Should English stay the lingua franca of Europe?
There were many lingua francas of which French was supposedly the first global lingua franca. That changed and it became English (from what I understand). We will probably see another language become the lingua franca, so my question is: should it be English? Are there better candidates out there? Why / why not?
I think we are at a point now where almost everybody in Europe is able to speak at least some English. So cultural exchange has never been easier. Why make it more difficult again by adding another language people have to learn first?
As a Brit (but European at heart and strong “Remain” voter), I am quick to remind fellow Brits that English is a language heavily derived from our European ancestors: French, Latin, Germanic (Proto-Germanic, “Old English”, Old Norse, Romance, etc), Greek, Dutch, Spanish, and more.
I know the United Kingdom has been a royal asshat throughout the centuries but the mark of Europe is intense and undeniable; without Europe, there is no such thing as the English language (except perhaps a number of proper nouns that are rooted in the Celtic people and their ancestors) [Edit: see crappywittyname’s comment below].
I hope our European siblings can find solace in the fact that “English” is a distinctly European language that is full of words from all of our tongues.
The Celtic languages are closely related to European languages such as Breton, the ancestor languages having been developed and spoken widely in Europe pre-Roman conquest.
I'm only being picky because it adds even more support to your (already very fine) argument. You don't even need that caveat.
English is a global lingua franca, not just european. And it's not just because of the american and british influence, but because it's a relatively easy language.
Also the translator programs are better and better, this is actually a good and fitting usecase of current LLMs. I think we are not far away from the babel fish.
but because it's a relatively easy language
I literally cried learning English as a kid lol
The grammar is fairly simple, but spelling is a total train wreck and an unparalleled nightmare of inconsistencies and convoluted rules. As long as you don’t have to read or write anything, there’s not much to cry about.
Me too, but later I learned a bit of german and latin. The thing is you can fake english easily, like "why use lot word when few do trick" is a totally understandable sentence. Word order is not as stict as in german, no cases, no grammatical genders, verb tenses are mostly optional. Pronunciation is messed up though.
I HATE the idea that we would have some Kind of built into us translators. Languages are a crucial part of human development and, therefore, they should be learned in school the old way. (Ofc school must also evolve)
a relatively easy language.
Counterpoint:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zJ69ny57pR0
No language is inherently easy to learn. Whether a language is easy to learn depends on how close it is to the languages you already know, thus to a Dutchman it will be much easier to learn English than to a Russian or a Thai. It is true that learning English is made a lot easier by having such a huge media presence, meaning it’s very easy to immerse yourself even without living in an English-speaking country.
That may not be entirely true. Some studies have shown that Danish children generally take longer to learn to talk than children from other Scandinavian countries, which are incredibly similar in most other aspects. The leading hypothesis is the complicated phonology is to blame.
Popular science article in Danish, summing up the several studies
As a Dutchman living in Germany I can attest to the immense difference that dubbing makes. While even young children in the Netherlands consume tons of English language media and have done so for decades, their peers in Germany generally get only dubbed versions. This leads to a lackluster immersion when "properly" learning English.
It's a lingua franca, and I don't even think it's about being easy to learn... avalanche effects are completely sufficient to explain its status. Many people already speak English, so more people learn English to speak with them, now even more people speak English, and so on, and so forth... the development of any lingua franca only depends on the ability to talk to as many people as possible. It's absolutely a bonus if it's easy and quickens the process, but at some point the pure amount of speakers outside ones own country becomes the overwhelming factor.
It’s not possible to please everybody so I vote for Basque and pleasing nobody.
Came here to say that. I intended to propose an immensely complex language that almost nobody understands and that is unrelated to any other family of languages. My choice was Hungarian or Finnish but Euskadi (aka "Basque") clearly beats it. I had the privilege to learn some words from Basque coworker years ago when I was living in Spain for a while and I swear it is so utterly alien to anything I've heard, that it must be of extraterrestrial origin.
