As the continent marks the Year of African Languages in 2006 to help promote the use of the mother-tongue, does it matter if Africa's indigenous languages are dying out?

Africa is the most linguistically diverse continent in the world, according to the UN's Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (Unesco). People speak close to 2,000 different languages which is a third of the world's linguistic heritage.

New languages such as Kenya's sheng, a mixture of English, Swahili and mother-tongues, are emerging. But up to 300 languages have less than 10,000 speakers, which puts them on the UN's endangered list, and 37 are in danger of completely dying out in the next few years.

So, if people stop speaking the old languages, what, if anything, will be lost? Why do people create new languages such as sheng? How many languages do you speak? Do you know of a mother-tongue that no longer exists? save minority languages.