University of Leeds

SCHOOL OF EDUCATION

Online Submission of Assessed Work

Why English, Spanish and Mandarin won’t be the only three languages in the future?

Introduction

Language, as the “strongest and most durable tie that can unite mankind” (Alexis de Tocqueville, French), is the necessarily skill that mankind are born to learn. There are more than 2500 kinds of language in the world. Some are widely used around the world (for example, English, Mandarin, Spanish and etc.), while some others are only used by hundreds of people within a small area (such as American Indian languages). Because of the rapid development of globalization, the majority languages become more and more widely used while minority language are less used and dying. As a consequence, in the BBC article “Twenty top predictions for life 100 years from now”, some predict that in 100 years there will be left only three languages in the world – English, Spanish and Mandarin. The prediction raises huge argument. In this assignment, I argues that there will be a slim possibility of the prediction although the majority of people strongly support it.

The assignment begins by reviewing why English, Spanish and Mandarin has become such widely used due to the historical and commercial aspects. Secondly, I will try to define the nature need of lingua franca and examine whether or not English, Spanish and Mandarin can meet the criteria. Thirdly, I will draw attention to the negative affect that will bring to these three languages if they become lingua franca. Lastly, I will discuss the benefit of multilingualism.

The Spread of English, Spanish and Mandarin

Why English, Spanish and Mandarin become so popular and widely spread around the world but not other languages?

English is the most widely used language nowdays. The begin of the rise of English was back to 1800s. The powerful British Empire conquered and colonize many countries and regions around the world. Along with their colonialism, English and English cultural was brought to the countries and regions. Local people were forced to learn English and use English as their official languages. Although the time of Colonial Era was end, English and English cultural were left and spread in the countries and regions. Later on, United States, the biggest country that use English as their first language, became the most powerful economic country in the world. In order to be internationally compatible, commerce has driven people “must learn English”. Except from the historical and commercial reason, English has its unique charm. Compared to other languages, English is rather easier for general people to learn. It doesn’t have very difficult or complicated grammar or pronunciation. Due to this fact, many publications, academic papers and political documents are released in English edition. Also, the popularity of Hollywood movies and English songs make those whose native languages are not English become attractive in English. In many countries and regions, such as China, Japan and southeast Asia, English is a compulsory curriculum since primary school. Professor Newmark (2002), who is actually against monolingual linguistic imperialist, still thinks that English is the best language in the world and provides 15 reasons to support his idea. He concludes English as a global lingua franca.

Spanish, pretty much like English, become popular because of colonialism at first. Spanish was brought to the southern America. The majority of people in southern America use Spanish as their first language. The economic power of Spain and southern America is also not be overlooked. They are becoming more and more important in international trade market. But what makes Spanish become really popular is its special culture. Learning Spanish will enable the learners to keep pace with Hispanic influence on culture which is strong and getting stronger.

Chinese is the largest group of people in the world. That makes more than thirteen hundred million people use Mandarin as their first language. Except from Mainland China, Macau, Hong Kong and Taiwan, Singapore also regard Mandarin as their native and official language and widely spoken in the influential Chinese communities in most southeast Asia countries. During the past 150 years, many Chinese immigrated and settled outside China. When they settled, they also brought Mandarin and Chinese culture to the place, which made Mandarin widely spread throughout the world. China has one of the oldest cultures in the world. Its rich and continuous culture has attracted a large amount of people to study Mandarin. However, what makes Mandarin and China so important is the rapid growth of Chinese economy. China is now the second largest economy in the world, following United States. Many international businesses done businesses in China and planed for long-term investment. Experts from Goldman Sachs even say that by the end of 2040, China will take over United States’ position in world economy and become the first and biggest economy entity in the world. At that time, “let them learn Mandarin” will replace the typical attitude of “let them learn English” in todays United States and UK.

The wide spread and us of English, Spanish and Mandarin make other languages, especially minority languages struggle to survive. According to EfBT Education Trust 2011 research, the numbers of students take a GCSE language lesson are continued declining each year. Among the language lessons, French and German are effected most. Each year, there are more than ten languages disappearing, which is a great lost for the world cultural heritage.

