Hi,

Do you think that there should be one global language, taught in all schools in all countrys? If yes then what language should it be, or how should it be decided? How would you implement it?

Personally I think yes, there should be a global language. In order to decide I think we should have a Eurovision style voting thing where each country chooses their favourate 2 languages, (so as to avoid each country voting for itself) and then we tally the votes and go with that.

Each country would still teach its native language however the prime language would be taught first and foremost.

This would have to be a very very longterm goal with it probably only truly being globally effective in 100 years from now.

I just feel that it would be helpful if everyone spoke at least one common language.

My Votes - English/Japanese

Just wanted to see peoples ideas and thoughts.

ALSO - Rules for this are, be polite and respectful to each others views and thoughts please.

I highly doubt the world could ever agree to use just one language. Hell, America is too stubborn to use the metric system.

English is already the lingua franca of the world, used by many in business all over the world. If it is encouraged to be used more throughout the world, it can function as a global language for everyone to use.

If the world were to take part in this proposed multilingual project, maintaining their native tongues while adopting another for use in business, it should be English; seeing how that mostly is the case--it just needs to be encouraged and more available in places around the globe.

This gives an advantage to the English speakers of the world, but if they were to learn a second, it should be Chinese...more precisely Mandarin Chinese. Although Japanese may seem a valid choice, their economy and population has slackened in its huge amount of growth recently and are not going to be near as important in the future as China is and will be even moreso.
Double digit economic growth in China economically, and the massive amount of people, leads me to believe learning that language will be useful...as English-speaking America will have to give up its hegemonic power and share with Mandarin-speaking China in the near future.

America is too stubborn to use the metric system.

"I say the metric system is a tool of the devil! My car gets 40 rods to the hogshead, and thats the way i likes it!!!"- Abraham "Grandpa" Simpson

I noticed you say it will take 100 years to make it effective globally. If you look at how quickly English has spread to become everybody else's second language globally during the last 20 years, in another 20 everyone should be reasonably proficient in English as a first or second language anyway.

I would prefer a global language to be considered secondary in importance to each country's own language like the way we do it now.

Esperanto was invented to serve the purpose of being an international language. It is not the language of any country, so no one can have political objections to it. Since the mid-1800's there have been a few people promoting it. Unfortunately, it has never caught on. Here is a link to the Esperanto League of North America.

http://www.esperanto-usa.org/about_eo.html

I was going to delve into Esperanto a couple years ago, but never got around to it, and it fell out of memory. Thanks for the reminder. ;)

I think it should be Japanese, but only so that I can practice mine with everybody else and finally become fluent!

I think it should be ghetto slang, taught by a heavy nasty looking hillbilly woman with no teeth and missing half of her tongue.

Of course there should be one global language, and it should be french, since it's the only normal language.

What ? Being arrogant again ? Oh, non :D

Don't you all know?

There are already two universal languages..............laughter, and love. ;)

"A lingua franca is any language widely used beyond its native speakers, primarily for international commerce but extending to other cultural exchanges, such as diplomacy. The origin of the term lingua franca is Italian (literally "Frankish language"), derived from the medieval Arab and Muslim use of "Franks" (ancient Germanic people) as a generic term for Europeans during the period of the Crusades.

Originally "lingua franca" referred to a mix of mostly Italian with a broad vocabulary drawn from Turkish, Persian, French, Greek and Arabic. This mixed language (pidgin, creole language) was used for communication throughout the medieval and early modern Middle East as a diplomatic language; the generic description "lingua franca" has since become common for any language used by speakers of different languages to communicate with one another."




While English can be the prefered language it can't be the lingua franca of the world since the term refers to a mixture of terms and words from multiple languages. A mixture of English and other languages will probably be the language used by people from different language groups communicating with each other though.

I can remember speaking what we called Ridgewood German when I was a kid. We used expressions such as, Wir gehen nach Grandmas house for Sunday dinner. Or we will
gepainten der Haus this weekend.

I used to work in a community with a very high concentration of Hispanics. The young people spoke Spanglish, sprinkling sentences with English and Spanish words seemingly at random.

I think the eventual lingua franca will come about from a slow evolution of what is already happening; mixing English with other languages. Look at the number of 'foreign' words already incorporated into English, bouquet, ersatz, baksheesh, chauffer, hookah, glasnost..... There are words we think of as English words that are of foreign origin but that are so commonly used that we have forgotten where they came from.

The future lingua franca will be a polyglot of all the major languages now being spoken.

A lingua franca is any language widely used beyond its native speakers, primarily for international commerce but extending to other cultural exchanges, such as diplomacy.

This was what i was trying to express, English can be expected to be used for global economics and politics in the world market.

The future lingua franca will be a polyglot of all the major languages now being spoken.

That may be true, but i see a differing scenario...because modern day English is a mixture of many languages, and adopts or infects others perpetually. English will greatly change in the coming decades with the information age having us transfer ideas instantaneously, but such as in German...its influence can be seen. der Computer, das Radio, die CD and many other words now added to the Deutsch vokabeln jeden tag. Ich sehe...*ahem* excuse me, I see the English language as becoming exponentially more important and known by greater people in the future, more dialects may develop...but it will still be English.

My reference to English being the "Language of the Franks" was to impart the idea that it would be used for global trade of ideas and currency, although there may be wider meanings of the term involving language assimilation, i merely meant for a more precise, narrower meaning regarding economics, that's all.

Part of the reason English is so extensive in the world is the fact that English speaking countries control so much of the world's wealth and technology. All international, commercial airline pilots communicate in English. (How that must gall the French.) Computer language is basically English. English language music is pervasive all over the world.

English is the first or second, or at least one of the official languages in:
Great Britain, Ireland, U.S.A., Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Guyana, Belize, Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, Malta, Botswana, Cameroon, The Gambia, Ghana, Kenya, Kirabati, The Marshall Islands, Micronesia, Nauru, Palau, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, Tonga, Tuvalu, Vanuatu, Western Samoa, India, Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe, Lesotho, Liberia, Malawi, Mauritius, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, South Africa, Swaziland, Tanzania and probably a few others. Add to this places like Bermuda, The Virgin Islands, Guam and places where English, while not an official language, is widely spoken and you are right, Evalian. English will probably be the lingua franca.