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Top 10 Languages - Rankings in 2050 | ||
Tags: Language Importance | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| Meelämmchen Diglot Senior Member Germany Joined 4872 days ago 214 posts - 249 votes  Speaks: German*, English Studies: Modern Hebrew | Message 65 of 108 11 January 2011 at 1:56pm | IP Logged | ||
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1. English
2. some only locally important languages, like Hindi, Mandarin, Spanish, Japanese, French, Korean, Russian, Arabic, German English is almost everywhere learnt today as the first foreign language. China would have to become significantly more economically powerful than the USA, Canada, Great Britain, and all the countries, that have English as their first foreign language (especially the Western ones), and the other Asian countries together, to have Mandarin engaging English, that means that ministries in countries decide they have reason to adopt it as a foreign language. And that is just not possible. Even if so, who learnt Russian even during the high noon of Cold war? At least it would take some time, before countries adopt their school systems to the new situation, so China would have to be for decades the world leading economic and, as well, political power and that I don't see as well. Then there is today's generation speaking even more English than the last one (my hypothesis). And then there are India and all the other potentially big economies of Asia in 2050. You just have to focus on some languages. You can not expect pupils in the world to learn in school English, Mandarin, Hindi, Japanese, Korean, and Spanish. Not to speak of French or even maybe Russian. English will stay the uncontended number one and it will be mostly up to the geographic position of countries, what will be the second foreign language. Why should the Polish people learn Mandarin, if it would make much more sense to learn, besides English, Russian or German? And that is true for all the other smaller countries who are far away from China. And I think for the average student to master two foreign languages is a very ambitious goal. Given that, my prognosis would be: In Africa that will be English and French/Arabic, in the Asian countries (and in Russia probably as well) English and Mandarin, in Europe English and Spanish/French/German/Russian/also Latin, Ancient Greek (for every country, I think, there is the question of: power of tradition vs. pragmatical approach?)/Japanese/Mandarin/Hindi. Middle East: English and Farsi/Asian one/French/maybe Turkish (no change in Israel: English/Arabic, maybe they start Biblical Hebrew besides Israeli and Arabic..). USA: Spanish and French/Asian one. South America: English and X (propably any other one). But if we say the average student will only learn to speak one language at all, then it is English, because it was their first foreign language. And it is now 2011. What has happened since 1961: although the US being the super power back then, English only was adopted in schools through out the world very, very slowly. Only the Asian countries made an extraordinary step forward and Africa backwards. The rest stayed on their level. South America relativly didn't come forward, as well as the autocratic states of the Middle East, France's power declined a bit. The block states imploded after 1989. All in all only two big changes. I'm pessimistically arguing for the status quo. The US and Europe will in 2050 no longer be that depending on China's Rare Earth Elements. And as was in the 19th century electricity and the steam engine the motor of development it is today the computer and bio technology, high tech industry etc. and leading there are USA, Europe (and Israel), and the successfull Asian countries. Unfortunatly that means despite their ressources (and because of their governments and current dependencies) no good to South America, Africa, Russia and the Arabic Middle East, at least they could try to keep track of the development but it will mean much more dependency on the three regions mentioned above. Edited by Meelämmchen on 11 January 2011 at 1:59pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| SamD Triglot Senior Member United States Joined 6448 days ago 823 posts - 987 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish, French Studies: Portuguese, Norwegian | Message 67 of 108 11 January 2011 at 8:49pm | IP Logged | ||
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The top 10 languages in 2050 are probably going to be the top 10 languages of 2011. There doesn't seem to be much debate about English, Spanish or Mandarin Chinese.
Hindi/Urdu may be among the top ten languages on the basis of the number of speakers, but relatively few people outside of southern Asia will learn those languages. Japanese is mainly confined to eastern Asia, but there are plenty of people fascinated by anime and manga. Japanese will continue to be an important language. French has a large number of second-language speakers around the world. I wouldn't count it out. Russian is not as popular as it once was, but it will still be significant. Arabic belongs among the top ten. Because of Islam, there will always be plenty of second-language speakers of Arabic around the world. Portuguese could go either way. As Brazil becomes a more and more significant country, more people may choose to learn Portuguese...or more Brazilians will use English or Spanish. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| vilas Pentaglot Senior Member Italy Joined 6749 days ago 531 posts - 722 votes Speaks: Spanish, Italian*, English, French, Portuguese | Message 68 of 108 12 January 2011 at 12:29pm | IP Logged | ||
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My personal opinion
1)English 2)Spanish 3)French) 4)Portuguese 5)Chinese 6)Russian 7)Arabic 8)Hindi/Urdu 9)German 10)Italian 1 person has voted this message useful | |||
| polyglHot Pentaglot Senior Member Norway Joined 4855 days ago 173 posts - 229 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, English, German, Spanish, Indonesian Studies: Russian | Message 69 of 108 12 January 2011 at 12:57pm | IP Logged | ||
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Italian..? Please, that language will stay within it's borders.
