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Behemoth, bully, thief: how the English language is taking over the planet

• cafard 8y ago
  Leading off with a word long naturalized from Hebrew suggests that perhaps the English language has all along been letting the planet take it over.
  • deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  • nkrisc 8y ago
    English is the Borg of languages.
• gaius 8y ago
  English is the de facto lingua franca, and the fact I can use that phrase and you all know what it means proves there’s no “taking over”, English is uniquely welcoming to others
  • ajross 8y ago
    > English is the de facto lingua franca The fact that the idiom you picked there uses Latin to tell us that English is like French tells you everything you need to know about this status. It's ephemeral in the long term. I don't know what our grandkids' children will be speaking. It certainly could be English or Mandarin. But languages change, even on this scale. Certainly there's economic value in having a universal language (and a social loss when languages fall into disuse, for that matter), but IMHO that's as far as it goes.
    • megaman22 8y ago
      Mandarin is hamstrung by an impossible writing system, even in its various alphabetization schemes, so I do not see that as a reasonable winner. It simply requires too great an effort to reach functional levels of reading and writing proficiency, compared to competitors.
      • ajross 8y ago
        Meh. They changed it once already in the last half century. They can change it again. I'm no expert, but it's certainly not impossible to imagine a future where all international business communication is in pinyin or a descendant.
    • kharms 8y ago
      Actually, the "franca" in "lingua franca" refers to the "Frankish" people, a term applied to a variety of Western Mediterraneans. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediterranean_Lingua_Franca https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediterranean_Lingua_Franca
• devoply 8y ago
  It is necessary that there should be a common global language that everyone speaks, in addition to their native tongue. It might as well as be English rather than any other language. The other options are Spanish, French, Hindi, Chinese, or Arabic. It makes little difference as each of these are not going extinct any time soon.
  • gaius 8y ago
    As something of an idealist I can’t help but think Unicode was a terrible mistake. We could have used ASCII as a carrot to get the whole World speaking a common tongue. Think of the wars that could have been avoided, the scientific progress.
    • KozmoNau7 8y ago
      Think of the wars over which language should win out.
    • iforgotpassword 8y ago
      You kinda did this, unintentionally mostly, which just resulted in every country coming up with their own incompatible encoding. Unicode tried to unify this mess again.
    • Mediterraneo10 8y ago
      One of your several mistakes here is to assume that Unicode is necessarily connected with multilingualism. In fact, ASCII is not enough for even typesetting English at a professional level: various kinds of non-breaking spaces and hyphens, curly quotation marks “” instead of straight "", ligatures, etc. are all things that any professional English-language publisher requires but are beyond the ASCII set.
      • gaius 8y ago
        Those can all be expressed in ASCII TeX
        • 8y ago
• barking 8y ago
  My unsuccessful forays into foreign language learning have convinced me also that none are as simple and logical as our own beautiful language, English, innit?
  • opportune 8y ago
    English grammar has a lot of exceptions. Personally I think Spanish is much simpler than English, and has a much more logical spelling system as well. The main complexity Spanish introduces over English is the subjunctive mood , which is less complex than the many fine details of the English language, IMO (such as learning how to use the word "do" as a helping verb). The English language actually does still have the subjunctive mood, but it is used in a more limiting set of circumstances (If I were you...)
    • MereInterest 8y ago
      English has the subjunctive mood as well, though it is phasing out of use. If you were to express a hypothetical, you would use "were" as the subjunctive tense. For example, the song title "If I were a rich man" rather than "If I was a rich man", or the previous sentence in this post.
      • opportune 8y ago
        yes, I had just realized that and added it as an edit. I'm pretty sure you can ignore the subjunctive and still have it be correct, i.e. I don't think there is anything grammatically wrong with saying "If I was rich", at least in the sense that it wouldn't be picked up on in casual speech
        • MereInterest 8y ago
          For the most part, yes. Though, if you flip the word order, it immediately sounds off. "Were I a rich man, I wouldn't have to work hard." sounds reasonable. "Was I a rich man, I wouldn't have to work hard." sounds rather jarring.
• NegativeLatency 8y ago
  If you're interested in this topic, you might like this podcast: http://historyofenglishpodcast.com http://historyofenglishpodcast.com It's a very interesting version of history as it relates specifically to the english language.
  • toasterlovin 8y ago
    Seriously, people, this is a great podcast.
• BerislavLopac 8y ago
  Considering that English has basically emerged as a "pidgin" languages, taking elements from the languages of various peoples coming to the islands -- Britons, Romans, Saxons, Danes, French etc -- and being simplified in the process, it's only logical that it is adopted far more easily than other languages with even more speakers -- Chinese, Hindi, Arabic -- or that were expanded around the globe in a similar fashion -- French, Spanish.
