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English as the universal language | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Woodpecker Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 5811 days ago 351 posts - 590 votes  Speaks: English*, Arabic (Written), Arabic (Egyptian) Studies: Arabic (classical) | Message 1 of 206 18 October 2009 at 1:10am | IP Logged | ||
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Two threads (German Minister and BBC Reporter; Chinese as a lingua franca) I've been involved in in the last two weeks have both ended up touching on the intended subject of this thread without specifically focusing on it. I found both discussions very interesting, and was thus inspired to write this small tome.
There are two questions I'm interested in debating in this thread. 1.Is English on the cusp of becoming the world's first truly universal language? 2.Is such an outcome desirable? What will the consequences be? In explanation of the first: By universal language, I don't mean the language spoken by everyone, everywhere, exclusively. That's a silly and terrifying idea. I don't even mean a language that is spoken to some degree or another by everyone on the planet. By universal, I basically mean it's the first choice for intercultural communication of the vast majority of human beings, and is therefore considered a vital part of one's education. Starting from a postulate of continued globalization over the course of the next century, I think a natural chain of logic emerges. The more the world becomes connected, the more contact there will be between people of different linguistic and cultural backgrounds. People like communicating with each other, and usually find a way to do so. Communication is also extremely profitable in many cases. And for efficiency's sake, things work most smoothly if everyone learns the same second language. So I guess, by universal, I mean the language spoken to a decent level by the vast majority of the emerging global middle class, and in that position because it will have become necessary for everyone who wants to be part of said global middle class to learn it. In explanation of the second: Fairly self-explanatory, but I would make one important point. I'm NOT asking if American/European dominance of the globe is a good thing. I'm asking if having a universal language is a good thing, and if English is necessarily the right universal language. My thoughts on the first question: Well, obviously, I wouldn't have started this thread if I didn't thing there was a very real possibility of English obtaining universal (as defined by Woodpecker) status. Here's my argument. There is going to be a very serious need for a standardized means of communication across the planet in the near future. I think there's pretty clearly need already. Global business is now a business of milliseconds, and taking time to translate something from Mandarin to Finnish costs a prohibitive amount of money in wasted time alone. And the ties that bring the business classes and wealthy elites together today are spreading to the rest of us. But beautiful as a world of optoglots would be, such a world is very unlikely because again, it's very inefficient. It's far easier for everyone to learn one common language than to learn four. I think I've expressed my reasoning for “why universal” well enough (for now), so on to “why English.” English is already a long way along the road to becoming universal, and nothing else is even close. Everywhere I travel I meet tons and tons of English speakers, and countless more who are desperate to learn. I described this experience in another thread, but I'm going to include it again because I think it helps capture my point. At the non-formal education center I'm currently volunteering at here in Egypt (as, I admit, an English teacher...), we had a meeting of all the volunteer teachers a few nights ago. According to my scribbled notes, the native languages in the room were Spanish, German, Swiss German, two dialects of Arabic, several dialects of English, French, and Polish. There was never any question about what language the meeting would be run in. Despite the fact that most of the people in attendance were Arabs, we used English. It was the only thing close to a common language among the whole group. And in fact, not only did everyone speak English, everyone spoke good English, including the Egyptian volunteers who had grown up in the same incredibly poor neighborhood the center is in. From what I hear, this sort of occurrence is becoming increasingly common across the world as the demand for and availability of English-language education continues to boom. All this convoluted 1 AM ranting leads me to the following conclusion. Given the huge demand for English education, the wild success of English so far, the constant exposure to English most of the educated people of my generation have, and the probability of of continued US hegemony for at least the next two decades (and probably a fair bit longer, but this is not the place for that debate), English has reached a tipping point, and if current trends hold, English will basically be a universal language when my generation (we're going to college right now) is done raising its children. With regards to the question of desirability, well, I have some opinions, but I'm going to save most of them until after I've (1) had some sleep and (2) heard some other opinions. I would just mention that I think this is an interesting discussion because if English really does reach the point of being truly universal, it's probably there forever. Final note: Thank you for reading my dissembling musings. I will probably edit this in the morning. I'm pretty sure there are some parts that are unclear, and I know there are rampant typos. However, I wanted to post this tonight because I've been thinking about it all day, and I want something intellectually stimulating (your opinion) to read when I wake up tomorrow. Thanks. Sam Edit 1: Oh, and please be civil! This is a controversial topic, but it's a very interesting one, so let's not ruin everything by getting the thread locked! Edited by Woodpecker on 18 October 2009 at 1:13am 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| Paskwc Pentaglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5677 days ago 450 posts - 624 votes Speaks: Hindi, Urdu*, Arabic (Levantine), French, English Studies: Persian, Spanish | Message 2 of 206 18 October 2009 at 2:13am | IP Logged | ||
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1. Yes
2. This doesn't have any real normative value. Would it be efficient? Certainly. Are there dimensions of good and bad? I'm not so sure. Edited by Paskwc on 18 October 2009 at 2:13am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| maaku Senior Member United States Joined 5574 days ago 359 posts - 562 votes Speaks: English* | Message 3 of 206 18 October 2009 at 2:18am | IP Logged | ||
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You mean... English is not the universal language? I think you're starting from the wrong premises. For all the reasons you mentioned, English is already the "universal language" you describe. I find it far more controversial to suggest that it is not.
