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DAVID CRYSTAL
“ENGLISH AS A GLOBAL LANGUAGE”
PREFACE TO THE 2ND EDITION
The 1990s were a revolutionary decade with a proliferation of new linguistic varieties coming from the implementation of internet and the public recognition of the global position of English.
David Crystal in the first edition of the book says that “English has already grown to be independent of any form of social control”, these is nothing likely to stop its spread as a global “ LINGUA FRANCA ”. Other authors have different opinions. The role of these books has been to underline some of the parameters of enquiry. There were few general hypoteses to motivate research, some are issues relating to language use: political, economic, demographic and social factors have been identified as potential influences on world language presence. Others are issues affecting language structure: how regional and social factors influence the growth of language varieties. David Crystal has published this 2 nd^ edition of “English as a golbal language” because things have changed from the first edition, there is much more literature available to refer and more point of view to take into account.
Chapter 1 : WHY A GLOBAL LANGUAGE?
The topic of English as a global language has been treated these years in many magazines, newspapers and television programms and series. If English is your mother tongue you may have mixed feeling about the way English is spreading around the world. You can be proud of the success of your language, but also concerned because people who speak English around the world change it, they don't speak the same English you do. They use it in the way they want. Often in English press we can find expressions like “look what Americans have done to English”, and Americans say the same about variations in English which are emerging all over the world.
But even if English isn't your mother tongue you can have mixed feelings about it. If you want to learn it, you can be proud of your achievement when you make progress, but you know that a mother tongue speaker has an unfair advantage over you. Or you can be envious if you live in a country in which the survival of your language is threatened by the success of English. This is why language is always in the news, as much it's global, as much it's newsworthy.
What is a global language?
A language achieves a genuinely global status when it develops a special role that is recognized in every country – mother tongue use cannot by itself give a language global status, but a language has to be taken up by other countries around the world in 2 ways:
1. It can be made the official language of the country used as a medium of communication in such domains as government, law
courts, media and educational system = semi official status/second language complementary to the first one. English today has some kind of special status in over 70 countries.
2. A language can be made a priority in a country's foreign language teaching, aven thogh it hasn't official status. English now is
the language most widely taught as a foreign language, often displacing another language.
So there are different ways in which a language can be official.
Reasons for choosing a particular language as a foreign language can be: historical tradition, political expediency, desire for commercial, cultural or technological contact. When chosen the presence of this language can be different depending on the extent to which a government or a foreign aid agency give financial support to a language-teaching policy.
The distinction between “second” and “foreign” language isn't just a difference in fluency or ability, a second language has some kind of official status.
In the early 2000s about a quarter of the world's population was already fluent or competent in English, and this figure is steadly growing= 1,5 billion people.
What makes a global language?
The fact that a language is a global language has little to do with the number of people who speak it, the important is who these speakers are. There is a close link between language dominance and economic, technological and cultural power. If the users of a language succeed on the international stage, their language succeeds. Some people think that English has been chosen because of its easy grammar, but this property isn't enough to ensure a language's world spread. A language has traditionally become an international language for the power of its people, expecially politic and military power. It happened with Greek, Latin, Arabic... the history of a global language can be traced trough the successful expeditions of its soldier/sailor speakers. It's mecessary a military power to enstablish a language and a economic power to mantain and expand it. Expecially in the 19th and 20th centuries, when economic developments began to operate on a global scale. And at the beginning of the 19th century Britain had become the world's leading industrial and trading country and by the end of the century the population of the USA was the largest in Western Europe and its economy was the most productive and fastest growing in the world.
Why do we need a global language?
In human interactions translations has played a central role for thousands of years. In communities in which just 2 or 3 languages are in contact, bilinguism or trilinguism can be a solution. But traditionally the problem has always been solved by finding a common language. Sometimes it's a PIDGIN, that's a simplified language used between communities when they begin to trade and it has different combined elements of their languages.
Only on the 20th century for the first time has born the necessity of a lingua franca for the whole world. The United Nations, the chief international forum for political communication dates from 1945. never before so many countries have represented in a single meeting- place. A small number of languages have been designated official languages for the organisation's activity. Now because of the high translation costs they want to reduce the numbers of languages included.
The need for a global language is particulary appreciated by the international academic and business communities. People have become more mobile physically (as annual airline statistics show) and electronically (as sales of fax, modems and Pcs show) and so they need more than ever a global language to communicate with people in other countries.