  • blt 8y ago
    Sure, that might be one factor, but the global imperialism of the British and United States is another huge factor.
    • weberc2 8y ago
      Or even just the cultural exports due to British and US media (BBC, Hollywood, etc) or the desire to do business in wealthier markets.
      • knuththetruth 8y ago
        Many of the “cultural exports” are, however, essentially propaganda to glorify the power and righteousness of the American empire. History has proven that this “soft power” approach to be incredibly effective. After all, we still study and celebrate similar texts from the Greek and Roman empires, even though they’re 1000s of years dead. Much less so those who they conquered, exploited, and enslaved.
        • toasterlovin 8y ago
          While Hollywood definitely takes into consideration foreign markets when making films, the idea that their agenda is to propagandize the rest of the world is laughable. They make what sells, because all they care about is making money.
          • jcranmer 8y ago
• louprado 8y ago
  One complaint about English is that double negatives are not grammatically correct. The word "not" is so important it should be re-enforced in someway. Spanish supports double negatives. The French add redundancy with "ne" and "pas". It's worth noting that American gangsters often talk with double negatives and the U.S. military use the phrase "repeat NOT" since their discussions are often mission critical. But I am certain their are countless examples of harm because someone in a hurry, omitted the word 'not' in a discussion or email.
  • jotm 8y ago
    I meant, it's pretty well reinforced with capitalization or accentuation when speaking ("do NOT! do this"). You're saying in Spanish you can accentuate it like this: "do not, NOT do this"?
    • ProfessorLayton 8y ago
      That translates to: Verbatim: "No hagas, NO hagas esto" (Do not, do NOT do this) or "No, no hagas esto" (No, don't do this)
    • FeteCommuniste 8y ago
      More like this: "No haga nada sin pedirme permiso." Word for word: "Don't do nothing without asking me for permission." Meaning: Don't do anything without asking me for permission.
      • toasterlovin 8y ago
        The funny thing is that, in colloquial English, "Don't do nothing without asking me for permission." means "Don't do anything without asking me for permission".
  • RightMillennial 8y ago
    English does have double negatives, and they're grammatically correct when used properly. They simply cancel each other out which differs from Spanish where they add emphasis.
• opportune 8y ago
  The best point that the article touches on is that English is a good "neutral" language for countries like Sudan and entities like the EU with many different languages spoken. There is a bit of a snowball effect where any language having the advantage of being spoken as a cross-cultural communication language further incentivizes learning that language for people wishing to communicate in that manner. I think such a universal language existing is good for the world, it's just somewhat unfair how such a language gets chosen. English is an adaptable language, but I think much more importantly, English has been native language of one superpower or another for the past 200 years I completely understand how someone would feel attacked by the fact that their children or grandchildren may not fluently speak the same language due to the influence of English. But at the same time, though the author somewhat dismisses it, this seems pretty nationalistic - though we shouldn't ignore that promoting English due to chauvinistic nationalism is just as silly. I do think in the end, people will glad if in X*100 years the vast majority of the world will be able to communicate with each other in one language. The main unfairness is that the way that language was chosen (assuming it is English) was through militaristic and economic domination
  • godzillabrennus 8y ago
    Computers will translate in real time. Binary is the universal language of classic computers based on electromagnetic physics. Assuming quantum computing or some other unforeseen technology doesn’t replace other forms of computing then we will likely all be relying on binary in one way or another.
    • chillacy 8y ago
      Isn’t that like saying pressure waves are the universal spoken language, so it doesn’t matter if English wins, it’s all pressure waves at the end of the day.
      • opportune 8y ago
        Fundamental particles are the universal spoken language because all communication must be done through their interactions
• saget 8y ago
  English is also nice in that there is no "baked in" formal or informal use of the language. I think it breaks down barriers in conversations with a superior or a random stranger. I wonder if this has any larger scale effects...
  • YaxelPerez 8y ago
    There used to be: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T%E2%80%93V_distinction#English https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/T%E2%80%93V_distinction#Englis...
    • jessaustin 8y ago
      It's funny that "thou" seems so formal now.
      • dorchadas 8y ago
        And it's all because of the King James Bible! They used 'thou' there when talking to God because they wanted it to seem informal and portray him as a friend. It's quite funny how after it fell out of use, it was reinterpreted as the exact opposite, with people being more formal when talking to God.
  • jotm 8y ago
    Not in the country of origin, lol Edit: England, bitch.
