languages are in danger of disappearing.

Language vitality and media functions

The UNESCO scale takes into account intergenerational language transmission, the absolute number of speakers, the proportion of speakers in the population, the availability of educational materials, and the position of government officials. New spheres of use are a separate factor: a language that is featured on television and online receives a higher vitality rating. An international Delphi study conducted by the European Centre for Minority Issues links media presence with increased use of minority languages and the expansion of their everyday applications.

For minority communities, media in their own language is a space for everyday communication, public debate, and representation of community interests. Access to information is also a goal. Researchers of minority media typically cite three operational effects. Prestige: the language heard on the airwaves is perceived as a valid means of communication. Access: speakers of a weak state language receive news without intermediaries. Normalization: everyday contact with the language reduces its exotic status.

According to surveys, Europe has fewer minority languages than other continents, yet enjoys better legal protection. A UNESCO project in the Peruvian Amazon demonstrates the practical side of working with three languages. Communities conducted sociolinguistic assessments, produced signs in native languages, and produced short claymation cartoons about how residents perceive their own connection to the environment.

Print: Hebrew, regional newspapers, publishing networks

By the 1880s, Hebrew remained the language of prayer and literary scholarship. Eliezer Ben-Yehuda, settling in Jerusalem in 1881, set out to restore its spoken function. His chosen tool was the newspaper: initially, he edited Ha-Havatzlet, and from 1884, he published his own newspaper, Hatzvi, subtitled "a newspaper of news, literature, and science." At the same time, he compiled a Hebrew dictionary, organized societies for lovers of the spoken language, and taught in schools where the language was being introduced into education.

Reference literature describes the Hebrew revival as the only fully successful case of the language’s return to everyday speech. "Hatsvi" broke the mold of the Jerusalem press: secular news, events, human stories — the reader experienced the language in action. "Ha-Havatzlet" served two purposes: it served as a local publication and as a channel of communication with the diaspora in Europe. As the number of speakers grew, so did its circulation; magazines were published in Hebrew in Europe, and the meetings of Zionist groups were recorded in Hebrew.

European minor languages relied on regional newspapers to sustain their existence. Asturian texts were published in four Spanish publications, Frisian texts were published in Het Friesch Dagblad and Leeuwarder Courant, and Friulian texts in Messagero Veneto and Il Gazzettino. Their own dailies appeared less frequently: the Catalan Avui, the German-language Der Nordschleswiger, and the Danish-language Flensborg Avis on both sides of the Danish-German border.

Coordination began in 2001. The preparatory editorial meeting was held in Trieste, the founding meeting was in Palma, and the charter was signed on July 28, 2001, in Bolzano. Toni Ebner became the first president of the MIDAS network. The network brought together editors-in-chief from more than ten European language communities to exchange information and collaborate in publishing and marketing. Today, the association unites 29 publications from 12 countries in 13 languages and advocates for support from EU states and institutions for publishing in minority languages.

Radio: Cheap Airtime and Civil Rights

Radio is cheap. Radio’s demise has been predicted for over sixty years, and it’s surviving. A University of Hawaii review cites the following reasons for its continued viability: low operating costs, asynchronous consumption through replays, podcasts, downloads, and streaming, and rare quality — the listener is engaged without being completely absorbed, and their hands remain free.

Minority languages entered European airwaves in the early decades of radio. Sami broadcasts began in Norway in 1946 and Finland in 1947, Welsh on the BBC and Frisian on Omrop Fryslân since the 1950s, and Breton since 1959. Television opened its doors later: Welsh programs on the BBC in 1964, Breton in France the same year, Basque in 1971, and Frisian in the Netherlands in 1979.

The first Sami radio report in Norway was broadcast in 1936: a recording of a Christmas service from the church in Polmak. Regular broadcasts began in 1946, with teacher Kathrine Johnsen, the "mother of Sami radio," hosting the first few years. To give a sense of scale, in 1957, Sami broadcasts occupied 60 minutes a week.

NRK Sámi Radio, its own channel, launched in 1999 as one of the world’s first fully digital radio channels. Today, it is a division of NRK Sápmi, broadcasting news in Sámi languages for radio, television, and the web; the name was changed in 2011. There is no separate Sámi television channel; content is broadcast on NRK’s general channel schedules.

Ireland’s Radio na Gaeltachta launched on Easter Sunday, April 2, 1972, from a studio in Castle, Connemara, using a recorded speech by President Éamon de Valera. The station grew out of the Gaeltacht civil rights movement: in 1970, activists launched the pirate radio Saor Radio Chonamara; a year later, Postmaster General Gerry Collins announced the creation of the public service in Parliament. Initially, it broadcast for two hours in the evening; 24-hour broadcasts began on October 1, 2001.