What are the dangers of a global language?
The dangers of a global language are:
- Linguistic power. Those who speak a global language as a mother tongue are in a position of power compared with those who have to learn it as a official or foreign language? No, but just if this global language is taught from the time that children begin their full time education and manteined continously. In this case they will be bilingual and they will speak as good as a mother tongue speaker. But this kind of control is currently achieved by a minority of non-native learners of any language. Children are ready for bilingualism, but this ability seens to die away as they reach their teens, so the aerlier, the better because when that task is taken seriously, with reference to the acquisition of a global language, the elitism argument evaporates.
- Linguistic complacency. Will a global language eliminate the motivation for adults to learn other languages? British and American aren't motivated to learn other languages because of a lack of money and opportunity and also interest. Or maybe because of the the increasing presence of English as a global language. This is not a question of attitude, even if most of the times people say “I'm not good at languages” and this self-denigration commonly derives from a bad language learning experience in school. These days, there are signs of growing awareness, within English speaking communities, of the need to break away from the traditional monolingual bias. At least at the levels of business and industry, many firms have begun to make efforts in this direction and people are discovering that they are not that bad as they thought at laerning languages. Statistics about foreign language learning show that in 1996 only 38% of of British companies had an executive able to speak in another language and in 2002 this percentage has fallen to 29%. English -monoligual companies are encountering language difficulties as they try to expand in areas of the world like East Asia, South America and Eastern Europe, that are supposed to have greatest prospects of growth and where English isn't so largely spoken. Anyway we are still a long way from seeing the English-speaking nations renounce their linguistic insularity.
- Linguistic death. Will the emergence of a global language hasten the disappearance of minority languages and cause widespread language death? We have to say that the process of language domination has always existed throughout linguistic history independently from the emergence of a global language. Today in North America, Australia, Brazil, Africa and Indonesia many indigenous languages are being lost, and once lost it can never be recaptured, this is why in 1990s were born international organizations with the aim of recording for posterity as many endangered languages as possible. But this problem has only a limited casual relationship to the emergence of a global language. This movements are commonly associated with nationalism, but language is part of the identity of people. Arguments about the need for national or cultural identity are often seen as being opposed to those about the need for mutual intelligibility, but they can happily co-exist. The 2 functions can be seen as complementary, responding to different needs. The emergence of a global language influence the structure of other languages, thiese influences can be welcomed or opposed (as French do), but don't forget that English has borrowed thousands of words from other languages. Many experts come to the conclusion that there is only a casual link between the widespread of English and the disappearance of minority languages.
Could anything stop a global language?
A global language can be stopped. If the status of global language depends on political and economic power, a revolution in the balance of global power can bring to a different choise. There is than a more plausible scenario: another method could eliminate the need of a global language,the automatic translation. This way people can communicate using their owm languages with a computer translating. In 25-50 years the speed and accuracy of these machines will be improved, but it will take longer because they become globally widespread and economically accessible. During this period of time the position of English as a global language is going to become stronger and stronger.
A critical era
It's difficult to make predictions because there are no precedents. In a generation a global language has become a reality. But now still 2/3 of the wold's population don't use English.
Chapter 2 : WHY ENGLISH? THE HISTORICAL CONTEXT
There are two answers to the question:
- geographical-historical , which shows how English reached a position of pre- eminence tracing their movement around the world.
- socio-cultural , which explains why it remains so looking at how people all over the world have come to depend on English for their economic and social well-being.
The language has penetrated in political life, business, safety, media and education.
English arrived in England from northern Europe in the 5 th^ century, it began to spread aroud the British Isles and in the 12 th^ century in Ireland, which fell under English rule.
- A growing sense of national identity and emphasys on the differences between New Zealand and Australia (accent and use of distinctive vocabulary).
- (^) They take account of the rights and needs of the Maori people, who are now 10% of population.
SOUTH AFRICA
First arrived were Dutch.
British involvment dates from 1795 during Napoleonic Wars and British was made official language of the region in 1822, but initially there were regional dialect variations among the groups of British settlers, the accent resulting has similarities with the Australian accent.
English was beeing used as a second language by the Afrikaans speakers. An African variety of English developed spoken by the black population, it was influenced by the different language background of the speakers.
English has always been a minority language in South Africa, the first language of the majority of whites and of the coloured population was Afrikaans, it was an important symbol of identity for those of Afrikaner background. English was used by whites of British background.
