Is English Appropriate for a Global Language?Several intrinsic features of Engl

Is English Appropriate for a Global Language?
Good morning, everyone. Today, we will continue our discussion about English as a global language. Some have argued that there are intrinsic features of the English language that set it apart, and make it an appropriate choice as a global language and it may be worthwhile investigating some of these claims. Today, I will give you a brief account of these features and approach the question whether English is appropriate for a global language.
[1]First of all, the richness and depth of English’s vocabulary sets it apart from other languages. The 1989 revised "Oxford English Dictionary" lists 615,000 words in 20 volumes, officially the world’s largest dictionary. If technical and scientific words were to be included, the total would rise to well over a million. By some estimates, the English lexicon is currently increasing by over 8,500 words a year, although other estimates put this as high as 15,000 to 20,000. It is estimated that about 200,000 English words are in common use, as compared to 184,000 in German, and mere 100,000 in French.[2]The availability of large numbers of synonyms allows shades of distinction that are just not available to non-English speakers and, although other languages have books of synonyms, none has anything on quite the scale of "Roget’s Thesaurus". Add to this the wealth of English idioms and phrases, and the available material with which to express meaning is truly prodigious, whether the intention is poetry, business or just everyday conversation.
[3]Secondly, English is a very flexible language.[4]One example of this is in respect of word order and the ability to phrase sentences as active or passive—e.g. I kicked the ball, or the ball was kicked by me. Another is in the ability to use the same word as both a noun and a verb, such as drink, fight, silence, etc.[5]New words can easily be created by the addition of prefixes or suffixes—e.g. brightness, fixation, unintelligible, etc, or by compounding or fusing existing words together—e.g. airport, seashore, footwear, etc. Just how far English’s much-vaunted flexibility should go or should be allowed to go is a hotly-debated topic, though. For example, should common but incorrect usages be accepted as part of the natural evolution of the language, or reviled as inexcusable sloppi-ness which should be summarily nipped in the bud?
[6]Thirdly, its grammar is generally simpler than most languages. It dispenses completely with noun genders,[7]and often dispenses with the article completely.[8]The distinction between familiar and formal addresses was abandoned centuries ago. Case forms for nouns are almost non-existent, with the exception of some personal pronouns like I/me/mine, he/ him/his, etc, as compared to Finnish, for example, which has fifteen forms for every noun, or Russian which has 12. In German, each verb has 16 different forms, while English only retains 5 at most(e.g. ride, rides, rode, riding, ridden)and often only requires 3(e.g. hit, hits, hitting).
Well, in the fourth aspect, some would also claim that it is also a relatively simple language in terms of spelling and pronunciation, although this claim is perhaps more contentious.[9]While it does not require mastery of the subtle tonal variations of Cantonese, nor the bewildering consonant clusters of Welsh or Gaelic, it does have more than its fair share of apparently random spellings, silent letters and phonetic inconsistencies.[10]There are somewhere between 44 and 52 unique sounds used in English pronunciation, depending on the authority consulted, almost equally divided between vowel sounds and consonants, as compared to 26 in Italian, for example, or just 13 in Hawaiian. This includes some sounds which are notoriously difficult for foreigners to pronounce, and some sounds which have a huge variety of possible spellings. In its defense, though, its consonants at least are fairly regular in pronunciation, and it is blessedly free of the accents and diacritical marks which festoon many other languages.[11]Also, its borrowings of foreign words tend to preserve the original spelling rather than attempting to spell them phonetically. It has been estimated that 84% of English spellings conform to general patterns or rules, while only 3% are completely unpredictable.[12]Arguably, some of the inconsistencies do help to distinguish between homophones like fissure and fisher; seas and seize; air and heir; aloud and allowed; weather and whether, chants and chance; flu, flue and flew; reign, rein and rain; etc.
Finally, some argue that, from its adoption of thousands of words from other languages with which it came into contact, the cosmopolitan character of English gives it a feeling of familiarity and welcoming compared to other languages, such as French, for example, which has tried its best to keep out other languages.[13]Despite a tendency towards jargon, English is generally reasonably concise compared to many languages, as can be seen in the length of translations. A notable exception is Hebrew translations, which are usually shorter than their English equivalents by up to a third. It is also less prone to misunderstandings due to cultural subtleties than, say, Japanese, which is almost impossible to simultaneously translate for that reason. The absence of coding for social differences may make English seem more democratic and remove some of the potential stress associated with language-generated social blunders.[14]/[15]In many other languages, one has to distinguish between formal and informal verb forms and sometimes other more complex social distinctions. The extent and quality of English literature throughout history marks it as a language of culture and class. As a result, it carries with it a certain legitimacy, substance and gravitas that few other languages can match.
OK. I have outlined five linguistic reasons to justify English as the global language. On balance, though, the intrinsic appeal of English as a world language is probably overblown and specious, and largely based on chauvinism. It is unlikely that linguistic factors are of great importance in a language’s rise to the status of world language, and English’s position today is almost entirely due to the aforementioned political and economic factors, which is the topic of next lecture.