- World Organizations like UNO, UNESCO, WHO, etc. uses English language.
- The language is used in international conferences, seminar and workshop.
- English is the language of global commerce, the main language of international diplomacy, It is the language of air traffic control
- It is the most common language on the Internet. It's the language that international travellers with different native languages used to communicate with each other.
But how did English reach this kind of status?
In the 16th century, England started establishing overseas colonies including large areas of the Indian subcontinent, Africa, Australia, and New Zealand. In 1922 the British Empire covered almost a quarter of the earth and almost 1/5th of the world's population. Some of these countries become populated by the English settlers and these are the countries where English became the dominant language, replacing many others. Other countries were not populated by permanent settlers, only by administrative, military, and commercial personnel. Generally in these counties English did not become the single dominant language but became a prestigious language.
English as a second language being taught in school curriculum of many countries, this is something that has continued to increase in response to the growing importance of English. Today over 97% of scientific articles are written in English, in the past couple of decades globalisation has solidified the position of English as a global language. People from all over the world interacting with each other more relying on English to communicate. On top of that, the internet has accelerated that trend. English is the No.1 language online, and people from all over the world are constantly communicating via social media in English. Just open a YouTube video's comment section, you will see most of the comments are in English.
Will English be the international language forever ?
Well, forever is a very absolute word, nothing last forever, but it seems that English will be the international language for the foreseeable future.
Evolution of English language.
Was English always like this?
No, old English is so far away from the Morden English. It has its own journey of evolution. Some report says over 7000 English word that we use today are from French.
Shakespeare credited with creating a huge number of English words in early Morden English. From him, we get words like assassination, manage, uncomfortable and many more.
The language continues to evolve and may be someday the words we are speaking today will sound as old and strange to the future listeners as old English sounds to us.