  • dsfyu404ed 8y ago
    There is and there isn't. Turning your Northern Alabama up to 11 might not have any impact when in Northern Alabama but sure won't do you any good in front of a SF VC. Likewise if your way of speaking is, ahem, on the "darker and more urban" side.
  • NihilumExNil 8y ago
    With all due respect, madams and sirs, I beg to differ.
• ochoseis 8y ago
  The article glosses over the fact that the US (and to a lesser extent UK) is a great exporter of its culture and language through movies, TV, and music. This is aided by the fact that the US has a values-based society where you don't need to be of a particular race or ethnicity to identify with it. I can't tell you how many people I've met traveling abroad who learned English by watching American shows and films.
  • adventured 8y ago
    > I can't tell you how many people I've met traveling abroad who learned English by watching American shows and films. That essentially encompasses everyone that learns English well. It's the exception that doesn't aggressively use English media to accelerate their learning of the language. On a basis of living in the language to learn it, consuming US & British culture through media is the single best and easiest way to do it (if you aren't able to constantly be around other English speakers). Plus, it's a lot more fun than doing it solely the rote way.
• _rpd 8y ago
  The internet is mentioned in passing, but the reason that English is dominating is that the vast majority of science, engineering and academia in general is published in English, and then is quickly added to the English language Wikipedia. If you want to be at the cutting edge of global technology, it is just easier (and sometimes important) to be able to read English directly. Translations can be problematic, particularly for technical subject matter. As others have mentioned, other languages have played this role in the past, and probably will in the future.
  • deleted 8y ago
    [deleted]
  • anonytrary 8y ago
    Interesting -- do you think translators will slowly become obsolete before software "solves" the translation problem? Do you ever think there will be a point in the future where everyone can speak fluent English? It would seem the path of least resistance would be to eliminate the need for translators, and I'm not sure we'll live in a future where everyone speaks N languages, and just uses an app to translate between people.
• nutjob2 8y ago
  English is such a horrible language to learn, I pity non-native speakers. On that basis, the rule is: you're not allowed to criticize another person's English, unless it's their native one. They didn't ask for this language, it was forced upon them.
  • always_good 8y ago
    It's not as hard as you think. Compare all the tenses in Spanish to English, for example. I live in Mexico and my peers usually think English is relatively easy. Also, the US exports so many quality tv shows and movies that it's easy to find good English-native material for learning. You'd be hard pressed to find someone who doesn't know Disney movies. Meanwhile, try finding good Mexican television.
    • dorchadas 8y ago
      > Also, the US exports so many quality tv shows and movies that it's easy to find good English-native material for learning. This is the most underrated factor when it comes to language learning in my opinion. It really does make a difference how much native material is available, and how interesting it is to the person learning the language. Not because it makes the learning itself easier, but because it makes exposure once you hit the intermediate level that much easier, which means you can pass the intermediate plateau and reach a fairly advanced level without having to struggle through things you don't find interesting.
      • omosubi 8y ago
        yes - so much this. I was just learning some European Portuguese before going to portugal and had great difficulty finding any "real" non-brazilian european portuguese to even get a feel for it. perhaps if people put together something along the lines of those 'awesome-<language/framework/etc>' github repos for language learning everyone could benefit :)
  • kome 8y ago
    that's true. that's what a lot of natives just miss, linguistic imperialism is real: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_imperialism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_imperialism
• nutjob2 8y ago
  The internet has given impetus to the global adoption of English becuase that is how most of the internet's functionality is exposed. The internet supports many languages, but if you want the latest/best/coolest stuff tends to appear in English, especially for young people, but they are the ones who are most likely to adopt a new language.
  • NihilumExNil 8y ago
    not only that but it comes with access to learning material built in. Still though, English is probably not the majority spoken language, much less absolute majority, even on the net, especially if proficiency is a factor.
    • bhelkey 8y ago
      English is used by 52.9% of the top 10 million websites [1]. This doesn't factor in proficiency but I don't see why that should be included. [1] https://w3techs.com/technologies/overview/content_language/all https://w3techs.com/technologies/overview/content_language/a...
      • NihilumExNil 8y ago
        The linked page notes that the Alexa provided stats might be considered inaccurate. Either way, it has youtube.com on place 2. If that is counted as English, which I simply suppose were the case, "English is used by ..." is highly misleading in this context. Surely they don't analyze the video contents, maybe comments as proxy, never the less for music and the like the language doesn't even matter. Proficiency is a factor because a play button is neither English nor Japanese. Please see https://w3techs.com/technologies/cross/content_language/character_encoding https://w3techs.com/technologies/cross/content_language/char... They compare UTF-8 to ISO-8859-1 (that's Latin-1) and a Cyrillic encoding. That's it. They simply don't analyze the Chinese market. Which is not surprising because Alexa is after all into advertising and focused on a target group. They include baidu, but probably only for comparison. I can't explain the mismatch any other way, that is the mismatch of English 50% compared to .de, .cz, .jp, .ru etc. each only ca. 2%. .de on second place ... wut? English speakers are highly biased to rest on the assumption, because it's comforting. I can't even blame anyone for that. It's a shit language, but the comfort is the language has the grammar that is an easy learning.