FYI Euskadi is a region of Spain that doesn't include all Basque-speaking territories. The language is Euskera.
Also, there is a Basque lemmy instance! lemmy.eus
Basque might be the most neutral language of them all, right? Does it have a connection with any other European language?
Nope. Basque is considered a language isolate, not related to any other language.
Nope, it's an isolate.
A lingua franca isn't controllable. French was the lingua franca as it had been the dominant language of trade. Then the British Empire and later USA emerged and dominated global trade, and it became the lingua franca through shear necessity.
In the tech age, English has also become the lingua franca which is likely to cement it's position into the future. In Europe, it's been a convenient second language for many as it allowed Europeans to compete in global trade and also talk to each other with 1 common language, also avoiding nationalist concerns around language. English has also been less controversial as a second language than everyone learning French or German for example given the history of previous european wars.
A language isn't owned by any country, so it doesn't matter that the US is going crazy or that the UK left the EU. English is likely to stay the lingua franca in the west and in Europe as so many people already speak it, it's already well established in schools and culture and in all honesty there isn't an obvious alternative.
In terms of economics, China is powerful but Chinese is spoken largely by one country, and is hard for Europeans to learn due to how fundamentally different it is. India is emerging as an economy, with English it's own lingua franca in a continent divided by numerous languages. Urdu is being pushed by the hindu nationalist government but the global reality is that speaking english is a strength for Indian citizens in trade and global work place, so it's unlikely people will stop learning and speaking English in India in the foreseeable future.
The only other viable alternative in global terms currently for Europe would be Spanish due to the shear number of native speakers. But the problem remains that most Europeans don't speak Spanish and while there is a large number of spanish speakers, they are heavily concentrated in the Americas. Meanwhile English is already spoken widely in Europe, North America outside of Mexico, India, and many other former British Colonies including widely in Africa, Oceania and across Asia.
It's certainly possible things may change, but at the moment it seems unlikely. We're not seeing a huge trend of people moving away from English. One possibility though is that translation apps become near instantaneous and people move away from learning any 2nd language. However I personally think that is unlikely as a translation app can never be perfectly instantaneous due to the nature of grammer - you need the whole of a sentence to translate into another language with a totally different sentence structure, especially for longer and more complex sentences.
So I think it's unlikely English will be displaced as the lingua franca. It is also unneeded - it benefits Europe that a European language is the lingua franca (regardless of the UK exiting the EU etc), and it also benefits Europe as so many Europeans speak English - so the best thing for Europe is to help spread English, and offer a different influence and culture from the US with other English speakers particuarly in emerging economies. English can be Europe's trojan horse for sharing it's culture and values.
A lingua franca isn’t decided upon, it just happens to become one because of some power its speakers hold. In the Indonesian archipelago, Malay became a lingua franca because it was used by traders. In Europe, French was a lingua franca because French held a large amount of prestige among the European nobility. Now, English is the global lingua franca because English-speaking media have dominated the global media landscape.
If you want there to be another lingua franca in Europe, that language will somehow need to attain a good reason for it to become one. You can’t just pass a law proclaiming it now being ‘the lingua franca of Europe’.
Forcing people to speak eg. German by law might work, though you’ll probably have to be prepared to coerce people into actually doing so, and thus will have to ask yourself whether that’s worth it. Otherwise, there’s a good chance people will not really give a shit about your stupid law.
You could also maybe abolish all EU level accommodation for other languages than the official language in a new federalised Europe. Then, if you want anything done at that level, you have no choice but to use the official, non-English, language. This seems like it might spur an elitist environment where only a small layer of Europeans (outside of the country from which the speakers of the official language originate) will generally be able to speak that language.
This all seems a bit fantastical, though. Unless Europeans en masse stop consuming English language media, and at the same time start consuming the media of one specific other language (thus it’s a movement away from English and toward some other language by language users themselves), there won’t be a new lingua franca in Europe.