There is a linguistic side of the South African apartheid society --> Afrikaans was perceived by the black majority as the language of authority and persecution → English was perceived by the Afrikaner government as the language of protest and self-determination, many black saw English as a means of achieving an international voice an uniting themselves with other black communities.
Now Afrikaners have become bilingual, they can speak fluently an English that often resembles the British-based variety.
The 1993 Constitution names 11 languages as official. The difficulties of adiministering are immense and English continue to be an important lingua franca which dominate also in the South African Parliament.
SOUTH ASIA
A third of the people of India are able to hold a conversation in English and considerable numbers of English speakers are also in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan. The varieties of English spoken in the subcontinent are collectively called South Asian English.
The first contact with British in the region was in 1600 with the formation of British East India Company. During the period of English domination English became a medium of administration and education in the subcontinent and the primary medium of instruction in the universities of Bombay, Calcutta and Madras.
Now the official language is Hindi, English is an associate official language and is used in legal system, government, education, armed forces, media, business and tourism. By the joung people of this area is perceived as the language of cultural modernity.
FORMER COLONIAL AFRICA
The Dutch were the first who established a permanent settlement in Africa., by 1914 Britain, France, Germany, Portugal, Italy and Belgium divided tho whole continent (apart from Liberia and Ethiopia) into colonial territories. After the 2 world wars there was a repartitioning of the territories and the confiscation of Italian and German terrotories.
Most of the countries created the Organization of African Unity.
English began to visit Africa from the end of 15 th^ century and by the beginning of 19 th^ century, the increase of commerce and anti-slave trade activities had brought English to thr whole west african coast.
English varieties developed especially in 5 countries, now they give English official status:
- SIERRA LEONE : the first groups arrived from England, Nova Scotia and Jamaica, was used as a base for anti-slave-trading squadrons. Received is independence in 1961.
- GHANA (formerly GOLD COAST): was declared a Crown colony in 1874 following a successful British expedition agaist the Ashanti to protect trading interests. Achieved independence in 1957.
- GAMBIA : english trading along the Gambia River dates from 17th^ century, there was a period of conflict with France. Now the country is an independent member of the Commowealth from 1965.
- NIGERIA : achieved independence in 1960 and it's one of the most multiligual countries in Africa, with some 500 languages. A british colony was founded in Lagos after exploration of the interior.
- CAMEROON : in 1919 was divided between France and Britain, the areas merged as a single country in 1972 and both the languages remained official.
- LIBERIA : is the Africa's oldest republic founded throught the politic of the American colonization society, which wanted to establish a homeland for former slaves. The consitution is based on that of the USA. It managed to retain its independence during the scramble for Africa during the 19 th^ century.
The IMPERIAL BRITISH EAST AFRICA COMPANY was founded in 1888 and soon afterwards a system of colonial protectorates became established. Several modern states gave English official status when they gained independence, but it's also used as a medium of international communication in many other regions.
English is official language in Botswana, Kenia, Lesotho, Malawi (with Chewa), Namibia, Uganda, Zambia and Zinbabwe. In Tanzania it was a joint official language with Swaili until 1967, but it's still an important medium of communication.
The kind of English which developed in East Africa were very different from those found in West Africa. Large numbers of British emigrants settled in the area, a british model was introduced into schools. The result is a range of mother-tongue English varieties, which have lot in common with South African and Australian English.
SOUTH-EAST ASIA AND THE SOUTH PACIFIC
Territories in and to the West of the South Pacific display an interesting mixture of American and British English. In Philipines the influence of american English remains strong.
English became the language of power in the British territories of South-East Asia, the introduction of a British educational system,with theachers coming from Britain, exposed learners to a standard British English very early. Rapidly became the language of professional advancement and literature.
- SINGAPORE : bilingual educational system introduced, with English used as a unifying medium, important in education and media, diffused among the general population. A new local variety, known as Singlish, as evolved.
- MALAYSIA : after independence adopted Bahasa Malaysia as the national language and the role of English became more restricted, but it's still an obligatory subject, as a foreign language and not a second one.
- HONG KONG : english has always had a limited use in the territory, both English and Chines have official status, but Chinese is the mother-tongue of 98% of population. Over a quarter of them have some competences in English.
- PAPUA NEW GUINEA : people speak Tok Pisin, an English based pidgin.
A world view
The world position of English today is the result of 2 factors:
- the expansion of British colonial power
- the emergence of USA as the leading economic power oh the 20 th^ century.