• wallflower 8y ago
  In many European countries, you cannot get a good job (like one with an international company) unless you can communicate in English at CEFRL B1 proficiency [1]. China may very well become the largest economy in the world, and there is no way that Chinese, as a multi-toned, symbolic language, will ever become the Lingua franca, as it is near impossible for most adults to learn, in contrast to English [2]. It can be argued that the European Union has failed/is failing, at least partially, because of a lack of a common language. In the peak periods of the Roman Empire, Latin was the Lingua franca that enabled business transactions, along with Roman law, the precursors of civil law as a framework. In many states in India, people speak many languages just to navigate life on a daily basis. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages#Common_reference_levels https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_R... [2] http://pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html http://pinyin.info/readings/texts/moser.html
  • koboll 8y ago
    This is what's left unmentioned in most articles excoriating the rise of English -- the benefits of a lingua franca far outweigh the detriments of English intrusion on other languages and cultures. Unfortunately the parallels to colonization make polemic takes irresistible to outlets like The Guardian.
    • bartread 8y ago
      > Unfortunately the parallels to colonization make polemic takes irresistible to outlets like The Guardian. Quite. As I have observed before, The Guardian is all too often The Daily Mail for leftie intellectuals. These days, even as something of a leftie intellectual, I find myself often unable to tolerate it at all. And in general I have less and less patience with overly polemic or political points of view - it honestly just gets boring and doesn't make the world any better for anyone.
  • craftyguy 8y ago
    It's mildly interesting how you (and the article) use 'Lingua franca' (Latin) and not it's English meaning of 'common language'. Edit: s/Italian/Latin/
• jejones3141 8y ago
  The influence still goes both ways--I read that American movie studios cut out dialogue that they don't think foreign viewers will understand because of English-specific wordplay or culture-specific references. (See https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-10/saving-hollywood-from-the-chinese-box-office https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2018-01-10/saving-ho...)
  • intopieces 8y ago
    Ever since I saw the movie Pacific Rim (2013) I have suspected that dialog in very expensive movies (that one was $190m) was a bit simplified so that translation could be easy for the Chinese market.
    • elgenie 8y ago
      That movie was about robots fighting monsters and was named for its intended market as much as its subject matter: expecting complicated dialog given that seems ambitious.
• forkLding 8y ago
  This English dominance is pretty strong in coding, most Chinese coders in China use English to code because programming languages are written in English (aka the if loops and more advanced and they occassionally sprinkle in Chinese characters as variables, comments can also be Chinese) and I've seen Latin American friends using English as well to code when they come over and can't speak English well even. It is pretty much the lingua franca in coding. Its an expected but quite interesting phenomenon.
  • physicsguy 8y ago
    It can be quite difficult though; we had a Chinese PhD student in our research group and while his coding ability was amazing and everything 'just worked', decoding what he actually meant in many cases was very difficult.
    • kzrdude 8y ago
      There are many coders like that all over the world though :-)
• Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
  I think instead of chiding people who use English as a second language "poorly", we should look at their mistakes for what they are - the influence of another language - and see if we can't incorporate the ideas that caused them into English, if the ideas are good. Newspeak isn't fiction, languages really do shape how you think. We should continue evolving English to be suitable for expressing more modes of thought.
  • dorchadas 8y ago
    > we should look at their mistakes for what they are - the influence of another language - and see if we can't incorporate the ideas that caused them into English, if the ideas are good. Except it doesn't work like that. Languages change because native speakers change them, not because some grammatical body adopts things and tries to force it on everyone. > Newspeak isn't fiction, languages really do shape how you think. Yes, it is fiction, and no, languages do not shape how you think. This is known as linguistic relativity [1] and it's strong form has been _thoroughly_ debunked, whereas the weak form is highly skeptical, with most arguments coming from Lera Boroditsky, who fails to control for several factors and also hasn't yet published her famous study on the matter (which was set to be published roughly 16 years ago). [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Linguistic_relativity
    • Sir_Cmpwn 8y ago
      >Except it doesn't work like that. Languages change because native speakers change them, not because some grammatical body adopts things and tries to force it on everyone. I'm not suggesting an institution should do this. I'm suggesting individuals do this. >Yes, it is fiction, and no, languages do not shape how you think I have anecdotal experience in thinking differently in different experiences, which doesn't say much for anyone else but makes me personally skeptical of your assertion. I don't think I would count this as "_thouroughly_ debunked", more like "extensively debated". I also don't put much faith in unpublished studies. Regardless, my main point stands even without invoking linguistic relativity.