In Goideltacht, the station has a listenership of 26% of the adult population, a high figure for a minority-language radio station. The station’s full-time studio in Castle was expanded with stations in Kerry and Donegal within the first year, and the transmitter network covered all Gaeltacht areas in western Ireland. Pádraig Ó Raghallai became the service’s first director.

In Alaska, KBRW from Utqiagvik, the northernmost city in the United States, broadcasts a one-hour program, Uqalugaat Inupiat Stories, featuring Inupiaq words and phrases five days a week. Oregon’s KWSO hosts "Talking Drum and Language Hour," featuring lessons in Ichishkin, Kiksht, and Numu, the languages of the Confederated Tribes of Warm Springs. KTNN from St. Michaels, the "voice of the Navajo Nation," broadcasts sports reports and breaking news in Diné Bizád.

Host L. Williams has been working on the radio for 32 years and commentates on Phoenix Suns games in Navajo. His reports are tailored to listeners who understand the language better. On-air support also connects with schools: researchers note that radio reinforces language immersion programs where they exist and helps listeners see the connection between language and community culture.

Welsh-language TV: The channel won by hunger strike

Until 1982, Welsh broadcasts on the BBC and ITV were broadcast sporadically, at inconvenient times. Both major parties promised a Welsh-language Channel 4 at the 1979 election; after the Conservatives’ victory, Home Secretary William Whitelaw reversed the decision. Licence fee denials and sit-ins at BBC and ITV studios swept across Wales.

In September 1980, Gwynfor Evans, the former leader of Plaid Cymru, went on hunger strike. Margaret Thatcher’s government relented before it could begin. Thus was born S4C, Sianel Pedwar Cymru, Wales’ fourth channel. A separate authority, independent of the national regulator, was created to manage Welsh broadcasting on the new channel.

Welsh listeners felt neglected by the UK’s national media for decades. The campaign was grassroots, and the government created the channel after a wave of demands. Radio Cymru and the independent production sector, which included ITV Wales, have kept their voices on air for all these years; the Cymru 2050 strategy explicitly calls for their work to be strengthened.

The channel launched on November 1, 1982, at 6 PM: 22 hours of Welsh programming per week, primarily during primetime from 7 PM to 9:30 PM, plus a children’s slot before dinner. The schedule was built on a publisher-broadcaster model: the channel produces almost nothing itself, with content commissioned by independent studios across Wales. Today, it broadcasts over 115 hours of Welsh programming per week, with English subtitles over the Welsh language.

The digital version of S4C Digidol launched on November 1, 1998, broadcasting exclusively in Welsh. Until 2010, the analogue channel supplemented its schedule with Channel 4 programming during off-peak hours. After the analogue signal switch-off on March 31, 2010, S4C became an entirely Welsh broadcaster, the only such broadcaster in the country.

Funding comes from two sources: advertising and a fixed government grant, which amounted to £94 million in 2007. BBC Cymru Wales provides approximately ten hours of programming per week free of charge, including the news segment Newyddion and the daily soap opera Pobol y Cwm, funded by the licence fee. Since 2013, a partnership with the BBC has given S4C a place on iPlayer and an additional source of funding.

In 2018, the channel’s headquarters moved to Carmarthen, into a building on the Trinity Saint David University campus, where it became the anchor tenant. A review by Euryn Ogwen Williams that same year recommended updating the mandate: removing the geographical restrictions on Wales, moving to a unitary council, expanding commercial freedom, and empowering the channel to work toward the government’s target of one million speakers by 2050.

The Cymraeg 2050 Strategy sets a second goal: increasing the proportion of residents who speak Welsh daily from 10% to 20%. The Welsh Government document cites broadcasting as a tool for revitalizing the language over decades, while citing the country’s print sector as weak, increasing the burden on broadcasters.

Irish and Basque variants

Irish law designates language as the country’s first official norm; in fact, it remains a minority. TG4, launched in 1996 as Teilifís na Gaeilge, grew with the support of RTÉ — in terms of personnel, expertise, technology, and funding. By its twentieth anniversary, market research showed that more than three-quarters of respondents considered the channel’s impact on language positive. In December 2025, the channel announced a €10 million package for new programming.

The authorities’ assessment grew over time. By its twentieth anniversary, TG4 was recognized as a successful project promoting the Irish language and culture; in its documents, the channel was described as an instrument of bilingual policy and the normalization of language use. Success here is understood pragmatically: the language is broadcast daily, without any exoticism or ceremony.

Radio remained important, and after the 1990s, community stations were added: Raidió na Life in Dublin, Raidió Fáilte in Belfast, and Raidió Rí-Rá. In 2026, TG4 announced multi-year content commissioning rounds, and its 2024 annual report describes the development of Irish-language speech recognition systems and its participation in European projects.

