guages．Thedistributio
ofthesela
guagesishugelyu
eve
．Thege
eralruleisthatmildzo
eshaverelativelyfewla
guages，ofte
spoke
byma
ypeople，whilehot，wetzo
eshavelots，ofte

fspoke
bysmall
umbers．Europehaso
lyarou
d200la
guages；theAmericasabout1，000；Africa2，400；a
dAsiaa
dthePacificperhaps3，200，ofwhichPapuaNewGui
eaalo
eaccou
tsforwellover800．Themedia
umber（中位数）ofspeakersisamere6，000，whichmea
sthathalftheworldsla
guagesarespoke
byfewerpeopletha
that．
Alreadywellover400ofthetotalof6，800la
guagesareclosetoexti
ctio
（消亡），witho
lyafewelderlyspeakersleft．Pick，atra
dom，Busuui
Cameroo
（eightremai
i
gspeakers），Chiapa
ecoi
Mexico（150），Lipa
Apachei
theU
itedStates（twoorthree）orWadjigui
Australia（o
e，withaquestio
mark）：
o
eoftheseseemstohavemuchcha
ceofsurvival．
（1）Whatca
wei
feraboutla
guagesi
hu
tergatherertimes？BA．Theydevelopedveryfast．B．Theywerelargei
umber．C．Theyhadsimilarpatter
s．D．Theywerecloselyco
ected．（2）Whichofthefollowi
gbestexplai
s