7 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| robsolete Diglot Senior Member United States Joined 5174 days ago 191 posts - 428 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish Studies: French, Russian, Arabic (Written), Mandarin | Message 70 of 108 12 January 2011 at 2:14pm | IP Logged | ||
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Reasons why I disagree with the "Yellow Terror" that has everyone learning Mandarin in
some sort of fear that one day they'll wake up and be locked out of the world economy: 1) The Chinese are active around the world, but they tend to learn the languages of wherever they go to do business. I can't speak for Chinese people, but I think that many businessmen would consider it a "strategic asset" if they can discuss matters amongst themselves privately in a language that nobody else understands, or can write notes and e-mails with characters so obfuscating that nobody can even attempt to read them. It's like having a built-in encryption system. For all the hubbub about Chinese economic "dominance" in many parts of the world, there seem to be absolutely ZERO attempts to culturally impose Chinese on the local populations (unlike the European colonists before them). 2) Due to said European colonialism, almost every corner of the world has some level of familiarity with the Latin alphabet. Anyone of moderate education, almost anywhere, under the age of 40, knows their ABCs. Speakers of other major languages (Arabic, Hindi, Chinese) have learned to communicate in their native languages in the Latin alphabet, partly due to the restrictions of computer software over the last 20-30 years. To switch the entire world from a Latin-based language, using a script that everyone and their uncle knows, to hanzi? Yeah, right. Good luck. 3) As stated by others, English is the primary foreign language taught throughout much of the world. As methods and materials improve, in one or two generations the kids learning English in school will be very, very good. India is the primary example of this. The momentum has already reached a critical mass, and nothing shot of a major disaster can really run it off course. 4) Don't confuse "buying and mining resources across the globe" with "power projection." The PRC is, by and large, still very focused on internal affairs. They set up businesses around the world to get resources, but that's only so they can actually supply their massive internal demand for development (which is in a way the only way to retain social/political harmony over such a huge, diverse group of people--keep as many people paid as possible). In terms of military power projection or media influence, China has immense influence in their region, but their internal focus keeps this influence largely confined to East Asia. 5) The issue of materials. Almost every language has a wealth of materials for learning English. Chinese certainly has plenty of materials for speakers of major languages, but what about Kannada speakers, or Igbo, or Amharic, or Malagasy? I'm sure materials do exist, but the number/availability isn't going to come close. I think part of this has to do with the rise of the US as a superpower and as an immigrant nation: people from almost every corner of the world have come to the US to work and live, and either they or their children have learned English. This means that English/****** bilinguals exist for a wide, wide variety of languages, to the extent that Chinese/****** bilinguals simply do not. Anyway, I'm not knocking on China or being an obnoxious American here. I'm all for learning Mandarin, and I think there are a thousand fantastic reasons to learn it. But this wave of fear is not one of them. It assumes that the Chinese are setting out to conquer the world with their language (because, well, that's what we white people tried to do). I don't think most Chinese people have any such aim, and while many Chinese are very excited that I'm learning Mandarin, I don't think any of them really desire for the whole world to learn it for a variety of reasons. Given the very private nature of the PRC as well, I don't think the government wants the entire world to be able to listen to, read, and comment about every little word that their politicians say (which is basically what prominent US politicians have to deal with). China is certainly a growing power, and is certainly "the one to watch" in terms of economic development. And yes, they own a lot of US debt, but a lot of that serves them: buying US treasury bonds keeps the yuan artificially low, which encourages foreign investment. But this situation won't last forever, and as the yuan eventually rises, the investment will gradually fall. And even if China's GDP does surpass the United States's, remember that said GDP will be spread over a population four times as large, which limits the ability of that money to extend influence outside of China, since most of it will be going to serve domestic, basic needs. So this weird, rabid fear I see in a lot of people right now is insane and strikes me as vaguely racist: as if the Chinese are "the Borg" coming to "assimilate" the entire world. It's simply not true and simply not possible. Anyway, rant over. Learn Chinese, please do, but not out of fear. Because if that's your motivation, you won't. 10 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| dbruggeman Diglot Newbie United StatesRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4861 days ago 14 posts - 24 votes Speaks: English*, Spanish | Message 71 of 108 12 January 2011 at 4:10pm | IP Logged | ||
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In reading these posts I see some different opinions on the priority of Portuguese vs
French. I agree with the original poster that Portuguese is more important than French. French is on the decline while Portuguese is on the rise. There are more Portuguese speakers today and Brazil will likely overtake France in the size of its economy by 2030. Plus you can speak Portuguese without being criticized for your poor accent. 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||
| jimbo Tetraglot Senior Member Canada Joined 6083 days ago 469 posts - 642 votes Speaks: English*, Mandarin, Korean, French Studies: Japanese, Latin | Message 72 of 108 13 January 2011 at 3:00am | IP Logged | ||
Italian food. Yum! 2 persons have voted this message useful |
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