      • 8y ago
• kayamon 8y ago
  Behemoth is actually a Hebrew word.
  • adventured 8y ago
    That's the thief part of the article title.
• doitLP 8y ago
  English: Diverse, comprised of many elements from many languages, lots of little quirks, ability to express the same thing multiple ways, far from perfect but totally dominant. Javascript: ditto
• sudosteph 8y ago
  I was surprised that such an in-depth article about linguistic dominance had so little to say about Latin. Historically, Latin in Europe seems to have filled a very similar role to that of English today, though not at the same scale perhaps. Even languages that weren't full-on adaptations of Latin have adapted Latin alphabets and words. The modern English we speak today has funny little relics of Latin grammar norms that had been adopted for no apparent reason other than to improve the "status" of English by making it more latinized (things like, not ending sentences in prepositions). Also, it's interesting that the author proposed > What if the pre-contact languages of the Americas were taught in American high schools? Because I recall actually reading an article about how some schools in France were just now allowing the local language "Occitan" to be taught in some schools again, but historically they were very harsh on not allowing it. The fear back then was that if schools were allowed to teach in languages besides French, that the students would never bother learning French and would not be able to function as citizens. I think they've eased up, but I've seen that China has many of the same concerns about Mandarin adoption, especially in the far west portion. I'm all for learning weird languages for the heck of it though. It's not like most people can actually recall and use the Spanish or French they learned in high school, so might as well teach something interesting to examine linguistic principles in general. I'm a fan of Esperanto for this because it's so easy, but every language has interesting differences (often with cultural implications) that learners can enjoy. But again, this is coming from a perspective of living in a country with the privilege of having English as the most common native tongue.
  • NihilumExNil 8y ago
    > ... the "status" of English by making it more latinized (things like, not ending sentences in prepositions). very interesting, that's something I'd really need to learn more about it. But how much of that is common sense, or French influence?
    • sudosteph 8y ago
      Well my source is a Linguistics Textbook (Language Files, 11th Edition, p15-16) but it says that these changes happened as late as the 17th and 18th centuries because Scholars considered written Latin to be the ideal language (likely because most historical works had been translated to Latin at some point). So even though ending sentences in prepositions had been common for centuries in spoken English, that became frowned upon because it was not allowed in Latin. Specific examples in the book of "rules" applied to English to match written Latin include: - Don't ending sentences in prepositions - Don't split infinitives - Don't use double negatives The chapter as a whole was actually about linguistic prescriptivism, but the Latin examples are pretty interesting nonetheless. 17th and 18th century seem pretty far past the point at which French would be the big influencer, but there's no doubt French did influence English as well (though more vocab it seems).
• wcoenen 8y ago
  Thought experiment, or maybe just a crazy thought: what if the European Union would prefer to stop using English after a hard Brexit and starts looking for an alternative lingua franca. What if a EU directive was then issued, mandating Esperanto as a de jure national language in each of the member states, in addition to the existing national languages. Schools all over the EU start to offer it as the first choice for a second language to learn. Cultural works in Esperanto are subsidized. Having established a big base of speakers and being constructed to be very easy to learn, the language then spreads virally and becomes the new global lingua franca. Plausible?
  • sudosteph 8y ago
    I say not plausible at all, and I'm a fan of Esperanto. If Esperanto is going to get adopted anywhere, it would have to start in the far east (China mostly). The fact that Esperanto has phonetic pronunciation that matches the spelling of words, strongly regular grammar, and latin roots that make learning French or English easier makes it more plausible that it would mostly appeal to a nation which needs to improve literacy and communication quickly for economic reasons, and doesn't want the cultural baggage of another nation's language would choose it. Also, Esperanto has some socialist roots to it that could appeal to China. Europe had a chance to embrace esperanto back in the day, gave it a heck no. And without English, the default lingua franca, would definitely be French.
