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English as the universal language | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion |  | |
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5658 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes  Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 121 of 206 14 November 2009 at 9:45pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Sorry Volte, I thought it was -- at least in comparison with English. (See the specific points that I list). But if indeed Esperanto already has a strong culture then that would have to be respected, or another con lang would have to be used for the "EU common language" that I am speculating about. I basically just "used" Esperanto for this example, but perhaps "Interlingua" or a brand new conlang is what is needed. Edited by cordelia0507 on 14 November 2009 at 9:49pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Chung Diglot Senior Member Joined 6976 days ago 4228 posts - 8259 votes 20 sounds Speaks: English*, French Studies: Polish, Slovak, Uzbek, Turkish, Korean, Finnish | Message 122 of 206 14 November 2009 at 9:49pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
It's not a question about "why do I love English?" In the same way, I would never approach some non-Russians from the former USSR about their preference to use Russian as a common language and ask "why do you love Russian?" In both cases, the question is inapplicable. At most it merely turns a question of practicality into one of political preference. Hey, no one's stopping you from watching Arabic soap-operas or Chinese operas. It's called a satellite subscription service. :-P Another thing is that if you want to cut things up as continents, then Arabic should be removed as an official language or lingua franca from North Africa while English, French, Spanish and Portuguese should be removed from the Americas so as to let one of the Native American languages assume their "rightful place". Indeed many of the "European" languages should be removed from Europe with your thinking, since linguists believe that the Uralic (e.g. Finnish, Lappish) and Indo-European languages (i.e. virtually every other European language) established themselves in Europe from people migrating out of Asia (who even earlier likely migrated from Africa). The only extant language that you can say is "European" and therefore in its "proper place" would be Basque (even Basque would be a stretch since humans likely originated from Africa as I stated earlier). Should we impose Basque on the EU as the "rightful and official European language?" Edited by Chung on 14 November 2009 at 11:17pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5658 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 123 of 206 14 November 2009 at 9:54pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
I thought Rikyu-San's summary (previous page) was spot on. Nobody was standing with an AK47 pointed at anybody's head demanding that they learn and speak English. Various factors made people take the decision to do it themselves. Plus it became "cool", necessary for career reasons - etc, etc, etc... Either this would have to change (as Rik suggests might happen) or there'd have to be a campaign to make an alternative language "cool" and necessary for career reasons. That's what I favour, since I don't think that English is the right "lingua franca" for the EU. 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Gusutafu Senior Member Sweden Joined 5341 days ago 655 posts - 1039 votes Speaks: Swedish* | Message 124 of 206 14 November 2009 at 9:58pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I think we need to take care to keep the two questions apart:
1. American "culture" is sweeping the world and killing off traditional and/or local culture. 2. English is a lingua franca for business and tourism In your scenario, Cordelia, you ask us if we aren't against 1 and then take that as a reason for replacing English in 2 with something else. Would you be happy if Hollywood and LA kept producing lowest common denominator entertainment that slowly strangled real culture, while a German tourist in Lithuania would speak Esperanto? Where is the real problem? In my mind, it's not about language, although I think it is very sad that certain languages (not Swedish) are dying. I must ask you again, why do you think that English will succeed where a thousand years of Latin, German and French failed? Swedish is still alive and well! I personally don't like the idea of a global lingua franca, for me efficiency is not a priority. I would prefer a world of small nations, each with their own language and culture, with scores of local trade languages. I don't think there should be a global language, but if there must be one, English is not worse than any other choice. I can understand the intuitive feeling that English is boring and bland, but that is very far from the truth. I believe that the only reason one may feel that way is that we are so familiar with it. Objectively speaking, why would French or German be better? English has a long and interesting history (involving Scandinavians and Normans, which should please a Northener) and an incredibly rich literary heritage, almost on a par with Russian in quality. The morphology may be quite simple, but the syntax and lexicon are very rich. Aren't you confusing a very reasonalbe resentment against American and British foreign policy, and the spread of American garbage culture like a wildfire, with English as a language? Remember that English is the language of Shakespeare, Hollywood is just borrowing it. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Sennin Senior Member Bulgaria Joined 5854 days ago 1457 posts - 1759 votes 5 sounds | Message 126 of 206 14 November 2009 at 11:02pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Nah, not Interlingua. I say, let's use Klingon. This way Tony Blair will have to learn it when he becomes the president of Europe and that's bound to be fun (not for him, though). 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Hoopskidoodle Senior Member United States Joined 5320 days ago 55 posts - 68 votes Speaks: English* Studies: French | Message 127 of 206 14 November 2009 at 11:32pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
I'd say much earlier, with Louis Armstrong and Jazz during and after (what we call) World War I. Edited by Hoopskidoodle on 14 November 2009 at 11:33pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| cordelia0507 Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 5658 days ago 1473 posts - 2176 votes Speaks: Swedish* Studies: German, Russian | Message 128 of 206 14 November 2009 at 11:33pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Buttons
I just want to clarify that I don't hate ANY English speaking country, and particularly not the UK which I think is a super-charming country full of fun and nice people with a great culture. What I don't like is that the English-speaking (in fact, read American) culture, values and language are spread via the English language - this jeopordises local languages and creates lots of problems (as mentioned earlier) for non-English speaking people. Also, none of this had occurred to me when I moved to the UK several years ago. If French or German had an equivalent position in Europe I'd feel almost the same way about it (although in the case of German, at least it's a fully European language and not the language of a non-European superpower). But I certainly wouldn't want either German or French to be in the position that English is in right now! I hope this clarifies that I am not ranting against the UK or Brits. (Or against American people for that matter. The culture is great - INSIDE the US, or outside the US, in moderation.) Edited by cordelia0507 on 14 November 2009 at 11:44pm 1 person has voted this message useful |
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