The US linguist Braj Kachru suggested to think the spread of English as 3 concentric circles, representing different ways in which English has been acquired and is currently used:
- The inner circle refers to the traditional bases of English, where it's the primary language (USA,UK, Ireland, Australia, New Zealand and Canada).
- The extended circle involves the spread of English in non-native settings, where it's a second language and has become part of the country's chief institution.
- The extending circle involves nations in which English is taught as a foreign language, though they don't have a history of colonization by members of the inner circle.
The notion of variety of English includes standard, pidgin and creole varieties of English.
Chapter 3 : WHY ENGLISH? THE CULTURAL FOUNDATION
Richard Mulaster in 1582 felt that he had to defend English against who believed that it schouldn't usurp the place of Latin. In his opinion english was the best language to utter all the arguments. The problem was that Celtic languages were still strongly present in Britain at the time.
David Hume in 1767 at a time when French was recnozied as the language of international diplomacy, saw in America the key to the future success of English.
In the same period, John Adams said that nglish was destined to be the language of the world more than Latin and French were, because of the increasing population in America and their connection and correspondence with all nations, aided by the influence of England in the world.
Any consideration of politics leads inevitably to a consideration of the role of the media, because often a successful access to the media is the guarantor of political achievement.
The press
The English language has been an important medium of the press for nearly 400 years. The first English newspaper to appear was The Weekly Newes in 1622, while American development began later.
The 19 th^ century was the period of the greatest progress, thenks to the introduction of new technology and methods of transportation. It also saw the development of a independent press, most of all in the Usa, because in Europe there was a censorship, which meant that the provision of popolar news in other languages developed much more slowly.
When the Stamp Tax was abolited prompted a flood of pubblications, and by the end of the century, popular journalism brought Britain into the line with America.
The mid 19 th^ century saw the growth of the major news agencies, following the invention of the telegraph.
Newspapers are not only an international media, they play an important role in the identity of a local community.
Top 5 papers were all in English: The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Wall Street Journal, The Times and The Sunday Times.
A similar story could be told in relation to the publication of periodicals, magazines and pamphlets: a quarter of the world's periodicals are published in English-status countries.
Advertising
At the end of the 19 th^ century a combination of social and economic factors led to a dramatic increase in the use of advertisement in publications, expecially in the more industrialized countries.
In the Usa, publishers realized that income from advertising would allow them to lower the selling price of their magazines and this way publications in which over half the pages were given over to advertising became the norm. Posters, billboards, electric displays, shop signs became part of the everyday scene. Now is one of the most noticeable global manifestations of English language use, because english advetisements are not only the most numerous in countries, where english has no special status, but they are usually the most noticeable. The official language of international advertising bodies is English.
Broadcasting
English was the first language to be transmitted by radio, the first commercial radio was in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Advertising revenue became the chief means of support, as it later did for television. The British Broadcasting Company was established in 1922 and it was a monopoly, no other broadcasting company was allowed.
The fist director-general of BBC, developed a concept of public-servece broadcasting to inform, educate and entertain, which was highly influencial abroad.
Broadcasting organizations use English as a lingua franca, as it happens in the world of international politics.
A similar dramatic expansion affected later public television. Althought later to develop, the Usa rapidly overtook Britain, becoming the leading provider of Ebglish language services abroad.
Many countries during the post-War years launched English radio programmes and if we list the languages in which these countries broadcast, only one language has a place on each of the lists: English.
Cinema
The new technologies which followed the discovery of electrical power altered the nature of the public and home entertainment, and provided fresh directions for the development of the English language.
In Europe, France and Britain provided an initial impetus to the artistic and commercial development of the cinema. When sound was added, Ebglish language came to dominate the movie world. Of the 44 studios, 32 were British or American.
Despite the growth of the film industry in other countries, english-language movies still dominate the medium and these a strong English-language presence in most of the film festival too.
Popular music
Most of technical developments in the recording industry took place in the Usa and radio stes around the world testify to the dominance of English in the popular music scene today. Many people make their first contact with English in this way.
During the early 20 th^ century, European light opera, developed an English-language dimension, because several composers were immigrants to the Usa.
When modern music arrived it was almost entirely an English scene (Elvis Presley in the Usa, the Beatles in the UK).
No other source has spread English-language around the youth of the world so rapidly and pervasively.