This seems like it might spur an elitist environment where only a small layer of Europeans (outside of the country from which the speakers of the official language originate) will generally be able to speak that language.
Not your main point, but I watched an interview with some senior translator person at the EC, and they said that the EC very intentionally refrained from codifying a "Brussels English" over exactly this concern: that it would lead to official government documents being written in a form that the typical person in the EU would consider distant, have a "Brussels elites that spoke differently from me" impact. The concern was that this would have negative political effects.
Can't recall the name of the guy, but IIRC he had a British accent. Was an older guy.
Did drive home to me that there is a lot of political consideration taking place over policy decisions that I probably wouldn't normally have expected.
That’s really interesting. Language is one of the main ways we distinguish ourselves (often subconciously). Designing a special Brussels English would likely make the ‘Brussels Elite’ more of a distinguishable ‘they’ indeed.
The Year of Esperanto is finally upon us! Bonan Matenon, Europe!
Nia tempo venis!
I would actually love a law that says Esperanto has to be the first foreign language taught in each EU school.
Why not a combination out of all European languages. Might be a huge mess, but still.
Edit: I‘m an idiot.
English has a blend of Germanic and Romantic features, which is nice for Europe, and no inflections to memorise, which is nice in addition. You could also argue that no grammatical gender is a positive feature.
On the downside, the orthography is ass, so maybe there should be a new EU-standard fonetik version. The contractions are confusing. A non-native speaker can maybe add some more, but that's all I've heard about.
As a non-native speaker, I’d say that your summary of the upsides and downsides matches my experience.
maybe there should be a new EU-standard fonetik version.
Or maybe it’s finally time for Shavian alphabet to shine!
Reminds me of an old joke:
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 peopl 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 forst plas.
This is awesome. Would like to try this with Anglish (https://anglish.org/wiki/Anglish) to make a true English English.
Or Uniscript!
We could also use this as a chance to push Esperanto!
Gi estis desegnita por ci tiu specifa afero! (Please forgive me its been a while haha)
Spoken English and written English are two different languages that have different features and different design flaws.
And one of the flaws of written English is that it has no spoken equivalent, haha!
No, most people are pragmatic in this case and eastern countries changed from Russian ~30 years ago so another change isn't coming any time soon.
As my parents saw the change from "it is really appreciated that you can speak English" to "it is expected that you can use it". I can tell that it is so engrained in our multinational exchange that it won't be even desirable.
The Lingua Franca didn't change because someone decided to change it, it slowly happened. You could argue it would be nice for EU if the (local) Lingua Franca would be the language of a large member state, but I don't see it happening by force. Probably better to just leave it to be English, even if the Irish are the only native speakers in the EU.
English is mostly used in commercial now, changing it would be costly and you would need the commitment of many others people to accept a new change in how to approach the world or just Europe, it's a tipe of commitment I doubt people would be willingly to accept.
Logical thinking I would think English should stay. It is by far the most known foreign language in Europe.
Question is, what should be the criteria for deciding which other language?
If it is for the sake of current global usability, English remains top.
If it is for geostrategic considerations, Spanish, French and Arabic would be the languages to cover South and Central America, large parts of Africa and West Asia.
If it is for population dominance inside the EU, it would be German, which probably will ruffle some feathers. If it is for population dominance in Europe, it should be Russian, which will ruffle a lot of feathers.
We will probably see another language become the lingua franca
That's gonna take a while. Chinese is an unlikely candidate due to how difficult it is to learn to speak and especially read and write, despite the rising international influence of the Chinese state. And I rather doubt that Europe's Germanic-speaking countries will stop using English as a lingua franca anytime soon, it's just too easy to learn for them compared to any other possible candidate.
Let's hope it's not going to be Russian anytime soon.
Something like Esperanto would be a nice alternative for the EU, though. Maybe there's other artificial languages that are even better? I'm not well-versed in this topic.
