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Ten years ago Michael Krauss sent a shudder through the discipline of linguistics with his prediction that half the 6,000 or so languages spoken in the world would cease to be uttered within a century. The word that is similar to "shudder" would be...

• Cover

• Alert

• Advice

• Tremble

Unless scientists and community leaders directed a worldwide effort to stabilize the decline of local languages, he warned, nine-tenths of the linguistic diversity of humankind would probably be doomed to extinction. Write a similar word in meaning and context to the word "doomed"

Many researchers would like to know which structural elements of grammar and vocabulary – if any – are truly universal and probably, therefore, hardwired into the human brain. Which option would replace the word "hardwired" suitably? More than one option is possible.

• Ingrained

• Inherited

• Deep-rooted

• Compelled

One factor that always seems to occur in the demise of a language is that the speakers begin to have collective doubts about the usefulness of language loyalty. The meaning of the word "demise" in this conext would be "die"

• Yes

• No

Most Americans and Canadians, to the west of Quebec, have a gut reaction that anyone speaking another language in front of them is committing an immoral act. The word "gut" can be replaced by...