With more Tokelauan speakers in New Zealand than in Tokelau, it remains a unique but endangered language

  • Written by: John Middleton, Doctoral Candidate, University of Auckland
With more Tokelauan speakers in New Zealand than in Tokelau, it remains a unique but endangered languageNukunonu atoll.GettyImages

If you didn’t know Tokelau Language Week begins this weekend, you can probably be forgiven. Spoken by fewer than 5,000 people worldwide, Tokelauan has been designated “severely endangered” by UNESCO, its second-most at-risk category. You simply don’t hear it spoken much – or spoken about.

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