Althoough every country has its popular singers, only a few manage to break through into the international arena, and in order to do so they need to be singing in English. 99% of the pop groups worked in English and his mother tongue was irrelevant (abba swedish but sang in English).
During the 1960s and 1970s, english for the younger generation around the world became a symbol of freedom, rebellion and modernism. The social, political and spiritual messages carried by the words resounded in many countries, providing many people with a forst enperience of the unifyind power of English.
International travel
Each journey has immediate linguistic consequences.
The leading tourism earner and spender is the Usa and money speaks very loudly in tourism, because a tourist has extra money to spend while on holiday. Restaurant menus have a parallel version in English, credit card facilities are most noticeably in English. But we don't have to forget that there is still 2/3 of the world not exposed to english and if we stop at a village on our way to a destination, we can experience this linguistic diversity.
Safety instructions in international flights and sailings, in hotels are now increasingly in English alongside local languages.
The role of the military in the spread of english is difficult to evaluate: the presence of US and British forces have certainly brought he local inhabitants into contact with english speaking culture rapidly and in some instances the effects would be long-lasting, for example in case of marriage. But a short term presence would have a long term influence on local language awareness?
International safety
Language has come to be used as a mean of controlling international transport operations, especially on water and in the air. During the communications between air and sea personnel the use of a lingua franca has proved of a great worth.
English has been recognized as the international language of the sea. Mariners need to make their speech clear and unambiguous, to reduce the possibility of confusion in the sending and receiving of messages. In 1980, a project was set up to produce Essential English for International Maritime Use, it included procedures for initiating, maintaining amd terminating conversations, recommended grammar, vocabulary and structure for messages. Seaspeak has a considerable expressive power, though is far more restricted than everyday language.
If only a handful of nations are truly seafaring, all nations are nowadays airborne. Seven years later the creation of the International Civil Aviation Organization, they agreed that English should be the international language of aviation , it's safer if all pilots understand all conversations and if more than a language is used the risk of a breakdown in communication inevitably increases.
Supporters of bilingual air traffic controll stress the fact that not all pilot have a good command of english and there are some famous cases where the primary cause of the accident seem to have been linguistic, it may be safer if they are allowed to communicate in a language they both understand well. Even within a single language, terminology and phrasing need to be standardized to avoid ambiguity, this system is called Airspeak. Currently there are no agreed international standard for aviation english ot tests that pilots have to take, but most pilots' english is far greater than the level required by Airspeak norms and english remain the recommended language of international air travel.
Education
When we investigate why so many countries have decided in the last years to make english an official language or to teach it as a foreign language in their schools, one of the most importat reasons is always educational. A person is more likely to be in touch with the latest thinking and research in a subject by learning english than by learning any other language.
Since 1960s, english has become the normal medium of instruction in higher education for many countries. The english language teaching business has become one of the major growth industries around the world with thousands of schools and centres worldwide.
In occasion af a consultation, people professionally involved in this field agreed that the global market of english language teaching and learning will increase over the next 25 years, most of all in central nad eastern europe, and the countries of the former Soviet Union, where is thought that over 10% of the population are now learning english. They also agreed that:
- english will retain its role as a dominant language in world media and communications
- is essential for progress and will provide the main means of access to high tech communications and information
- will remain the world's language for international communication.
Exercises of this kind have o clear predictive value, but if identical opinions are expressed from so many countries, they help to confirm that english is emerging as a global language.
Communication
If a language is really an international language, it's going to be most apparent in those services which deal directly with communication. In these domains isn't easy to come by information about the use of english.
Usa accounts for nearly half of the world's volume of postal traffic, a statistic shows that ¾ of the world's mail is in english and it's easy to understand if we think at all the organizations which use english as an official language or even just for correspondence.
express worries in their national press about the onslaught of 'Americanisms'. If anything were to disestablish the military or economic power of the Usa, there would be inevitable consequences for the global status of the language.
Some analyst consider the english language to have been an important factor in maintaining mutual intelligibility and american unity in the face of immigration explosion. What has emerged is a conflict between the demands of intelligibility and identity and one outcome has been the official english movement. The language spoken by over 95% of the population has come to be threatened by the emergence of a more dominant languages and english users find themselves on the defensive nd insisting that the status of english be guaranteed. The position for and against official english have been arguedth varying amounts of moderation and extremism. The bill allowed the use of languages other than english in such cases as a public health and safety services, the teaching of foreign langauges, policies necessary for international relations and trade, actions that protect the rights of people involved in justicial proceedings. It aso stated that it was not its purpose to discriminate against or resctrict the rights of any individual or to discourage or prevent the use of languages other than english in any nonofficial capacity.