Lingua Franca

What is lingua franca? Lingua franca means the language that enables different groups of people who shared different languages to communicate with each other. A vernacular language rose to become a lingua franca mainly because of conquest, commerce, conversion (Ostler, 2010) and diploma. In 2005, Smith pointed out the one and most important purpose of lingua franca is to create a “unambiguous communication environment between people with unintelligible tongues”. He also argues that a lingua franca should meet the need of five criteria – easy to speak, simple grammar, regular inflection and orthography and unambiguous,. It can be concluded in one demand – easy to learn. However, English, Spanish and Mandarin fail to meet some of these criteria effectively to some extent.

Although English is the most widely used language around the world, it’s still hard for some group of people to learn. For pronunciation, English may difficult for some nonnative speakers to pronounce because it has a lot of vowel phonemes which has no equivalent sounds in the speakers’ mother tongue. Also, English has a complex grammar system. Syntactically, the verb of English has changes in terms of tense and the nouns has changes in terms of number. These variations are much more simpler in Japanese and some other languages. In Mandarin, there is even no such variation. Meanwhile, English is ambiguous because it has relied too much on word order, which causes a lot of trouble for translators. As a consequence, Smith (2005) concludes “English is a poor lingua franca”.

Spanish has a very complex verb inflection and orthography rules. For example, in English, the conjugation of the verb is usually in three to four forms (be – is are was were). However, for Spanish, a verb usually has six conjugations for one tense. The following is the conjugation of ser (means “be” in English) in indicative present tense.

Conjugation Conjugation

Yo(I)    soy nosotros(we) somos

Tú(you) eres vosotros(you) sois

Él/ella/usted(he/she/it)      es        ellas/ellos/usteds(they) son

There are 108 conjugations for a regular verb in all tenses, not to mention the irregular verbs. Spanish is also difficult to pronounce. The special pronunciation of letter “R” has caused many troubles for learners.

Mandarin, compared to English and Spanish, origins from a completely different language system. While English and Spanish are alphabetic, Mandarin is hieroglyphic. In an interesting article “Why Chinese is so damn Hard”, the author David Moser pointed out several reasons. Firstly he thinks the writing and reading system is ridiculous. In English, every word is composed by 26 letters. However in Mandarin, there is no rules for how the word is formed. This means there are no shared cognates. And the writing system isn’t very phonetic, which make it really hard to memorize new words and phrase. Secondly, Mandarin is ambiguous. Each word and phrase usually has several meanings. In order to understand the word and phrase, the learners have to relate it to the whole sentence. So even by looking up new words in the dictionary, it’s still difficult for Learners to understand. What seems most ridiculous for the author is that a sentence may even have a completely different meaning if pronounced in a different tone.

From what’ve discussed above, it’s undoubted that English, Spanish and Mandarin all have weakness in their language system which stop them from becoming lingua franca. Although they may remain popular and widely used in some extent, there is still a slim possibility for them to take the place of every other language in the world.

Negative effect when become a Lingua Franca

Lingua Franca has changed over time. Back in the old days, French was the world language because French played a lead role in international commerce. One would be called subliterate if he couldn’t speak or understand French. 500 years ago, because of the rapid spread of Christian, Latin was brought everywhere along with Christian and Latin gradually took the place of French and became the “world language”. Over the past 150 years, due to colonialism and the powerful economic and cultural strength of United States and United Kingdom, English plays a dominant role as world language. And nowadays, Spanish and Mandarin have gained more attention and win places in world languages. By looking through back of the history, it’s undoubted that no language could be the lingua franca all the time. A language become a lingua franca mainly because of political, economical and cultural reason. And one language would be easily taken by another language to be lingua franca if the other language has more powerful political, economical or cultural impact on the world. The rise and fall of French and Latin mean that English, Spanish and Mandarin may also face the same problems in the future. Although the growth of numbers of people use these three languages are continued growing for several decade, there are obvious evidence that their roles as world dominant languages may fade away within several years. (David Graddol, 2007: p5).