That's gonna take a while
French was replaced within 60-80 years. Such change isn't fast, unless forced. However, I don't know how it could be forced. We aren't in a feudalistic system anymore and EU interests are heavily influenced by an English-speaking upper class.
And I rather doubt that Europe's Germanic-speaking countries will stop using English as a lingua franca anytime soon, it's just too easy to learn for them compared to any other possible candidate.
Try this.
Let's hope it's not going to be Russian anytime soon.
One can only hope, not only because of the implications, but also because the language is very complicated IMO. Their case system is horrific.
The Chinese writing system probably isn't so bad with predictive text entry (perhaps even better than English) but I think a tonal language with limited sounds has some challenges taking on the dominance of English in global culture. I like songs in other languages but being able to listen to artists from South America, Mexico, Germany, Italy, Norway, Finland singing in English is a privilege I don't take for granted. When you go down the rabbit hole and discover a country like Japan has a lot of talented musicians it is sometimes hard to understand why they don't have more global recognition until you understand that countries struggles with English language proficiency.
Also English vocab borrows from all around the world. That gives a lot more flexibility for word choice than a language like Esperanto.
You still need to know most of the common characters, otherwise you can't actually read the language.
English if we want ease of communication (and is the most likely path forward)
Esperanto if the goal is to teach it to a whole generation: it is designed to be easy to understand when you already know one European language (especially a latin one I think?)
Chinese if the goal is to speak the language of the dominant non European power in the next century
let's all switch to Sumerian.
We would be the badass of the world.
Yes. It's easy and already established. There is no reason to change it.
I'm too lazy to learn another language. Pick from English and Polish, alright?
It made us Brits lazy. There's little reason for people to learn other languages due to English being so popular as a second language.
Don't get me wrong, there are people. But I don't know many people that can speak other languages. I am actually envious of others that do.
It simply amazes me when someone can speak multiple languages.
I'm now over 10 years out of school where i learned english and started to learn another language. Now with an adult brain it is quite facinating to self observe how the brain is slowly rewired to adopt to the new language and how the longer you stay on track the faster the learning becomes.
Latinam magnam iterum faciamus. 😎 🥂 🧐
Not even my hate for the US or Britain is enough for me to learn Latin. I had this shit for 5 years and I didnt learn anything. Fuck this bullshit.
Yea, I think English might become the glue between languages that will strengthen, not weaken the EU, same with the Indian Union (they are both Eurasian peninsulas too :D)
We should start using Toki Pona.
I want to learn this. So cool
It's super easy to learn, but extremely hard to express stuff with.
To say "I love bricks" you'd say "poki loje lon sinpin li poki tawa" which translates directly to "red box on wall is lovely to me".
A vid by Half as Interesting on it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_d6bGAw5yt8
It's gonna be Chinese whether y'all like it or not.
Eh, maybe, maybe not. They aren't really the juggernaut they used to be, and their birth rate is now below replacement so there's no "they'll just outbreed us" jerk to do, even.
Which Chinese?
The national language of China, the one virtually every Chinese person means if they say "Chinese". Mandarin.
But what instead? Spanish? German? Esperanto?
I root for Spanish! Creating a bridge with my Latino friends and thus upsetting the US at the same time.
It's because of the network effect. If you only know your local language and want to unlock speaking to the rest of the world when learning English gets you pretty far.
A lot of people start learning English because a lot of people speak English. Since now Europe, North America, half of Africa, Middle East, South Asia, Latin America, Oceania speak English to some extent that I know of.
It's absolutely bonkers how far English has gotten in one generation so learning anything else as a second language is pretty weird.
@atrocity I remember a few years ago there was a French far-right group or something that proposed Latin to be the lingua franca instead, lol. But I haven't heard anything since.
I'm so old that I actually studied Latin in school though I wouldn't be surprised if my school still teaches it.
To be honest it was really useful as a base language for learning French and I've always found it easy to pick up bits quickly and get about easily in Spain and Italy as a result.