- THE POLITICAL ARGUMENT FOR : english is viewed as a linguistic glue which guarantees political unity, others said that english has been the basis of social stability in the Usa any threat to this stabilizing influence would lead to the growth of a country within a country which would descourage contact between groups.
- THE POLITICAL ARGUMENT AGAINST : an official english bill is unnecessary because there is no risk of disunity and there is no more need to make english official now than there was at the time of the revolution, when Dutch and Germanwere spoken by substantial numbers. English is not in danger, while other languages actually are. This bill is an unwarranted federal intrusion into self-expression and the use of a common language doesn't guarantee ethnic harmony.
- THE SOCIO ECONOMIC ARGUMENT FOR : an expensive multilingual support policy is undesirable because there are over 300 languages to be taken into account and no country can afford a language policy which tried to give official protection to so many languages and it's not possible to do a selection. The oly alternative is to support none other than the language of the vast majority. The provision of alternative language services is wasteful of resources and a better return for money would come from spending it in improving the english language abilities of immigrants to the Usa. Educational programmes in the immigrant's mother tongue are not real help because they eliminate the incentive for immigrants to learn english and this keeps them in low-paid jobs. Official status would safeguard english as the language of opportunity.
- THE SOCIO ECONOMIC ARGUMENT AGAINST : the new law wouls cause greater complication than it would solve and probably would be more axpensive to implement and to maintain. An important complication is that any new layer of federal control would also have to be implemented alongside the individual laws enacted by several states which already display a great deal of variation.
The field of healty and safety provide a good example of areas where much more could be done. In Germany, for example, pharmaceutical companies have to provide instructions labels in Gastarbeiter languages. It is not feasible to help everyone who has difficulty with english, but it is not acceptable to not help any of them.
It is also thought that interest in foreign language learning will further diminish, at a time when foreign language ability is increasingly seen as advantageous.
- EDUCATIONAL ISSUES : pro-official supporters think that many students in bilingual education programmes are being taught by teachers who has a low quality level of english and they are growing with an inadequate command of english that will mark them as socially inferior.
Anti-official supporter stress the value of bilingualism as part of a child learning experience, observing that they are more likely to do well in learning a second language if their language is valued by the society in which they find themselves. If there are inadequacies in the educational system, are due to the failure of government to provide enough financial support for learning resources and teacher training. The 'official english' bill does noting to enable fluency in english other than simply stating that it must be.
Pro-official position feel that transitional programmes were being devised to get children into the english speaking mainstream as quickly as possible and now are being used to preserve cultural identity and reduce integration. From a position where immigrants were expected to learn english, there cases of non immigrants in schools now having to learn the immigrant language. Anti-official supporters find that the 'official english' position is one of elitism and discrimination and would abrogate constitutional rights to freedom of expression and equal protection of the laws. The future direction of the debate is still unsettled and the language arguments had become increasingly polarized. Supporters are labelled racist, while immigrants 'welfare hogs' and it's difficult to see the grounds for compromise. The number of states anecting official english legislation increased from 22 in 1995 to 27 in 2002.
New Englishes
Salman Rushdie comments in an essay that the english language ceased to be the sole possession of the english some time ago. The Usa have only the 20% of the world's english speakers, it's obvious that no one can now claim sole ownership. This is probably the best way of defining a global language: that its usage in not restricted by countries or by governing bodies. There is no way in which any kind of regional social movement can influence the global outcome.
If current population and learning trends continue, the balance of speakers will change dramatically. There are probably already more people who speak emglish as a second language than first language speakers. An inevitable consequence of these developments is that the language will become open to the winds of linguistic change in totally unpredictable ways and the emrgence of new verieties of english in the different territories where the language has taken root.
Many distinctive forms also identify the Englishes of the other countries of the inner circle.
The new Englishes are somewhat like the dialects we all recognize within our own country, but intead of affecting mere thousands of speakers, they apply to millions.
Dialects emerge because they give identity to the groups which own them, international varieties express national identities, and are a way of reducing the conflict between intelligibility and indentity. There is the existence of a common language and both parties retain their identities.
