Should the Europeans speak one common language? Which language?

Answer 1

No! That'd be horrid. Preserve history, don't toss it away & spread English even moreso.

Answer 2

Well the fact that most Europeans are already learning English in schools means that communication is possible despite the numerous amount of languages spoken there.
If your asking whether all of the countries should implement English as their official language I would definitely say no. These countries have a right to preserve their lanugages. If the Italian speaker can already understand each other speaking in their native language why should they have to switch to English (a second language) to speak. Also, it would be such a bad thing to learn how to speak more than one language. For example, I plan to travel to Europe in about a year and visit places like Spain, Portugal, Italy, and France. Despite the fact that there may be people there who already speak English I doubt that I'm going to rely on that. The way I figure it is if I'm in THEIR country I should speak THEIR language. However, most Americans don't typically do this when they travel abroad (which is why everyone else thinks of us as monolingual). But then Americans get upset when people from Latin America come here and don't speak English. Apparently no one likes it when the table are turned. That's just my opinion though.
Chao ; )

Answer 3

Some Europeans speak a very common language.
Why should continental Europeans speak English, when most Brits don't want the Euro, aren't even sure they want to stay in Europe and still believe in a 'special relationship' which has led to British soldiers being killed in unjustified wars?
I would vote for the two most widely learnt languages in Europe, (after English) namely French and German. By the way, I am British born and bred.

Answer 4

First, let me be very clear about this.
The idea of a common language, especially if it is arbitrarily chosen or worse, would be next to useless. This is assuming by 'Common', you mean the sole language.
If however, you refer to an AUXILIARY language, intended to bridge the gap between cultures by providing an easily learnt method of communication then yes. It would open the EU and indeed, the world up to far more in the way of understanding.
Let's exam the first example where each linguistic group would resent the fact that any other language was forced on them, and NOBODY would agree on ANY language since they would all want their own.
Esperanto is making headway in becoming an AUXILIARY language, yet people reject it out of hand because they all fear the loss of their tongue and a single language spoken by all, which of course is exactly what Esperanto is trying NOT to do.
As a common SECOND language you and you and you have no need to sink years into study of a language that you will most likely NEVER fully assimilate like a native. The choice would be yours. With Esperanto you can be comfortable talking to your neighbour in your native tongue and just as comfortable talking to Ming Lu across the waves on an equal footing in this easily learnt language. It's like a neutral handshake, because each participant invested an equal amount of effort to learn this easy language. (16 gramatical rules... NO exceptions!)
Believe it or not, Esperanto represents the best chance for the survival of the multitude of dying languages since it's purpose is to forestall the monopoly of any one National tongue to the disadvantage of another.
So will it some day become universal (which by the way doesn't mean that EVERYBODY in the world speaks it, just those that want it / need it)?
Well, the $600 million+ USD spent yearly on translation services at the UN (six official languages) and a similar amount in the EU says, sooner or later something is going to change, and this is the cheapest and most effective, proven alternative.

Further, if you don't think Esperanto is making headway, check this.
In a recent reprint of the Unua Libro (first book), editor Gene Keyes said that when he first started the project in 2000, he did a search for Esperanto on Google and it yielded over 1 million hits. At the completion of his task in February of 2007, the same search yielded over 34 million hits. Out of curiosity, after I had read that I did the same search and it yielded over 39.2 million hits. That's up over 5 million in two months. So it's growing. Slowly (or maybe not so slowly!)
Obviously not everyone will find a use for it, and that's fine. However for those that take the time and bother to search out the other users, it's worth it. Of course searching out other uses gets easier with each passing day.
Personally I have friends all over the world. Friends I wouldn't have had with out Esperanto.

Let's answer some specific concerns that many people have raised but not bothered to research.
The language is Impractical and awkward?
The two million plus (as of 1995) people that use it says it's not Impractical. Two million was considered the functionally fluent level (IE: able to get by in the necessary elements when travelling) in 1995. Since 1995 the Internet has grown by leaps and bounds, and Esperanto right along with it.
Wikipedia hosts around 250 different languages. Esperanto ranks 18th in the most numerous articles category.
More than these languages to name a few.

19th Slovak
21st Czech
http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/List_of_Wikipedias

NOBODY has to give up their mother tongue, nor should they.
Esperanto as an auxiliary language however would be wonderful.

I encourage everybody to research and draw their own conclusions.

Ĝis!

Answer 5

no they shouldn't. Everyone should speak his own language, we must save languages we mustn't lose them.
But I agree, It would be easier for us to communicate to each other in a common language. English could be one and it's already spoken by a large part of Europeans and it can be learnt quite fast(Italian, French, Latin are not easy to learn!! they have coniugations or declinations, a difficult grammar O.o I'm Italian)...But it would be more correct if we spoke a new language, an "invented" language, a mixture of english easy grammar and words derived from Latin that most people would understand...Esperanto isn't easy at all, Interlingua is a bit easier but not easy enough.
I apologise if I said the word easy so many times xD
I'm 15 and that's the English I can speak...
I hope there are not too many mistakes....I said that English grammar isn't so difficult xD

Answer 6

There are now three dominant roots in Europe -

Slavic languages - no comment
Scandi-german languages
And latin languages which include Portuguese, spanish, french, italian, romanian, and partly english -

A latin eurolanguage should be the solution - There is too much non-said against anglo-american - I never understood why northern european countries polished american shoes, in learning their language with so much servility - In fact I understand but restrain saying anything about this

Answer 7

No! I think it's great that Europe has so many languages and cultures packed into one...Just think how many countries, languages, cultures, traditions etc can be found in such a small space. Europe is unique in the world....and if we all spoke just one language, a lot of culture would be lost with it. Ok so English, French, Spanish or whatever as a second language yes, but not kill languages just so that one can reign over others -very very very bad idea!

Answer 8

Well English is the "lingua franca" right now all over the world! many years ago it was Latin and then it was French, but right now it is English without a doubt. I'm studying about it right now!! I don't really know if we all should speak a common language. It is quite difficult as every country has its own language and its own culture and traditions, so it would be difficult to change that! but I think that it is necessary to have skills in English in order to be able to communicate with the rest of Europe. I'm Spanish myself but I speak English and a few more languages. I think English can be quite useful not just to communicate with English people but to communicate with people from other countries specially when I don't know their mother tongue as with Germans or Scandinavians.

Answer 9

Most people suggest English, obviously, mainly because it's already extremely widely spoken. But the obvious disadvantage of using any national language internationally is that it gives those countries where it's spoken natively an enormous economic and cultural advantage over the others.

Something like Esperanto is obviously preferable for this reason, though getting people to adopt it (or something similar) would be extremely difficult.

We're better of with multilingualism.

Answer 10

Oh no !!! That isn't true... They said this a few years ago, because they wanted to set up a common language called "esperanto", but that doesn't function. I think it was too difficult to learn a new language, too complicated...

Nobody in Europe speak esperanto. But some teachers teach esperanto (but I don't understand why...)

So if you want to know more, here's a link :
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto

Answer 11

The old dentist Zamenhof who invented esperanto would say that is what I invented Esperanto for.I did learn it and the grammar is easy.Writing is easy,speaking it is nearly impossible.The doctor invented some awfull endings like --ajn and ojns._IDO-- which was Esperanto's child is much easier and did away with the bad endings.Also the superscripts over letters is not desirable.The only common language they will ever have is the EURO.