Teach English in XisaishAngongyeyuanqu Guanweihui - Huangshi Shi

When I saw this topic I thought about whether it is worthy of debate and whether anyone individual views on the subject has any influence or really matters anyway. Language will evolve to meet the needs of the people who use it and what might be the global language today may very well change in 50 years. The English language is arguably more fluid and adaptive than any other language as is evidenced by the ever changing nature and colloquialisms present in everyday English depending on the various countries it is spoken. Therefore it could be argued that the English language has evolved to meet the needs of the time and place wherever and whenever that may be. It is obvious even to a non english speaker that the are vast differences between the English spoken at the turn of the 19th century compared to the 20th century which is near impossible for the average modern day native speaker to comprehend the meaning of even basic sentences. Before it is determined whether English is the global language or not it would be wise to understand what constitutes English as a language and where does it stop becoming the English. For example, I would argue that Pigeon English which has 25 variations worldwide (according to Wikipedia) is not English but a simplified form of English grafted onto the native tongue of the people who adopt it. All latin based languages also have similarities which make them sound familiar to English speakers and use similar words in their vocabulary but the litmus test has to be whether or not an average native speaker of English can understand what is being said. Unfortunately, most cannot, however they do hear familiar snippets of English, after all, language serves no other purpose other than to facilitate communication and recording data. The act of colonialism by the European powers of the time had the desired side effect of spreading their language to the far reaches of the respective empires. While English and Spanish were adopted by many, it is English which was more diversified and spread out where as Spanish, Portuguese and French were more restricted to the few countries they occupied. Along with the spread of religion this had the effect of laying a solid foundation for English to be spoken in all English colonised countries. The next major factor in favour of English dominance was the advent of the American talking movie industry with meant for anyone to truly enjoy the experience then it would be beneficial to know some English. Later there was American pop culture including the music and computer games industries which have spread round the globe and into all corners of countries which previously have had little exposure to English, again requiring the necessity of learning English to really enjoy the experience. There is no doubt that at present English reigns supreme as a global language, I have personally noticed the dramatic increase in end users of English compared to the 1980's, at this time there were few English speakers in large parts of Europe and Asia whereas today one can travel almost anywhere in the world and find someone they can communicate with. There is also the argument that we are now a global village leaping off the back of social media and the Internet. Whether this shrinking of the world has increased the necessity for a global language is a separate argument. There is one more point of interest regarding politics of English speaking countries which has been predominately on the side of good throughout history, supporting free speech, democracy and human rights. Add to this the ease of learning basic communication English compared with the tonal based languages and its place should be cemented. Of course we must address the elephant in the room; China. According to the UK news service, The Telegraph (14 August 2019 ) there are just over 1 Billion Mandarin speakers in the world today compared to 860 Million English speakers. Included in these English speakers are approximately several hundred million Chinese English speakers which ironically amounts to more that the American population, conversely there are approximately 50 million people learning Chinese world wide. At present there is nothing to suggest that Chinese is about to overtake English as a global language however as the Chinese economy surpasses the US in size there is a possibility for things to change over the course of the next century. This doesn't mean that Chinese will become a global language, most western cultures struggle with the tonal system of speaking and the writing would also be too difficult for most of those with a common alphabet to adopt. In summary I would have to argue that English is at present the global language at this point in time however I expect that the global language will eventually morph into something of a cacophony of sounds with every country adding words and phrases to the language as it evolves into its end product. This of course assumes that no one is at the helm driving this change and so the other argument would be that there is an orderly adoption of a version of English using the Phonetic Alphabet and making the existing language less complicated. This would require a committee from various countries to oversee and implement this task, taking decades, therefore the second outcome is less likely to eventuate.