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Is Chinese going to be the lingua franca? | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Alvinho Triglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 6235 days ago 828 posts - 832 votes  Speaks: Portuguese*, English, Spanish | Message 161 of 249 25 November 2009 at 3:23pm | IP Logged | ||
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I believe that Mandarin would come by a huge popularity amongst westerns as long as the main Chinese companies widespread around the world and set a huge influence in the areas where they're set up...along with lots of Chinese immigrants building settlements .....as American companies do.
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| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5839 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 163 of 249 25 November 2009 at 10:09pm | IP Logged | ||
I think that didn't come out quite as Alvinho intended. But I guess he means places like South Korea, Singapore, Japan and various places in Europe where you can find companies where most of the senior mangagement is American, and where English is considered the "working language" even though the business takes place in a non-English speaking country. I don't know anything about South America but I imagine it happens there too. Don't know if Americans are "building settlements" exactly - maybe Alvinho is referring to gated communities or condo areas that happen to be popular with expats, particularly Americans. This is the result of "globalisation", and I don't think that there'd be anybody stopping Japanese, Chinese and others from doing the exact same thing. In fact, I think it's quite likely that this will happen - particularly with Chinese companies and further on, companies from the other "BRIC" countries. Here in London we have a few Japanese financial institutions and multinationals. I have been in contact with a couple through work. They are like little "mini-Japans". To work there you have got to speak Japanese. When you enter the office and look around, most of the employees are in fact Japanese. They work and socialise "japanese hours" and can been seen catching the train home from work at very strange hours. The area that I live in is quite popular with Japanese expats and there is a community school nearby, and a supermarket. On the whole they keep a very low profile though. But it's a similar thing - just not quite on the scale of American business dominance. Personally I am no big fan of the "globalised economy". I think it brings out the worst in both companies and consumers. I don't want apples that have been shipped from New Zealand or clothes made in a Chinese sweatshop Etc. I try to avoid it, but obviously one cannot live in the modern society without taking part of the globalised economy. Edited by cordelia0507 on 25 November 2009 at 10:21pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Gusutafu Senior Member Sweden Joined 5522 days ago 655 posts - 1039 votes Speaks: Swedish* | Message 164 of 249 25 November 2009 at 10:43pm | IP Logged | ||
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There are also Japanese-towns in South America, with schools, living quarters etc. A friend of mine grew up in such a place in Mexico. I am sure there are also lots of similar settlements for Chinese and Koreans.
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| FuroraCeltica Triglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 6866 days ago 1187 posts - 1427 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French | Message 165 of 249 26 November 2009 at 10:08am | IP Logged | ||
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I doubt Chinese would become a global lingua franca, though I don't doubt it has the potential to displace Japanese as the most important business language in Asia.
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| Alvinho Triglot Senior Member Brazil Joined 6235 days ago 828 posts - 832 votes Speaks: Portuguese*, English, Spanish | Message 166 of 249 26 November 2009 at 4:41pm | IP Logged | ||
Hello Tombstone. Maybe I got puzzled when I was writing my point of view on this issue. I meant if there was a huge Mandarin influence around the world, it would happen that as long as many Chinese companies widespread around the world, not only in the East countries but Latin America and other continents. It reminds me of those sci-fi movies which aim at an upcoming decade that a certain corporation takes over the world and people live in a different world....but today I believe that Japan being the second economy of the world, Japanese would deserve a better background than Mandarin with more important companies mainly car and electronic factories and even mangas and animes, wouldn't it?....Would Japanese people be interested in widespreading it around the world? Edited by Alvinho on 26 November 2009 at 5:02pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Clintaroo Diglot Senior Member Australia Joined 6872 days ago 189 posts - 201 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: Tagalog, Indonesian | Message 167 of 249 27 November 2009 at 1:27am | IP Logged | ||
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Has anybody here heard of the children's program 'Ni Hao, Kai-Lan'?
I was just flicking through the channels on pay television before here in Australia and caught this program on Nickelodeon. The koala character caught my attention, but what caught my attention even more was the insertion of elementary Chinese words, making it in some parts a bilingual program. I thought it was really interesting, this was the first time I have seen an Asian language used together with English in a cartoon here in Australia. I never saw anything like that while growing up. Not sure if it means anything but I thought it was interesting nonetheless. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Captain Haddock Diglot Senior Member Japan kanjicabinet.tumblr. Joined 6769 days ago 2282 posts - 2814 votes Speaks: English*, Japanese Studies: French, Korean, Ancient Greek | Message 168 of 249 27 November 2009 at 8:53am | IP Logged | ||
Japanese is certainly growing in popularity. They've had to begin offering the JLPT exam twice a year to keep up with demand, and I've heard that you can attend Japanese immersion school in Canada now. 1 person has voted this message useful |
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