When a country becomes independent look for indigenous languages to provide a symbol of new nationhood, but in most cases this process proved unworkable, so they keep using the former colonial language and indigenous words become privileged. Most adamptation in a new english relates to vocabulary, because a country uniqueness will generate potentially large numbers of words related to the lifestyle of many indigenous people. So, when a community adopts a new language, and starts to use it in relation to all areas of life, there is inevitably going to be a great deal of lexical creation.
The linguistic character of New Englishes
The recency of the phenomenon means that we haven't still really understood what happens to the language when it is adopted in this way. The way the language has evolved in settings where most people are native speakers is likely to be very different from the way it will evolve in settings where most are non native speakers. However it is possible to identify several types of change which are taking place.
- GRAMMAR : 2 points are relevant. 1) grammars have traditionally focused on standard english, and essentially on written english, but grammatical distinctiveness is most likely to be found in non standard varieties. New englishes are likely to display a similar direction of development. 2) new varieties have attracted less attention because they are chiefly associated with speech, rather than writing. Even in the major european reference grammars, which have always acknowledged the importance of the spoken language, there has been a concentration on writing.
Traditionally the use of english has been in the hands of people for whom literacy is a significant part of their professional identity. But as english becomes increasingly global, we must expect far more attention to be paid to speech. Written english won't diminish in importance, but there is increasing evidence of new spoken varieties growing up which are only partly related to the written tradition or even totally independent of it. It is unlikely that any regional trends will be predictive of he grammatical changes which will take place in global spoken english.
Special attention is paid to areasof interactions between lexicon and grammar, with particular reference to standard british english and american english. When we examine colligations (lexical collocations in specific grammatical contexts) we find a multiplicity of differences and some sort of contrastivity, at many of these there is considerable lexico-grammatical variations. The kind of variantions is found at several places within the grammar. Althuogh each point is relatively small in scope, the potential cumulative effect of a large number of local differences, especially of a colligational type, can be considerable. We can find these differences between British and American english, but they are likely to be small compared with the kinds of difference which are beginning to be identified in the New Englishes. Linguistically trained obserbers collected examples which can only be illustrative of possible trends in the formation of new regional grammatical identities, but this studies are often only impressionistic, lacking the generalizing power which only systematic surveys of usage can provide.the absence of statistical data means that the varietal status of features identified as non standard is always open to question. Such studies are an invaluable source of hypotheses, their only purpose to illustrate the kinds of grammatical feature being proposed as distinctive in studies of New Englishes and it makes no claim to exhaustiveness or representativeness.
The range of examples eave little doubt that the domain of grammar has to be considered as central, alongside phonology and vucabolary, in investigating the linguistic distinctiveness of New Englishes.
It's not always clear whether a new feature arise as a result of transference from a contrasting feature in a local contact language or is a general property of english foreign language learning, though individual studies sometimes suggest one or the other. The process of change is evently rapid and pervasive and origins are usually obscure.a synchronic comparison of a distinctive english construction with the corresponding construction in the contact languages of a region is usually illuminating, as it is precisely the interaction that is likely to be the most formative influence on the identity of a New English. In multilingual country, where english has been oinfluenced by a melting-pot of other languages the likelihood of a particular constellation of influences being replicated elsewhere is remote. Distinctive grammatical features are also likely to be increasingly implicated in the mixed languages which arise from code-switching.
- VOCABULARY : it doesn't take long before new words enter a language, once it arrives in a fresh location. Borrowings from indigenous languages are especially noticeable, but the long term role of this borrowings in relation to the distinctive identity of a new english, is unclear. In th case of american english, relatively few of the Amerindian loan-words which are recorded in the 17 th^ and 18th^ centuries became a permanent part of the standard language. On the other hand the amount of these borrowings is extremely sensitive to sociopolitical pressures, as is evident now in New Zealand where loans from maori are increasing.
The amount of borrowings is also influenced by the number of cultures which co-exist and the status which their languages have achieved.ina highly multilingual country, such as South Africa, Malaysia, Nigeria, where issues of identity are critical, we might expect a much greater use of loan-words. The influence of local languages is also apparent in the form of loan- translations, in hybrid forms where a foreign root (radice) is given an english affix or where 2 languages are involved in a blend (fusione).
