A game of tribal pursuit

Every two weeks, somewhere in the world, a language breathes its last: as many as half the globe's 6,500 languages are now facing extinction. And yet, faced with relentless homogenisation, with the global gallop of English as the new lingua franca, many of the old tongues are fighting back valiantly: in the European Union alone, people in 40 different communities speak a minority language different from that of their state: nationalism in Europe is resurgent. It is this apparent paradox that Helena Drysdale sets out to explore in her impressive new book, Mother Tongues.

No longer the footloose single woman of her earlier travel books, Drysdale decides to take her husband and two young daughters - one four years old, the other still unable even to sit unaided - on her European linguistic quest. They buy a mobile home, a converted Mercedes van, and over 18 months - juggling baby food and glue pens - travel from Samiland in the far north of Finland, to Catalonia on Spain's easternmost tip, to Macedonia on the borders of Greece and Albania. What emerges is a thrilling sense of possibility, of the pride that the smallest nations still have in themselves, of the resilience of their dreams for autonomy.

There is, however, no single story: each group has its own struggle. In the South of France, old ladies still use ProvenÁal as a secret language, most commonly as a tool for shameless gossip. The problems for the Sami - who, like the older residents of Provence, remember being beaten at school for speaking their indigenous language - are more deep-rooted: loss not only of language, but of land and culture, too. One subset of Sami is spoken now by only eight people. "How lonely they must feel," writes Drysdale, "condemned forever to be foreigners in their own land, and knowing that with their death will die a way of communicating, a repository of collective memory."

In places, this sense of the grief of marginalised communities turns into something far more belligerent: while Drysdale is in Bilbao, the Basque capital city, she hears news of another kidnapping: ETA's 45th victim in 26 years, of whom the police have only managed to rescue five. Basque, comically, may be "a Scrabble-winning language", with its plethora of high-scoring x's, z's, and k's, but its survival is also a matter of life and death. In Corsica - held up by such groups as ETA as a beacon of hope for the armed struggle - independence was once grasped, albeit some two centuries ago and for a paltry 14 years.

The book is rich in anecdote and linguistic analysis, in expert reportage and insight, and is in parts very beautiful. Drysdale's powers of description are as fresh as ever: Barcelona's rush-hour gives off a "raffish stink"; used condoms" lay like slugs in the dirt"; driving north through Finland "here and there a lake, a sheet of tinfoil, patched the forests".

The parallel narratives - linguistic investigation, contrasted with road-trip-with-small-children - also work very well: when the former threatens to become doughy with serious intent, the latter pops up to rescue with comedy.

Early on, Drysdale realises the misguidedness of believing that her daughters, like her, would thrill to the idea of being on the road. She asks her eldest, who has spent most weekends of her young life in London parks, which "she preferred of the glories we had seen - the chateaux of the Loire? The Gorges du Tarn? The cathedral at Tours? The prehistoric caves of PÈrigord? She muttered, 'Stockwell'".

In her own inimitable way, the younger daughter's last words - spoken as the family exhaustedly embarks at Cherbourg for the final ferry trip - mirror this. "Bum hole," she whispers, through pursed lips.