Over the course of human history, thousands of languages have developed from what was once a much smaller number. How did we end up with so many? And how do we keep track of them all? Alex Gendler explains how linguists group languages into language families, demonstrating how these linguistic trees give us crucial insights into the past. [4:02]

Additional Tags

origin, ted ed: how languages evolve, history of the english language, language

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Classroom Considerations

• Knovation Readability Score: 5 (1 low difficulty, 5 high difficulty)
• The intended use for this resource is Practice