National Awareness Days is highlighting the sixteenth International Mother Language Day which takes place on 21 February this year.

The National Awareness Days website says that the day was established in 1999 by the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO), and the day has been celebrated across the globe since February 2000.

International Mother Language Day aims to promote linguistic and cultural diversity, as well as multilingualism.

If you’ve forgotten most of your high school French, German or Spanish, then now’s your time to brush up your skills! Speaking another language is a really useful skill to have, even if it’s just for a short holiday abroad.

On the day, the International Symposium on Translation and Cultural Mediation will be held to discuss preserving and developing our heritage and spreading awareness of our mother tongues in order to encourage diversity and even inspire us to take up learning a new language.

Learn more about how to get that tongue wagging and spread the word of your mother tongue.


The United Nations has more information about the day…….

International Mother Language Day was proclaimed by the General Conference of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) in November 1999.

On 16 May 2007 the United Nations General Assembly in its resolution called upon Member States “to promote the preservation and protection of all languages used by peoples of the world”. By the same resolution, the General Assembly proclaimed 2008 as the International Year of Languages to promote unity in diversity and international understanding, through multilingualism and multiculturalism.

International Mother Language Day has been observed every year since February 2000 to promote linguistic and cultural diversity and multilingualism. The date represents the day in 1952 when students demonstrating for recognition of their language, Bangla, as one of the two national languages of the then Pakistan, were shot and killed by police in Dhaka, the capital of what is now Bangladesh.

Languages are the most powerful instruments of preserving and developing our tangible and intangible heritage. All moves to promote the dissemination of mother tongues will serve not only to encourage linguistic diversity and multilingual education but also to develop fuller awareness of linguistic and cultural traditions throughout the world and to inspire solidarity based on understanding, tolerance and dialogue.


For more information go to: National Awareness Days or the website for the UN

Written by Rachel Harrison, speech and language therapist, on behalf of Integrated Treatment Services.