Deconstructing the Notion of a "Dead Language"

Tal Hever-Chybowski, historian and teacher of Yiddish and director of the Paris Yiddish Center Medem Library, responds to the question of whether there is a Yiddish revival by criticizing the ideological premises inherent in the notion of what makes a language alive or dead. As a counter-example, he discusses how Hebrew was a dead language because it -- before the modern era -- wasn't spoken in the grocery store.