Language is more than a tool for people to communicate with each other or express their inner idea and feelings. A language usually has its very own unique and special cultural background. By simply speaking a particular language, the speaker can show others where does he from, what’s his special cultural background. Crystal (2005) says language give identity to the speakers and tell them which group of people they belong to.

However, in some countries such as China, India, the governors and educators pay too much attention to English. In China, English is the compulsory curriculum since primary school. One can only get his degree by passing certain English exam and get a good job by providing good grade on English. However, they may not even need to use English in the future. According to a survey conducted by Tsinghua University in China, more than 47% of people who have graduated from college for 5 years said they don’t really need to use English in their job or during their daily life. Other 37% of people said they need English to some extent, but only for simple daily communication and for leisure, such as watch Hollywood movie or listen to music. The rest 16% are those who get involved with foreign company business, diplomat issue or academic exchange. In order to study English and get good grade on English, students spend a lot of time on English but not their own culture or their majority. The northern government Uttar Pradesh of India is strongly against English to be the compulsory curriculum in school. The government says that educators should pay more attention on their native language can culture. They are afraid that English will create a cultural invasion in India since nowadays the young generation care more about western culture and festivals than their own.

For English, Spanish and Mandarin themselves, by spreading through the world, the language will mix with the local languages and culture. For example, the old English is quite different from the modern English. German , French and Latin has mixed many things into English. Gradually, English, Spanish and Mandarin may lost their own identity. David Graddol (2007) even afraid that being a lingua franca may mean the die of the language.

Benefits of Bilingualism and Multilingualism

Although there is an obvious decline in the numbers of student studying another language, more and more communities are promoting bilingualism and multilingualism and teaching their very own languages. The famous “Mother tongue plus two other languages” program conducted by the European community is a very famous example of promoting bilingualism and multilingualism within the social communities. Some language experts in UK urge that bilingualism and multilingualism should be more valued by educators and governors. (BBC, Diversity of Languages is Hailed, 2008)

To learn more than one language is also important to one’s career life. With the rapid development of globalization, businesses involve with International affair are more likely to hire who can speak more than one language. Not only China and Spain, but also many other countries are gradually become important in International trade. That makes some community languages play more and more useful roles in international trade market. For example, countries such as Saudi Arabia in the Middle East has always played an essential role in the petroleum market. So those who can speak or understand Arabic may get job opportunities in petroleum companies.

Learning another language not only means to speak a language, but also to get in touch with another culture. Language will help learners to appreciate and knowing more deeper of the culture. Learning another language also help the learners to understand more about their own language and culture. Some experts even point out that knowing and using more than one language will reduce the possibilities of developing dementia.

Conclusion

English, Spanish and Mandarin are now the most widely used three languages in the world due to the historical imperialism and commercial spread. However, English, Spanish and Mandarin will not be the only three languages that exist in 100 years. They remain some weakness to meet the need of world language franca. Meanwhile, to become a lingua franca may mean the die of the language. As the language itself shows the identity and cultural background of the speaker, there is only a slim possibility for them to give up their own languages. Also, being bilingual or multilingual may create more job opportunity for one. The governors and educators are supposed to promote language diversity because it’s beneficial to future development and personal cultivation.

Reference

Crystal, D. 2003. English as a Global Language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Cummins, J. 2001. Negotiating Identities: Education for empowerment in a diverse society. California Association for Bilingualism.

Graddol, D. 2006. English Next: Why Global English may mean the end of “English as a Foreign Language”. The British Council.

Nicolas Ostler. 2010. The Last Lingua Franca: English Until the Return of Babel. London: Penguin.

Smith, R. 2005. Global English: Gift or Curse. English Today, 21, pp56-62. http://journals.cambridge.org/abstract_S0266078405002075. [Accessed on April 20, 2013]

Macrum, R. 2011. Globlish: How the English language became the world’s language. London: Penguin.