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The dark side of language dominance | ||
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 Language Learning Forum : General discussion | ( Topic Closed) |  |
| Serpent Octoglot Senior Member Russian Federation serpent-849.livejour Joined 6410 days ago 9753 posts - 15779 votes  4 sounds Speaks: Russian*, English, FinnishC1, Latin, German, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese Studies: Danish, Romanian, Polish, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Croatian, Slovenian, Catalan, Czech, Galician, Dutch, Swedish | Message 89 of 176 30 May 2014 at 2:33pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Replacing English with German or French will achieve nothing. What Europe needs is to acknowledge that for most people, there's no need to speak perfect English, and it's much more beneficial to learn (at least;)) one more language to B1 in addition to it. Apart from Basque and Hungarian, pretty much any European language is mutually intelligible with something else or not far from that (ie you can have comprehensible input from the beginning). It's relatively common to speak a Romance language natively and learn one or even a few more, but this often happens at the expense of English, and choosing "the easy way" is also mocked. But at least people still learn these languages. Unfortunately it's much less common in other groups/families.
Basically I think that learning other languages should be promoted, especially those that can be learned relatively easily, sometimes even more easily than English (depends on one's native language). And we should all aim to communicate with our neighbours like Scandinavians do (although even they are starting to use English more. I think that's very sad). Edited by Serpent on 30 May 2014 at 2:38pm 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| beano Diglot Senior Member United KingdomRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 4435 days ago 1049 posts - 2152 votes Speaks: English*, German Studies: Russian, Serbian, Hungarian | Message 90 of 176 30 May 2014 at 4:23pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
Why wouldn't it be true? German is the most widely-spoken native language in the EU by a good 20-30 million. Their publishing industry is very strong and Europe's biggest book fair takes place in Frankfurt. I'm talking about all books here, not just university texts. Granted, many books are translated from English originals but they're still published in German. Edited by beano on 30 May 2014 at 4:24pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
 jeff_lindqvist Diglot Moderator SwedenRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 6722 days ago 4250 posts - 5710 votes Speaks: Swedish*, English Studies: German, Spanish, Russian, Dutch, Mandarin, Esperanto, Irish, French Personal Language Map | Message 91 of 176 30 May 2014 at 5:02pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
This I can't believe. The only times I've spoken English with fellow Scandinavians has been in company with other Anglophones. Anytime a Norwegian or Dane visits the library, they speak their native language, I (and anyone else) responds in Swedish and everyone is happy. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| tarvos Super Polyglot Winner TAC 2012 Senior Member China likeapolyglot.wordpr Joined 4520 days ago 5310 posts - 9399 votes Speaks: Dutch*, English, Swedish, French, Russian, German, Italian, Norwegian, Mandarin, Romanian, Afrikaans Studies: Greek, Modern Hebrew, Spanish, Portuguese, Czech, Korean, Esperanto, Finnish | Message 92 of 176 30 May 2014 at 5:17pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I had a Dane as a volunteer colleague in Romania who preferred to speak English with
Swedes... 3 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| stifa Triglot Senior Member Norway lang-8.com/448715 Joined 4686 days ago 629 posts - 813 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, EnglishC2, German Studies: Japanese, Spanish | Message 93 of 176 30 May 2014 at 5:35pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I've had to speak in English with Danes before, simply because they struggled with my
dialect, and speaking standardised Norwegian just feels...weird. 4 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| Solfrid Cristin Heptaglot Winner TAC 2011 & 2012 Senior Member Norway Joined 5147 days ago 4143 posts - 8864 votes Speaks: Norwegian*, Spanish, Swedish, French, English, German, Italian Studies: Russian | Message 94 of 176 30 May 2014 at 7:02pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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Hm. I have never, ever spoken English with other Scandinavians, but I know some Danes and Swedes
sometime struggle a little, and young people particularly have less and less exposure. 2 persons have voted this message useful | |||||||||
| 1e4e6 Octoglot Senior Member United Kingdom Joined 4103 days ago 1013 posts - 1588 votes Speaks: English*, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Norwegian, Dutch, Swedish, Italian Studies: German, Danish, Russian, Catalan | Message 95 of 176 30 May 2014 at 9:06pm | IP Logged | ||||||||
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I found a link about
anglicismos en español, where apparently the director of la RAE stated that borrowing words from English is detrimental to other languages, including Spanish. Interestingly, he also said that it thought that it was a pity that Spanish was not the language of science and technology. I am unsure exactly how the RAE are viewed nowadays, but if Hispanophones wish to conserve Spanish without Anglophone influence, perhaps Spain and Latin America supporting the RAE would help more. He even said that que-amenaza-salud-del-castellano">Anglicisms were like a virus to the Spanish language. Anglicismos are also discussed in daily issues in 141314388.html">everyday lives of Hispanophones, where the title says, "Anglicisms: Welcome Them or Reject Them?". The link is messed up again, but it is https://mx.mujer.yahoo.c om/blo gs/coo ltura/ anglicismos-acoger los-o- rechazarlos- 141314388.html http://actualidad.rt.com/cultura/view/28941-Anglicismos-viru s-que-amenaza-salud-del- castellano Edited by 1e4e6 on 30 May 2014 at 11:34pm 1 person has voted this message useful | |||||||||
| PeterMollenburg Senior Member AustraliaRegistered users can see my Skype Name Joined 5289 days ago 821 posts - 1273 votes Speaks: English* Studies: FrenchB1 | Message 96 of 176 31 May 2014 at 12:33am | IP Logged | ||||||||
Well I'm not going to argue for English' side here. So if it does continue (German being this strong with books) I'd be glad. I just find some of the statistics on English quite frightening. Why can't scientific research take place in other languages? It used to! It's all to do with a large audience I guess and that is sad too 1 person has voted this message useful |
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