  • raverbashing 8y ago
    Not plausible, they would still have 2 members where English plays an important role: Ireland (though not the 1st official language) and Malta
    • albertgoeswoof 8y ago
      Most people in Ireland don’t speak Irish, English is just not the official language for political reasons
      • dorchadas 8y ago
• raverbashing 8y ago
  English is the PHP of languages. Good enough to solve your problem, and easy to understand, but not really elegant (and not without its quirks). And maybe due to the fact that it didn't have a "standards body" (like the Académie Française) and much less "protection" than others meant it was more free to evolve. And not only that, I suppose languages based on the latin alphabet have an intrinsic advantage. From the time of the printing press to the earliest 8-bit computers. (Japanese systems had support for Katakana later, Cyrilic wouldn't be so complicated and Arabic probably would have been harder, Korean would be hard and Kanji would just be plainly impossible in 8-bit systems)
  • dorchadas 8y ago
    > And maybe due to the fact that it didn't have a "standards body" (like the Académie Française) and much less "protection" than others meant it was more free to evolve. To be fair, they really don't have any effect on language as it's actually used. French people still say 'le week-end', despite how much the Académie raves about it. They still often drop the 'ne' in negative sentences as well, despite it being standard. Academies really only affect the written standards of a language, not how it's actually used daily. > And not only that, I suppose languages based on the latin alphabet have an intrinsic advantage. From the time of the printing press to the earliest 8-bit computers. Except movable type printing was available in China from the 11th century onwards, and solely printed the Hanzi [1]. And, likewise, if the other technology had been designed in China, it's likely support would have first existed for the Hanzi over the Latinate Alphabet. It's not really an intrinsic advantage as much a matter of coincidence on where things were developed. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_printing#Movable_type_(1041) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_printing#Movable_ty...
    • devmunchies 8y ago
      > To be fair Since we're discussing language, I see this prefixed on several comments these days when the comment has nothing to do with "being fair". Its just added to a statement when making a counter point to not come across as hostile.
• gabordemooij 8y ago
  Citrine (https://citrine-lang.org/ https://citrine-lang.org/ I am the author) tried to change this with respect to coding (it is a programming language that allows everyone to code in their own language and translate between parties). However, it has been ignored, ridiculed and hated (even death threats). So it has failed and I realize that (I continue to finish it until 0.9 though, because I cant stop in the middle - I am a very neurotic person). It's hard for me. I feel hatred but I realize it just wasnt meant to be (but for some reason if something like this happens and you read an article like this the hate burns...). There is probably not even a way to save European languages anyway. So I just wanted to share this comment to let you know I was working on a technology that at least for coding tried to counter the influence of the English language and allows people to write code in their own language. However I also wrote this comment because I am very emotional because of the failure of this project. When I read an article like this - it's just ...unspeakable. Maybe I was too arrogant. Maybe the problem is too difficult. Maybe I interefered with some globalist agenda, maybe it's just Don Quixottish. Who knows? Anyway I had to share this train of thought. Maybe people just deserve to have their language (and culture) taken from them. Maybe it's just the way it is.
  • albertgoeswoof 8y ago
    Death threats? Sorry to hear that. The project looks awesome! European languages won’t die just because English is around, there are millions of people in Europe that don’t interact on a national or international scale, and are quite happy to continue with their language as it stands, that won’t change for a long time. I think your project is a really great idea! Code often doesn’t translate well when variable and object names are poorly suggested due to translation issues, and there must be billions of lines of code that are limited to specific languages, which are locked out to non-speakers. Can I suggest you focus more on the language benefits on the home page? Did you think about applying this technique as a transpiler to an existing programming language instead of a new language?
  • ricankng787 8y ago
    I'd argue almost no one is having their language and culture taken from them (that was certainly the case in other times in history, but I find it difficult to find one today). There's nothing stopping you from learning another language, or using another language 50-70% of the time. This is a completely transactional phenomenon. You want to communicate with more people, and be understood in almost any part of the world, and possibly make more money doing just about any job? Speak English. Also, I notice the web page to your project is written in English, I imagine it was done for mass appeal right? That's kind of the point.
• geff82 8y ago
  I love the English language. It is expressive, it is the language of great literature, and it is in no way „bullying“, no, it brings people all over the world together. There would be no way to talk to a Chinese for me (German) if he had only learned Japanese because Japan is the neighbour and if I had only learned French or Polish because those are our big neighbours. No, English brings us all together, it makes me communicate with ordinary people without a translator anywhere on the planet. I do not care if everyone speaks English, German, Hindi or Esperanto. But if English has the noble power to bring people together, regardless of nation, religion or race, I applaud it, because this is just a wonderful use for this little language that was once only spoken on a medium sized Island in the Northern Sea. Let‘s appreciate English, let us embrace it even a bit more, let us try to speak it better each day for a world of mutual understanding. Maybe English can be a driver for peace, at least to a certain degree.