The Basque path began from below. Even under Franco, the clandestine Radio Euskadi broadcast on shortwave from two continents. On May 20, 1982, the Basque Country Parliament unanimously passed the law establishing Euskal Irrati Telebista; Radio Euskadi Irratia opened on November 23, and the television channel ETB went on air at midnight on December 31 with an address from Prime Minister Carlos Garaikoetxea.

The group’s statutory mission is to protect the Basque language and culture. It comprises five television channels and six radio stations, reaching over a million people daily. Its second channel, ETB2, has broadcast in Spanish since May 31, 1986. Its geography is instructive: Euskara in the United States was preserved in families, ranches, taverns, and Basque hotels. Between 1991 and 2004, the group produced 45 documentaries in Euskara and Spanish.

The context has been building for decades: the first Ikastola in 1914, the Euskaltzaindia Academy in 1918, a unified literary standard in 1968, and official status in the autonomous region in the 1980s. In recent decades, the number of new speakers has increased, and the language has entered universities, administration, and the media.

Indigenous Television

Māori Television launched on March 28, 2004, from the Auckland suburb of Newmarket; two thousand people attended the dawn opening ceremony. Legislation passed by Parliament in 2003 mandated broadcasting "primarily" in the Māori language and articulated its primary mission: to promote language and culture through a high-quality, cost-effective television service that informs, educates, and entertains a broad audience. A second channel, Te Reo, entirely in the language, launched on March 28, 2008. The service is now known as Whakaata Māori.

The channel operates on a budget. Demand for Māori broadcasts is insufficient to sustain commercial viability, so the state subsidizes broadcasting entirely. At national ceremonies, such as Anzac Day and Waitangi Day, the channel de facto becomes a national broadcaster. Legal oversight is provided by the electoral college, Te Putahi Paoho.

Funding for programming is distributed by Te Māngai Pāho, an agency that grew out of Te Reo Whakapuaki Irirangi, which was renamed in 1993 and separated from NZ On Air in 1995. Iwi radio stations emerged in the early 1990s, long before the television channel; by 2002, independent producers had begun mass-producing programs for the new service. RNZ, the national service, is taking a different approach: Māori language is integrated into its predominantly English-language programming, and separate channels are not being created.

Researcher Jo Smith of Victoria University of Wellington spent three years studying the channel’s contribution to the Marsden Grant, which was worth $770,000 New Zealand. Her conclusion: its contribution to the cultural and political revival of Māori and to the nation’s self-image. Kai Time’s culinary tours, analysis, and ANZAC Day broadcasts have become a part of the national media landscape in less than two decades.

Canada’s APTN launched in 1999 as the first national broadcaster of Indigenous peoples, featuring programming about, for, and produced by them. The network is available in over 10 million homes and produces 51.5 hours of programming per week in 16 languages, including Cree and Inuktitut; all Indigenous language broadcasts are subtitled in English or French. On September 1, 2024, the channel split into two: APTN retained English and French, while APTN Languages received a minimum of 100 hours of programming per week in at least 15 Indigenous languages. The vision for this second channel is succinct: a single space where Indigenous languages are preserved and celebrated.

The network has received several industry and journalism awards. In April 2026, APTN launched a free on-demand library: nearly 2,500 episodes in 20 languages.

CBC Northern Service spends $24 million Canadian annually on 125 hours of weekly programming in eight languages: Cree, Inuktitut, Northern and Southern Slavey, Tlicho, Gwich’in, Inuvialuktun, and Inuinnaqtun. Daily news in Inuktitut and bilingual elective specials are included in the schedule. Finland’s Yle has been broadcasting eight hours a day in three Sami languages — Northern Sami, Inari Sami, and Skolt Sami — since 1947.

NRK, SVT, and Yle have been producing a joint news program, Ođđasat, since August 20, 2001: fifteen minutes Monday through Friday, around 5:30 PM, from the NRK studio, ten months a year. Half the program consists of Sámi stories, the rest consists of Scandinavian and world news, often about other indigenous peoples. In Finland, the program was broadcast on Yle Teema and Fem, later moving to the nighttime schedule of Yle TV1, and is shown the following day as a replay on TV Finland.

Music proved to be a gateway. In 2017, NRK Sápmi launched its first primetime entertainment show on the national NRK1 network: "Muitte mu," featuring Norwegian artists learning yoik from Sámi performers, and viewers hearing live Sámi speech. Euskadi Irratia launched the first public Basque-language music radio station for young people in 1990, and in May 2021, the band’s leader announced its own streaming service, modeled on Netflix. This format gave the younger generation a reason to engage with the language voluntarily.

Peru: news in Quechua

"Ñuqanchik" means "we" in southern Quechua. The program debuted on December 12, 2016, on TV Perú, becoming the first fully Quechua-language newscast on the country’s national television network. Over nine years, it has aired over 2,000 episodes, reaching an audience of over four million speakers.