Now that doesn't mean international communication won't occur in other languages as well; there will always be special exceptions. I imagine that Russian will continue to be a common language among the former Soviet states, Arabic in the middle east, Mandarin in the Chinese sphere of influence, Spanish in the Americas, and so on. But English opens up the doors of the entire world to you, and there's really no other language that can claim that. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| aokoye Diglot Senior Member United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5541 days ago 235 posts - 453 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Dutch, Norwegian, Japanese | Message 4 of 206 18 October 2009 at 2:40am | IP Logged | ||
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I think about this topic every so often and it really poses a bit of a dilemma. On the one hand, it would be convenient (economically and otherwise) to have one or two standard languages for multinational communication. It would more than likely make things significantly easier (specifically for anyone who's first language is English or whatever language(s) end up becoming the standard for communication, but that's a different issue).
The problem is that this idea posses a lot of issues. What happens when someone isn't able to, for whatever reason, learn English (or whatever language ends up being the go to language)? I think there would be a very real possibility for this to widen the economic class differences between people (which would then make it harder for the children of lower class parents to learn English and thus continue the cycle). It also seems like this would encourage the false belief that everyone should learn English because it's better than the other languages spoken worldwide and probably speed up the rate of language extinction. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| skeeterses Senior Member United States angelfire.com/games5Registered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6618 days ago 302 posts - 356 votes 1 sounds Speaks: English* Studies: Korean, Spanish | Message 5 of 206 18 October 2009 at 3:01am | IP Logged | ||
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I'll answer the second question first.
I don't think such an outcome should be desirable. As aokoye pointed out, having everyone learn just 1 or 2 languages would speed up the rate of language extinction. But this whole thing about "efficient global communication" is based on false hopes of materialism and unlimited wealth. Common sense should suggest that there isn't enough resources on the planet to give everyone a high living standard but so many people throughout the world are aspiring to have the American way of life with the house and the car. When economic hopes or greed is the primary motivation for a person to learn a foreign language, just imagine what disappointment will be there when that high paying Corporate job fails to materialize. All that time wasted could have been spent learning some job skills or a language a person really is interested. A Final note here: I don't want everybody on the planet to be able to listen in when I talk with other native English speakers. There's English speakers like myself who don't want everybody trying to emulate us or be able to know everything about us. Just as other countries get to have their "own language", it would be nice if America had the same thing going for it. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| pfwillard Pro Member United States Joined 5699 days ago 169 posts - 205 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French Personal Language Map | Message 6 of 206 18 October 2009 at 3:10am | IP Logged | ||
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It's as universal now as anything is likely to get before babelfish technology is perfected. After that, people may flee to strange minor languages as a way of escaping the thought police...
2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| maaku Senior Member United States Joined 5574 days ago 359 posts - 562 votes Speaks: English* | Message 7 of 206 18 October 2009 at 3:33am | IP Logged | ||
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Wow I can't understand the point of view that there shouldn't be a
universal/international language. Can you imagine what it was like before colonization, when there truly was no universal languages? No matter what language(s) you knew, there would be parts of the world closed off to you. Places where no matter where you looked you'd not be able to find someone to communicate with. Societies where if you went, you'd be a powerless deaf/mute unable to get by. And unless you were particularly fortunate, you'd probably end up dead. As a traveler, I can't imagine living in a world with large segments of it entirely closed off to me. But today, I can be confident that even in the remotest regions of Earth I can in an emergency find someone who speaks English (most likely), or one of the other major languages that I study. That's powerful, when you really think about it. EDIT: wow, that made me sound pro-colonization AND anti-minority languages... I assure you, nothing could be further from the truth. Colonization was evil and although I truly believe it is a good thing to have an international language, I am disheartened every time I hear people disparage their native language in favor of English. I wish people could see English as complementary, and not a replacement... Edited by maaku on 18 October 2009 at 3:42am 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| Paskwc Pentaglot Senior Member Canada Joined 5677 days ago 450 posts - 624 votes Speaks: Hindi, Urdu*, Arabic (Levantine), French, English Studies: Persian, Spanish | Message 8 of 206 18 October 2009 at 3:36am | IP Logged | ||
You'd choose to have private conversations over effortless fluency in the world's premier language? 3 persons have voted this message useful |
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