From the back cover: The majority of natural language processing (NIP) is English language processing, and while there is good technology support for (standard varieties of) English, support for Albanian, Burmese, or Cebuano-and most other languages-remains limited. Being able to bridge this digital divide is important for scientific and democratic reasons but also represents an enormous growth potential. The ubiquity of communications is a fantastic blessing but presents humanity with a very significant cultural-heritage challenge. Many natural languages are disappearing or are in danger of disappearing, and this is a tremendous cultural loss for all of us. As a "representative" of a small group of people with few speakers of their language, and even fewer who understand it, I feel strongly about this issue; beyond democracy, this issue may be critical for humanity's future.
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