题目内容：

Directions: After reading the passage below, fill in the blanks to make the passage coherent and grammatically correct. For the blanks with a given word, fill in each blank with the proper form of the given word; for the other blanks, use one word that best fits each blank.

Science fiction often presents us with planets that speak a single language. However,1. humans can express themselves in several thousand languages is a delight. Few would welcome the loss of this variety, and, along with it, a multiplicity of nations and cultures.

Unfortunately, the days 2. English shares the planet with thousands of other languages are numbered. A traveler to the future is likely to notice two things about the language landscape of Earth. One, there will be vastly fewer languages. Two, languages will be 3. (complicated) than they are today.

By 2115, it’s possible that only about 600 languages will be left on the planet as opposed to today’s 6,000. Too often, colonization has led to the disappearance of languages: Native speakers are punished 4. using their own languages. Urbanization has only furthered the destruction by bringing people away from their homelands to cities where a single language dominates.

In addition, it is easy for speakers to associate larger languages with opportunities and smaller ones with backwardness. Consequently, people stop passing on smaller languages  to their children.

There are diligent efforts 5. (keep) endangered languages from dying. Sadly, few are likely to lead to communities’ 6. (raise) children in the languages, which is the only way the languages exist as their full selves.

Instead, many communities create new versions of the languages, with smaller vocabularies and simpler grammar. The Irish Gaelic (盖尔语) proudly spoken by today’s English-Gaelic bilinguals is an example, something that one might call a “New Gaelic.”

Linguists have no single term yet for these new speech varieties, 7. from Germany’s “Kiezdeutsch” to Singapore’s “Singlish,” the world is witnessing the birth of more optimized versions of old languages. This simplification should not be taken as a sign of decline. All of the “optimized” languages remain full languages in every sense of the term.

We 8. regret the eclipse of a world where 6,000 different languages 9. (speak), but fortunately, it seems a decent amount of linguistic diversity will be preserved.  Besides, 10. languages become easier to pick up, the future may promise even more mutual comprehension.