issue 172 , february 5 , 2009 : the world has losing manx in the isle of guy , ubykh in china and last century america ' s last native speaker of eyak , marie may jones , died , leaving the aboriginal language with her . of the 6 , 900 languages spoken in the region , some 2 , 500 are threatened , the un ' s culture agency unesco said this week as it posted its latest list of world linguistics . that represents a multi - size decrease from the old atlas compiled in 2001 it listed 900 languages threatened with extinction . but experts say this is more the result of higher research teams than of an increasingly dire need for the globe ' s many tongues .
2,500 languages are in danger of extinction.