The program consists of two daily editions: from 5:30 to 5:55 AM and from 12:30 to 12:55 PM. The agenda is broad: politics, economics, agriculture, weather, job openings, health campaigns, music, and community celebrations. In collaboration with the Peruvian Ministry of Culture, the edition has added regional variations of Quechua: Ancash, Huanca, Pasco, Huanuco, Cajamarca, and Inquasi-Cañaris.

The program extends beyond television: it is broadcast by Radio Nacional, and recordings are published on the service’s YouTube channel. The morning newsroom is hosted by Clodomiro Landeo and Saira Choque, while the afternoon newsroom is anchored by Analy Gaspar and Ebert Villanueva. For its eighth anniversary in 2024, the public service called the program a pillar of the promotion and preservation of the country’s indigenous languages.

The same broadcaster, IRTP, launched the programs Ashi Añane in Ashaninka and Jiwasanaka in Aymara. Director Santiago Eshteino, who makes films in Peru’s indigenous languages, describes the effect simply: the films normalize language use and highlight the difficulties of its speakers.

Dubbing and cinema

Manny Wheeler, director of the Navajo Nation Museum in Window Rock, spent sixteen years trying to get a response from Lucasfilm and finally received approval in 2012. Five translators worked one weekend in April 2013, taking 36 hours to complete after watching the film several times. Around seventy Diné actors contributed voice work.

The premiere took place on July 4, 2013, at the Window Rock Rodeo Arena, a national holiday. The discs sold out almost immediately in the museum shop. Star Wars: A New Hope became the first major film to be translated into an indigenous language; the version was later released on Disney+.

The Canadian project Wapikoni Mobile brings mobile film studios to remote communities and teaches Indigenous youth how to make films on topics of their own choosing.

Industrial dubbing demonstrates the strength of demand for native audio. Netflix dubs content into 31 languages, up from 24 two years ago. Investment in dubbing is growing by 25-35% annually, while consumption of dubbed versions is growing by over 120% annually. The platform’s partner network includes over 125 studios. Internal research by the platform shows that dubbed versions are more popular than subtitled ones. The platform re-edited and re-dubbed the first two seasons of Money Heist for the sake of quality. Dubbing, previously considered a niche product in English-speaking markets, has been brought into the mainstream.

The craftsmanship details speak to the attention paid to language. Netflix’s Korean dubbing team conducts workshops on cultural nuances: the words "oppa" and "unni," used to address elders, are localized while preserving the original meaning. According to industry reports, the platform uses AI for voice synthesis and automatic subtitles; the DeepSpeak program synthesizes voices that match the original actors’ performances, and final editing is performed by linguists.

Network platforms and machine translation

Wikitongues has been operating since 2014. The initial goal seemed ambitious: at least one video in every language, oral histories from native speakers, a kind of seed bank of languages. The archive covers over 700 languages; the organization distributes a toolkit for local revival projects and supports Fon speakers in France, Yanomami speakers in Canada, and Aindilyakwa speakers in Australia. The team includes volunteers on every continent.

The project is expanding its search: a web search has begun to document languages, with a separate focus on the languages of the Jewish diaspora. Archival work has merged with a revival: the grandmother’s video recording may remain the only example of phonetics for her granddaughter, who has decided to speak.

The FirstVoices platform hosts websites for 85 language projects: 33 languages from British Columbia and more than a dozen from other countries and regions, plus 17 dictionary apps. The communities themselves contribute content.

Ainu FM Pipaushi has been broadcasting since 2001; 15-minute language lessons are funded by the state support fund. The Ainu Times newspaper has been published since 1997, and in 2016, STVradio launched a radio course for beginners.

Machine translation for languages with small corpora is limited by data. Parallel texts are insufficient, and the quality is substandard; large language models partially bridge the gap through cross-linguistic transfer. Neural network methods have even reached Akkadian, along with the Babylonian and Assyrian dialects.

Law and Financing

The European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages is the continent’s main legal instrument. Part III contains separate articles on radio, television, audiovisual production, newspapers, and financial support. Access to media in one’s own language is unevenly distributed: it depends on the legal category of the language and the size of the audience.

The Basque daily Euskaldunon Egunkaria was shut down by Spanish authorities in 2003; MIDAS campaigned for its defense at the EU level. The Irish case teaches another lesson: the language of first official status can be minority in usage, and broadcasting remains its primary showcase.

Limitations and Disputes

The economy works against small audiences. The Māori channel operates on a budget, with ambitious goals from the outset and limited funding. S4C has operated for decades under conditions of periodic cuts and funding uncertainty. Language hierarchies are reproduced on air: not all communities receive media in their own languages. The US industry press reminds us that indigenous language radio itself needs protection.

In June 2025, KTNN broadcast emergency updates on the Oak Ridge Fire in Diné Bizád. For some Navajo Nation listeners, this was the only clear source of information about where to go.