HOW TO K*ll A LANGUAGE: Sophia Smith Galer in conversation

We are delighted to welcome Sophie Smith Galer to Blackwell's for her latest book How To K*ll A Language: Power, Resistance and the Race to Save Our Words. Sophia will be in conversation with Rob Drummond, author of You're All Talk.

Doors: 6.30pm, Starts: 6.45pm

Tickets are £4 or free when purchasing a Book & Ticket option or a copy of the book in store ahead of the event.

About the book:

A globe-spanning investigation into the disappearance of languages that asks: what do we lose – culturally, politically, and personally – when a language dies?
Roughly 7,000 languages are spoken around the world today. Over half of them are expected to vanish in the next century – along with the wealth of information they contain, the family ties they represent, and the psychological benefits they confer. This mass extinction event is one of the most pressing cultural emergencies of our age.
Journalist Sophia Smith Galer journeys across continents and generations to chart the phenomenon of linguicide, or language death, and to uncover what’s behind it. From Ghana to Greece, Ukraine to Ecuador, her travels ultimately lead her back home: to Italy, where piaśintein, the Gallo-Italian language of her grandparents, is on the brink of vanishing forever.
Climate crisis, nationalism and war are decimating our languages – but there’s still hope. Smith Galer also spends time with the communities bringing their languages back, from Kurdish activists in Iran to Karuk campaigners in the forests of California, showing that another future is possible.

About the author:

Sophia Smith Galer is an award-winning author, journalist and content creator whose work focuses on language, technology and culture.

She is credited with pioneering journalism on TikTok in the United Kingdom, using short-form video to report for the BBC and VICE News across religion, technology and health. She has been recognised internationally for journalism innovation with a Webby, a British Journalism Award, a Forbes 30 Under 30 listing and a spot on British Vogue’s 25 Most Influential Women list in 2022.

As well as appearing regularly on BBC radio and in op-eds for The Guardian and Prospect magazine, Sophia makes weekly videos about language which have been viewed more than 200 million times, winning her an audience of one million followers online.

She is a Contributing Editor for Translator Magazine and runs monthly Language Bars at London’s Casa Italiana.In 2025, she launched her first app, Sophiana, which helps journalists turn their work into vertical video scripts; it won the Georgina Henry Award for Digital Innovation, a winning place on the International Center for Journalists Disarming Disinformation Solutions Challenge, and a position amongst TikTok’s 50 Global Changemakers.

If you cannot make the event but would like a dedicated copy of the book, please email [email protected] or call us on 0161 274 3331.

Our event format is usually a 45 minute discussion between the author and interviewer, followed by a chance for audience members to ask questions. There will be the opportunity to get your book signed/dedicated after the event. Events are a brilliant opportunity to discover new books, meet authors and likeminded readers and learn something new.

Support your local bookshop and help us keep the Manchester literary scene vibrant and exciting. You can follow us on Eventbrite and social media (@BlackwellsMCR) to keep up to date on upcoming events.

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