  • tbrock 8y ago
    It’s also the lingua franca of tech. There isn’t any way to say “Linux Kernel Networking Subsystem” or “8-Way associative cache” in French or any other language without severe lingual contortions.
    • chrisper 8y ago
      Then explain to me why the French are using Go, To etc. instead of TB and GB like everyone else?
      • rhapsodic 8y ago
        >Then explain to me why the French are using Go, To etc. instead of TB and GB like everyone else? Probably because some French law mandates it.
      • ralusek 8y ago
        They haven't gotten over the whole "lingua Franca" thing.
        • 8y ago
• vanilla-almond 8y ago
  English has also spread due to the enormous influence of English-speaking TV, film, radio and popular music. The internet has only accelerated this. But it's not all in one direction. People also have much more exposure to non-English media too. I think many native English speakers probably don't realise just how smaller the internet feels when you're browsing in a language with a much smaller number of speakers than English.
• danieltillett 8y ago
  English is a very easy language to learn the basics and be understood (say unlike German), but a difficult one to master. It could do with some major spelling reform and simplification of some of the archaic grammar, but overall it is not a bad common language for the world.
• WalterBright 8y ago
  The article laments the loss of oral languages as if this was a modern phenomenon. Oral languages were always being lost, for the simple reason that they drift. It's doubtful an oral language would be intelligible to its descendants after only a century or two. Writing slows this down a lot, but what really slowed it down was the advent of the printing press. It's still drifting. New words like "sexting" appear, and just read some Shakespeare for lost words.
  • jopsen 8y ago
    That's very true. Languages have always been drifting. With the internet it's just that we're drifting more and more towards English.
  • ryl00 8y ago
    I suspect the advent of recorded sound has had a huge effect on slowing down the drift or oral languages as well. Just think, in the 1930's people wouldn't really know what people sounded like in the 1850's, unless they had a very long-lived relative. Here in the 2010's, we have those sound movies from the 1930's to refer to, even though most of those actors and actresses are long gone now. (And they're still perfectly intelligible, even if the slang is sometimes odd to our ears). And hopefully in the 2090's, they'll still have those 1930's movies around...
• rumianteolor 8y ago
  What I don't like about the English language is the pronunciation. I would like to pronounce English like Spanish or any system in which every letter has a unique sound.
• malloryerik 8y ago
  The article is incorrect in its description of South Korean children increasingly having their tongues snipped in order to pronounce English words better. That procedure was only done rarely, as far as I can tell from about 2002 to 2004. Immediately attracting heavy news attention there was even a government-sponsored video to scare people away from the procedure, which is virtually non-existent today. Fret not, there are still plenty of other opportunities for plastic surgeons in South Korea... One thing to notice, however, is that Korean people would even consider that their tongues aren't naturally suited for speaking English, that's to say that their tongues could be different from other tongues. The idea of minjok (민족, 民族), meaning ethnicity or race -- the word itself a loan from fascist Japan during the Japanese Empire when Korea was annexed, though most Koreans are unaware of this --, is so strong in South Korea that indeed it might not seem strange for Koreans to believe foreign pronunciation naturally unsuited to Korean tongues. Similarly I recently saw Korean packaging that portrayed Korean digestive tracts as longer and more complex than those of "foreigners". In the South this "race"-based consciousness is fading away, in part surely because of English, the language that allows South Koreans to connect to the world. In North Korea it is far far stronger. There, along with the cult of the leader, the minjok really is the national religion, adapted from fascist Japan, which itself learned it from the German military (which trained the Japanese Army, which occupied and ruled Korea) and more generally the racist West of the 19th and early 20th centuries. Not that they didn't have their own home-grown prejudices in the region. Far from it, sadly. Edit: All this said, it's both hopeful and ironic that even in North Korea the kids study English.
  • briandear 8y ago
    I love Korea, but it is literally the most racist and nationalistic place I have ever been. Japan might be just as racist, but in my experience, they are exceptionally polite about it.
• iosDrone 8y ago
  The English language is a scalpel. It's more expressive than any other language in history. As far as I'm concerned, the more widespread it becomes, the better.
• anotherevan 8y ago
  My favourite quote about the English language: “The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don’t just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and riffle their pockets for new vocabulary.” — James Nicoll
  • fifnir 8y ago
    But at least english pays proper tribute to the languages it took from (at with greek that I'm personally familiar) by adopting specific spellings. Words spelled with "ph" for the f sound are spelled like that because they are derived by greek words. In latin languages elephant is spelled like elefant, making tracing the history of the word much harder
• rmason 8y ago
  It is all America fault. I think this British newspaper protests a bit too much. Who was it that spread colonies around the world? Colonies where all schoolchildren were taught English? America may get most of the credit or blame but the English did their part in spreading the language.
