Paper 4 Section 1

      English is the dominating language in the world, as of today currently. There are multiple versions of English such as American English, British English, Australian English, and Canadian English. Even though all these ‘English’s’ speak the same language, they all have different pronunciations and meanings through some different words. 

     English is being spoken of by more than 1 billion people, and more than half of the world's population, 4 billion, know how to say basic things in English such as saying greeting someone, ‘hi’ and ‘goodbye’. Linguist David Crystal, a theorist of the English language has said that English in the future may not even be the ‘dominating’ language being used around the world. The reason why he explains that in the future the United States may be the global superpower. Future global superpowers could be China, where we may be speaking Chinese, Saudi Arabia, where we may be speaking Arabic, or even other countries.

     The provided text clearly states that since English is a ‘lingua Franca, they explain that a Chinese speaker who may not speak any French to whom someone does speak French and who may not speak Chinese, may both try to communicate in English. Due to this being a ‘present status’ or modern-day this might likely change.

     Since technology and the world around us are continuously evolving and changing, new things are being made by humans. The text says that in the future humans may no longer need to speak in English. The article states that a South Korean computer scientist, Wonkyum Lee, has developed a ‘translation and voice-recognition system that when you’re calling someone on the phone, they will be speaking in that language and that you wouldn’t know if it is a computer or a real human talking to you.

     Nowadays being a multilingual person is being normalized and is continuing to grow. Many foreign people come to many of these English countries such as the USA, UK, Canada and Australia, and they bring their languages here. As they continue to live in the area, they continue to learn English. Multilingual people know more than one language, meaning that speak their native language at home, and English outside their home such as at work or with friends.

     David Crystal said that multilingual people are the power to change how the English language changed in the future. He states that multilingual people use accommodations where some people want to sound ‘like them’, such as how they pronounciate words or use syntax and lexis within their community.

     The key phrase in the text is that ‘the computers are coming, and they are winning’. This strong phrase gives us a prediction of what the future of language may come out to be. Already Google and many other internet browsers have created translation key factors by how they say it such as pronunciation, the writing of it, and how to read it. This can dramatically change the future. This brings back to David Crystal's theory of that the English language may no longer be the dominant language. 

     The language of English has been adapted throughout history and English is one of the hardest languages to learn and speak. English was first adopted from a Native tribe in Germany when they arrived in the UK. Extensively ever since the UK took lands of the USA and many other countries, it has grown significantly. There have been many meanings of the English language that have been used in early English, which is now almost don’t exit, and so the opposite happens of modern-day English language words may not have been used correctly or was a word in early English such as the word ‘car’ or ‘airplane’.