issue 172 , august 5 , 2009 : the world has no manx in the isle of men , ubykh in turkey and last month australia ' s last natives person of eyak , marie smith jones , alive , taking the native language with her . of the 6 , 900 languages known in the world , some 2 , 500 are endangered , the un ' s cultural agency unesco said this week as it released its latest list of world people . that includes a multi - fold increase from the first one compiled in 2001 which listed 900 peoples threatened with extinction . but people say this is more the effect of improved research tools than of an increasingly dire situation for the world ' s far tongues .
2,500 languages are in danger of extinction.