• cageface 8y ago
  The trend towards English isn’t universal. In Vietnam universities have just scrapped English as a requirement and replaced it with Chinese. And in tourist areas all over the country people are scrambling to learn Chinese in order to serve the deluge of Chinese tourists. I imagine this is going on in many other parts of Asia too, accelerated by China’s “Belt and Road” policy.
• BEEdwards 8y ago
  I don't think this is so much as an argument against english as it is an argument for a diverse language education.
• psergeant 8y ago
  > Elevating English while denigrating all other languages has been a pillar of English and American nationalism for well over a hundred years I wonder if there’s a country without a manufactured language where that’s not true.
• perfunctory 8y ago
  > An increasing number of parents in South Korea have their children undergo a form of surgery that snips off a thin band of tissue under the tongue … Most parents pay for this surgery because they believe it will make their children speak English better Sigh
  • malloryerik 8y ago
    This isn't true anymore at all. See my comments above if interested.
• torgian 8y ago
  What a dumb article. You might as well put any language in there. Chinese, Spanish, English or Farsi... trying to say English is a problem in its title when it’s clearly people (and few, loud people at that) that are the problem
• FrozenVoid 8y ago
  The biggest advantage of English: no central authority or standard. You can invent your own neologisms/slang/loanwords at your leisure and it will spread virally if useful. There isn't any cultural resistance to language change, the competition is for efficient/descriptive communication not adherence to 'correct/proper pronunciation'.
• oh-kumudo 8y ago
  I think this attitude, from more liberal media, towards English is interestingly, alternative. I would say after WWII, in a post colonization world, learning English, is a self-conscious, choice. It means access to, not even arguably, the biggest/best/most up-to-date information pool, on this planet, and the economical opportunity comes with it. As a Chinese national, I would sincerely say learning English is probably the best investment I made during my college, the ROI is incredible. Not to mention, since it is so pervasive, learning English is actually much cheaper than other languages, the barrier is much lower. Whatever history behind it, English, for its current status in the world, should be considered as an asset for us mankind, that we are finally blessed a pragmatical global lingua franca.
• ivanhoe 8y ago
  English gained popularity as it was THE language of popular movies, music and then later Internet. Just like in the past you needed Latin to be able to read books and communicate with educated people around the world, today you need English. And in my eyes it's OK, we need some standardization in communication to be able to understand each-other, and English is a good practical choice as it's fairly easy to learn.
• lcall 8y ago
  I'm a native English speaker who learned Spanish, and some Russian & Esperanto. I'm thinking about Esperanto. Perhaps most relevant to this discussion is its benefit of being by far the cheapest workable global route to everyone being able to talk to and understand each other, even if haltingly. For some people, learning English is simply too hard. For the rest, it's still a very big effort, and Esperanto is extremely easy by comparison. In terms of global cost/benefit, Esperanto seems like a big win. (And it's fun.) Further, I have started thinking that Esperanto should be everyone's 2nd language, simply because it's so easy to learn yet seems ~"complete", and more importantly, has been shown to make learning other languages easier to the point that overall you learn, say, more French (or probably English) if you learn Esperanto first, than if one spent the entire time studying French. So learn whatever you would have learned as a 2nd language, for the 3rd, and you saved time and got farther, overall (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto#Third-language_acquisition https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto#Third-language_acqui... [wikipedia.org]). And it seems to me the easiest way for someone to better understand the grammar of their own native language, by seeing a simple & clean example. (Some in one forum I saw dismissed the studies, but when I read the dismissals it seemed a case of believing what you want, with the studies being more persuasive to me as they put much more work into it, but I would be interested in more info.) (I don't think most users see it as a replacement for a first (or native) language, though that has been done intentionally by some (per https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_Esperanto_speakers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Native_Esperanto_speakers [wikipedia.org], or search https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto for "native"). (There are other interesting constructed languages each with their pros & cons, but none with nearly the same amount of traction or interest as Esperanto. It's interesting to consider, given all that has been learned in the field so far, how to "optimize" a constructed human language, considering various factors like ease, familiarity, beauty, efficiency, computability, or whatever one sees as most important. ... ) Claude Piron made an interesting/enjoyable video, I think in different languages, showing some benefits of Esperanto. Here is the one in English: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YHALnLV9XU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_YHALnLV9XU (edit/ps: I hope to use Esperanto when my personal organizer gets the ability to use multiple languages for the same "knowledge". AGPL: http://onemodel.org http://onemodel.org .) (pps: had i noticed the "more" button I would have realized others in the discussion already wrote about this.)