Do you think English should be the International Language of the world?

Question

OK Folks, it was just a question of curiousity, don't get all defensive and go into the attack mode. Isabelle, bravo, that was funny. I was not suggesting that anyone GIVE UP their own language. I wasn't proposing the legislation of it. It is however already the business language of the world and the educational language of the world since most University professors teach in English all over the world. It only requires that a person speak two languages, their own and English to communicate with the entire world. And I said WORLD, so speak it or get OUT was not an option.

Answer 1

Seems like it is headed that way.

But wouldn't it be nice-maybe not-if we could all communicate in one language who cares what it is.

Answer 2

The European Commission has just announced an agreement whereby English
> will be the official language of the European Union rather than German,
> which was the other possibility.
>
> As part of the negotiations, the British Government conceded that
> English spelling had some room for improvement and has accepted a 5 year
> phase-in plan that would become known as "Euro-English".
> In the first year, "s" will replace the soft "c". Sertainly, this will
> make the sivil servants jump with joy.
> The hard "c" will be dropped in favour of "k". This should klear up
> konfusion, and keyboards kan have one less letter.
> There will be growing publik enthusiasm in the sekond year when the
> troublesome "ph" will be replaced with "f". This will make words like
> fotograf 20% shorter.
> In the 3rd year, publik akseptanse of the new spelling kan be expekted
> to reach the stage where more komplikated changes are possible.
> Governments will enkourage the removal of double letters which have
> always ben a deterent to akurate speling.
> Also, al wil agre that the horibl mes of the silent "e" in the languag
> is disgrasful and it should go away.
> By the 4th yer people wil be reseptiv to steps such as replasing "th"
> with "z" and "w" with "v".
> During ze fifz yer, ze unesesary "o" kan be dropd from vords kontaining
> "ou" and after ziz fifz yer, ve vil hav a reil sensi bl riten styl.
> Zer vil be no mor trubl or difikultis and evrivun vil find it ezi tu
> understand ech oza. Ze drem of a united urop vil finali kum tru.
> Und efter ze fifz yer, ve vil al be speking German like zey vunted in ze
;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;;

F..the hell NO !!! No need to say more ! Pretty obvious that more than half the planet would agree with me !

AND on top of all the serious reasons, everybody or almost understands you and it is too much fun to take the piss out of you when you do not understand the rest of the world:-P

ANGEL :ENGLISH IS ONE OF THE EASIEST LANGUAGE TO LEARN !! THAT IS WHY SO MANY PEOPLE CAN BLOODY UNDERSTAND IT !! pffttt !

Edit after you added on: Ok Stealthgirl I got you now. Well it is already done. English is pretty much the language of communication across most of the world. No point in denying it.

Answer 3

English is already the language spoken by majority of the world. Most countries that don't even have English as their official language do business in English. There's no need to legislate it. English is already the International Language of the World.

Answer 4

English has become wide spread and I've noticed in many countries a person is considered successful and educated if they are able to speak the language well. Do I think it should be mandated as the International Language of the world, not necessarily. However, I feel that in time it will be.

Answer 5

It's the business language of the world. To propose it to be an intercultural thing would suggest the surrendering and assimilation a part of at least a hundred or more of those nations' heritage.

It'd be great that everyone would all speak the same tongue, but it may prove to be a slap in the face of tradition, identity and some degree of historic dignity to some, if not many, nations.

Haven't we destroyed enough foreign culture?

Answer 6

No. English is one of the hardest languages to learn if you did not grow up around it, and there are more than a few extremely stupid people out there who would never learn it no matter what you did. Not to mention the fact that you would have to find a way to teach the language to all of those people. I mean, you couldn't just send some one to all the schools because a lot of people don't go to school. They stay home and work because their families can't afford for them to leave. (they need the extra labor) This would mean you would have to send people to the slums of the world just to teach people a language they didn't even have to know.

Answer 7

No, I do not think that English could be the common language of the world, as it is more difficult to learn than you think. First it is difficult to spell.
Secondly English is very similar to Danish and Swedish in construction, which means that it can be very hard to understand in such a way that it is NOT what is said which gives the meaning of the sentences, but how it is pronounced and the situation. The very same sentence can too often have another meaning than the words really tell and that is really difficult to understand.
Third are the prepositions, which are used in a different way in GB than in USA, and that can make misunderstandings, serious misunderstandings. That’s my experiences.

Answer 8

No.
1. Too boring! There are so many rich languages out there, and such wonderful experiences to be shared. Language is deeply intertwined with culture.

2. Who would make that decision? As far as I know, there's no committee or organization who could decide that, and no "king of the world", either.

3. Why English? Chinese is spoken by many more people than english...

Answer 9

i feel that everyone in the world should know at least two languages, english could be one of them. alot of countries do educated their children in another language, that is lacking here in the USA. language is an option not taken often enough. but because of the diversity of the world, there will never be a universal language. but hopefully a universal understanding.

Answer 10

No, I do not think it should. Maybe to your surprises Spanish is the the first languages to more countries than English. Granted English is the first as the second languages in the world.

Answer 11

It is since air traffic controllers use it all over the world and it is a second language in most Middle Eastern and African countries.Then again, we can also start speaking Mandarin/Cantonese Chinese since it's second after English
besides Spanish.