The Spectacular Fortune of Native English Speakers
Three Point Essay #43 | The Global Lingua Franca
Jeff Sullivan’s Three Pointers
I. Language Wars
While Mandarin Chinese is the language with the highest number of native speakers…
The words you're processing in your brain right now have the highest number of total speakers. In 2023, you're lucky if it's your native tongue.
People in the U.S.—one of the most monolingual countries in the world—often don’t have enough respect for the fact that most humans elsewhere have the ability to communicate in many languages.
But it makes sense why. English is not just the most used language in the states. It is the de facto Lingua Franca. A lingua Franca is essentially an international common language; also known as a bridge or trade language.
As English-speaking Americans we take this for granted. But English was not always the global Lingua Franca. And it is not guaranteed to stay so.
For some time, French was the dominant international tongue for business and diplomacy. Long before this it was Latin under the Roman empire. With the decline of French influence and rise of America, it became English. This dynamic, as you may have noticed, still persists.
II. Perspective
Remarkably, although ~1.5 billion people speak English in total, only ~360 million speak it as their first language.
As a native English speaker, not worrying as much about your skill or vocabulary in the language is an advantage. There’s no shortage of people who dream of understanding and expressing themselves in English as well as you do—to gain access to the economic advantages and cultural richness that accompanies such an ability.
Now, there are plenty of fools who speak a second language. Like myself. But something that always bugs me is when someone calls a person an idiot because “they barely know English”.
Most of the time they are not stupid—they are just nervous to use a different language. Before you criticize someone’s English abilities, consider how you would sound trying to speak their language.
By realizing this, you can help people out. And help yourself out. You see how much you can learn from people from other parts of the world.
III. Language Evolution
The evolution of English is fascinating. While understanding the history of English in particular calls for a separate article, we can at-least understand the basics of its origins.
To do this we must look to language families. A language family is a group of languages related through descent from a common ancestral language.
One of the main families in Europe is Romance, whose common ancestral language was Latin. This family includes Spanish, Portuguese, French, and Italian.
The other main family is Germanic, whose exact parent language is unclear but is often called Proto-Germanic. This family of related languages includes German, Dutch, Swedish, and our friend English.
If we look even further back in history we see that English is falls under Indo-European branch of languages. This is one of the largest families in the world. It includes both Romance and Germanic languages, as well as many others.
The Spread of Modern English
Through centuries of world languages borrowing and imposing their ways of speech on each other, English continued to evolve and eventually spread.
The colonial era is when English rose to Lingua Franca status.
The United Kingdom imposed English on their territories around the world. When the dominance of the British Empire was dwindling, American imperialism stepped into the batter's box. These historical trends are the main reasons why English is as widespread as it is today.
Today there are many different dialects & accents of the language. But accents are not what matters. Having patience and respect for anyone learning this beautiful language is what matters.
As Oxford International Language School put it “regardless of the many languages one is fortunate to be fluent in, English takes its place as one of the world’s predominant forms of communication.” Therefore every day is a good day to improve your skill in it—whether through reading, writing, or quality conversation—hopefully all three.
DELIGHTFUL .JIM
I teach English Language Learners. I appreciate how difficult our language is to learn, especially for those whose native language isn’t in the Romance or Germanic group. Thanks!