Doesn't exactly roll off the tongue though. Would not recommend as a Lingua Franca.
@khannie I studied it too, but a Romanic language is already my native one, so I found it even less useful. Glad I escaped alive.
They should just stick with speaking American.
/Dodges shoes and runs away
Having a big economy who's inhabitants never have to invest time into learn another language is a huge advantage for this economy. It's not a level playing field. Today there is no reason to still support English. In Europe we should use Esperanto or another easy to learn equivalent.
Today there is no reason to still support English
This forum bringing together people from different countries, is in itself proof that there is a reason. Many people are already comfortable if not fluid in the language. How many folks speak Esperanto already?
How many folks speak Esperanto already?
As many as Lithuanians, Latvians, or Basque, and twice as many as Estonians.
Given how western society is doing, Mandarin might not be a terrible call.
Isn't it the most difficult language to learn for Westerners?
if by westerners you mean english speakers, then yes, it's known to be one of the more difficult ones. it's ultimately subjective, but what people find hard about mandarin is 1.the writing system 2.tones
what also doesn't help is definitely lack of exposure, chinese popular media isn't very popular in the west
Is this some kind of ragebait? I speak French but if you look at the attitude that the French have towards their language and compare that to their average commandment of the English language, why should we do that to a whole continent?
If you ask me people in the EU should be raised bilingually and learn English from kindergarten on. All administration and official stuff should be bilingual. That would be a way for the EU to remain competitive. But no, we rather go down the Nazi route, way to go.
Ja, warum nicht Deutsch? Deutsch ist in Europa sehr weit verbreitet und wird von vielen Sprechern auch als Zweitsprache gesprochen. 😉
So, why is it English and not German? Because immigrants in the US decided to speak English. And there are so many people who can understand at least a few words in English. But as a German I'd prefer German, too. It is spoken by many Europeans.
Je suis désolé, chers Français, mon français est trop mauvais pour que je recommande que cela soit recommandé comme la principale chose européenne. 😂
Pardonneh muah, ish speake nest par les languages forrinée. Toot le mond ist speeking mine sprackgghe so varoomm you speekeh anything else? Ish not geunderstand.
I'll start learning German when they remove genders from objects and start pronouncing numbers in the correct order.
G'day from Australia, please don't cut our borderless monolingual Island off. Kiwi's probably feel similar too.
Don't kid yourself, if you would speak English over there, how come I barely understood this Australian who told me he's been "leggin' it barefoot since he stacked it near the servo and now he's flat out like a lizard drinkin' and tryin' to find a dunny before he cops a fair dinkum blue".
This is clearly fabricated, you're missing way too many swear words.
I felt that. Not Australian, but I felt that.
English is good for the reasons pointed out. Also: It's no language of the EU (at least for now) so no country gets an edge over the others which should be considered too. (I'm a native German speaker)
Lojban! Though esperanto maybe is more reasonable.
As another person said, this is bad use of terminology. Lingua franca is decided by the people through natural use, not by governance.
I don't think such categorical distinctions are useful. Languages have been forced upon people for a long time. Italy, France, Germany, Spain, UK, and probably many other countries have forced their preferred language upon their people. Conquered peoples have had languages thrust upon them with no way to resist.
Two views on what language to chose: The language most spoken in Europe: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_number_of_speakers_in_Europe The language most spoken worldwide: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_total_number_of_speakers
So it looks like it might be either German, Spanish or French, depending on how you would assess it. No surprises there. Now to convert everybody, not so easy ;-)
Germany, Spain, and France didn't get it done in the 70 some years since the WWII, so my estimation of that changing is quite low. I think France is too chauvinistic to accept German due to its history and what the language sounds like. Spanish and French are too similar and France would again consider its language superior once again 😅
Now to convert everybody, not so easy ;-)
It could be done with heavy investments in education across the EU. It would have to be for all citizens and not just schools for <20. Adding it to every EU country's list of national languages would also help adoption, as government media would have to be broadcast in them all. If the EU were serious, it could happen within 20 years, I reckon.
