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The golden age of language was a few thousand years ago

New research suggests language extinction began with the rise of nation-states not colonialism

Comic speech balloons with different patterns represent the tens of thousands of languages spoken a few thousand years ago.

People speak or sign 7,500 languages today — a small number relative to the past.

Javier Zayas Photography/Getty Images

By Sujata Gupta

Some 7,500 languages are spoken or signed around the world today. Though that might sound like a lot, the number could have been up to 10 times higher a few thousand years ago, researchers report July 23 in Science.