74. Although Manx experienced a revival in the 20th century, it was initially classified as an extinct language by UNESCO. In which year did Ned Maddrell, the last surviving native Manx speaker of the 20th century, die?
From Quiz The English Language Let Me Down
Answer:
1974
Ned Maddrell was a fisherman born in the mid 1870s who had spoken Manx all his life; he apparently learned it from his great-aunt. As a teenager, when he first went to sea, he kept up his Manx by talking to Gaelic speakers; the village he came from, Cregneash, was full of Manx speakers, but very few people spoke it in the more urban areas. Eamon de Valera, the Taoiseach of Ireland, met Maddrell on visiting the Isle of Man in 1947 and sent over a team from the Irish Folklore Commission to record Maddrell talking, in the hope of preserving the language. However, the Manx language did not completely die with Maddrell; he taught the language to younger citizens, and schools began to teach the language, with the Manx Language Unit being formed in 1992. UNESCO declared the Manx language extinct in 2000, but later changed its status to Critically Endangered, due to the fact that there were still several Manx speakers on the Isle of Man. According to the 2011 census, approximately 2.27% of the population had some knowledge of Manx.
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