As a German, I would not want German to become a language of communication within Europe. The comparative political power of Germany within the EU is already too high, smaller Eastern and Southeastern EU members already have had to form alliances like Visegrad.
Ireland being the only country with English as major language within the EU makes English actually a more neutral language than languages of the populous countries. One could call it European English.
Maybe Sámi languages, Basque and Maltese could come together and form the most distinct language that is most neutral? /s
I'll laugh my ass off if it's French, I'll really have had the bilingual easy mode languages if that happens.
Would be great to switch to mandarin. /s for all you humourless.
Anything but english or french. Yes, I'm willing to put up even with brainfuck as a spoken language
TIL brainfuck is a thing. The stuff people come up with 🤣
I propose Icelandic
Let's switch to (a) sign language.
No more long-winded politicians. Their arms will get tired too fast. And, no more edgy podcasts, because no podcasts will be possible.
Yes, cause many people do speak "broken" english and its compared to french or other languages easy to learn.
I wanted to learn French for a long time now. Would be a great motivation
It never was 😹😹😹😹😹
You realise you wrote this in English don't you?
Yes, next!
It depends on what Europe wants to be. The language is in some ways connected to the culture. Would Europe get a more Mediterranean savoir vivre if everybody spoke Spanish or French? I think so.
An ambitious and interesting option for Europe could be Arabic as the lingua franca. If Europe commits, other countries like Iran or India could also be interested in joining. That could create a huge area with a single language as long as it doesn't splinter into dialects like the current Arabic.
An ambitious and interesting option for Europe could be Arabic as the lingua franca.
There's Maltese, which is an official EU language, albeit probably not the most useful for interchange with the Arab world as a whole.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maltese_language
Maltese (Maltese: Malti, also L-Ilsien Malti or Lingwa Maltija) is a Semitic language derived from late medieval Sicilian Arabic with Romance superstrata. The only official Semitic and Afroasiatic language of the European Union and the only Semitic language to use the Latin alphabet, and the only Afroasiatic language other than Somali to use a Latin script, it is spoken by the Maltese people and is the national language of Malta.
The original Arabic base comprises around one-third of the Maltese vocabulary, especially words that denote basic ideas and the function words, but about half of the vocabulary is derived from standard Italian and Sicilian; and English words make up between 6% and 20% of the vocabulary. A 2016 study shows that, in terms of basic everyday language, speakers of Maltese are able to understand less than a third of what is said to them in Tunisian Arabic and Libyan Arabic, which are Maghrebi Arabic dialects related to Siculo-Arabic, whereas speakers of Tunisian Arabic and Libyan Arabic are able to understand about 40% of what is said to them in Maltese. This reported level of asymmetric intelligibility is considerably lower than the mutual intelligibility found between mainstream varieties of Arabic.
Maltese has always been written in the Latin script, the earliest surviving example dating from the late Middle Ages. It is the only standardised Semitic language written exclusively in the Latin script.
This suggestion is at least original :p
But I think we should make our new lingua franca a generous gesture to the world: we should find some language only still spoken by one old woman in some remote village, give her a list of words to translate and have that be the basis for our new federal European conlingua franca!
Nobody in Europe wants Iran or India to join.
Also, most Iranians apeak Persian, not Arabic.
The point of speaking Arabic would be to have the same language as North Africa and Arabia. And once Europe speaks Arabic, neighboring countries like Turkye, Iran or Pakistan and India could see the benefit in joining.
This doesn't mean that those countries become part of the EU. It would just create a huge zone with a single language which has its own advantages.
What if it remained English, but with the change that a new phonetic spelling system is used instead of the clusterfuck that is regular English spelling?
Wat if it remejnd Inglish, bat wit de chejnđ dat a nju fonetik speling sistem iz juzed insted of de klasterfak dat iz de regjular Inglish speling.