There are also many examples of words or phrases of a well-established variety adopted by a new english and given a new meaning or use, without undergoing any structural change. Lists of lexical examples of this kind suffer all from similar problems. Because the investigator has focused on an individual country, it is often unclear, whether a particular word is restricted to that country or is also used in nearby countries. It is also unclear, especially in historical studies with limited
The question of how much local phonology, grammar, vocabulary and pragmatics should be allowed in is difficult an contentious. If the people who use mixed varieties as markers oftheir identity become more influential, attitudes will change, and usages will become more acceptable and everyone else would recognize their words as legitimate options. The contact-language words of the future will be include more alernative rather than supplementary expressions, the notion of a lexical mosaic as such is not new. It has always been part of the language.
An English family or languages?
The future of world english is likely to be one of increasing multidialectism. The forces of the past 50 years suggest that english is going to fragment into mutually unintelligible varieties, so that we end up with an english family of languages. The history of language suggests that such a course of events has been a frequent phenomenon (as in the case of latin), but it is no longer a guide. The New Englishes could move indifferent directions at the same time. The pull imposed by the need for identity, which has been making New Englishes dissimilar from British english, could be balanced by a pull imposed by the need for inelligibility, on a world escale, which will make them increasingly similar, through the continued use of standard english.
If a community wishes its way of speaking to be considered a language, 2 criteria need to be satisfied:
- the community has to have a single mind about the matter
- the community has to have a enough political-economic clout to make its decision be respected by outsiders with whom it's in regular contact.
There are very few examples of english generating varieties which are given totally different names and fewer where these names are rated as languages, any proposal for for language status is surrounded with controversy. Like the case of Ebonics proposed for the variety of english spoken by african americans, it didn't obtain the 2 criteria because the US black community didn't have a single about the matter and the people who had the political-economical clout to make the decision to be rspected also had mixed views about it.
It's very unusual to assign a novel name to a variety of english other than in the humorous literature.
There is one clear case where a specific regional variet of english has acquired a new name as part of its claim to be recognized as a standard in its locality:Scots. The situation is complex because the Scots community doesn't have a single mind about the matter, nor has it had enough political-economic power to make any decision be respected by outsiders.
We have yet to see whether the same situation will obtain in countries where the New englishes speakers are in a majority and hold political power, or in locations where new supernational political relationships are being formed. For example in European Union, english is the most widely used language. The result will be a novel variety of 'euro-english'. First-language speakers of english working in Brussels have been pulled in the direction of these foreign-language patterns. A common future is to accomodate to an increasingly syllable-timed rhythm, the use of simplified sentence constructions, the avoidance of idioms and colloquial vocabulary and a slower rate of speech. It's a natural process of accomodation, which could lead to new standardized forms.
The emergence of hybrid trends and varieties raises all kinds of theoretical and pedagogical questions during the 1990s. They blur (hanno reso confusa) the long standing distinctiond between first, second and foreign language and reconsider the notion of standard. Many of the new varieties have grown extremely rapidly, so that it's difficult to establich their role in their society or how people are reacting to them. In several cases generates controversy within the community.
If Englishes became increasingly different, as years went by, the consequences for world english wouldn't necessarily be fatal. A new form of english, let us think about it as WORLD STANDARD SPOKEN ENGLISH , would almost certainly arise. Most of people are already 'multidialectal' to a greater or lesser extent, they use a spoken dialect at home and another one when they are away from home, those who are literate have learned a third variety, that of written standard english which currently unites the english-speaking world. In a future where there were many national englishes, little would change. People will use their dialects within their countries and WSSE to communicate with people from other countries. People who attend international conferences or write scripts for an international audience have probably already felt the pull of this new variety. It takes the form for example of avoiding a word or phrase which you know is not going to be understood outside your own country.
US english seems likely to be the most influential in the development of WSSE, but the situation will be complicated by the emrgence on the world scene of new linguistic features derived from the L2 varieties, which will become numerically dominant. None of them has yet become a part of standard US or Uk english, but, as the balance of speakers changes, there is no reasons for L2 features not to become part of WSSE. This would be especially likely if there were features which were shared by several, or all, L2 varieties.
The concept of WSSE doesn't replace a national dialect, it supplements it, peolple who can use both are in a more powerful position than people who can use only one. The situation is the familiar one of diglossia, as illustrated by the high and low varieties found in such languages as Greek, German and Arabic. It would seem that english at the global level is steadly moving towards becoming a diglossic language. If WSSE emerges as a neutral global variety, brtish and american english will still exist, but as varieties expressing national identity in UK and Usa. For global purposes, WSSE will suffice.
