The Globalisation of English
A
English, a West Germanic language first spoken in early medieval England, has without question become the lingua franca of the modern era. Having arisen in the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England and southeast Scotland, use of the English language expanded following British colonisation from the 17th to mid-20th centuries. The subsequent emergence of the United States as the world super power in the 20th century further propelled this trend. Now, in the 21st century, a language that only a few centuries before was spoken by less than a million people is the third-most-common native language in the world, after Mandarin Chinese and Spanish.
B
Approximately 375 million people worldwide speak English as their native tongue, although the number of English speakers jumps to over a billion if you take into account those who speak it as a second language. This means that non-native speakers outnumber native speakers by a ratio of around 3 to 1. It is a first language in over 10 countries, with the United States leading the way with 226 million native English speakers and the United Kingdom coming in second with 61 million. It is also an official language in 60 nations and a language of special status in more than 15.
C
But it’s important to recognise that these numbers reflect the prevalence of not only spoken English but of written use of the language as well. Because it is the language of international business and trade, as well as the official language of the European Union and the United Nations, most official documents are either written in or translated into English. The same goes for books, magazines, newspapers and scientific writing, with a recent survey showing that over two-thirds of the world’s scientists read in English. The online presence of the language is equally as impressive. Of the estimated 200 million users of the Internet worldwide, around 36 percent communicate in English.
D
Language researchers have in recent decades paid particular attention to the phenomenon of the globalisation of English. They look to understand not only the expansion of the language but also how this globalisation is affecting the language itself. One of the most effective means of describing this phenomenon was put forward in 1990 by Brai Kachuru, a professor of Liberal Arts and Sciences at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, who used a series of ever expanding concentric circles to depict English’s global development.
E
In Kachuru’s model, the inner circle consisted of countries where English is the native language. Such countries included Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, Australia, and New Zealand. What all of these countries have in common is that they map the spread of the original diasporas of English speakers from the United Kingdom to new lands as the result of the expanding British Empire. Thus, the inner circle has set the norms for what constitutes English. Even though there are lexical and syntactic differences in the varieties of English used across these countries, their differences are relatively minor and they still represent the original foundations of the language.
F
The second outer circle consists of countries like Nigeria, India and Signapore where English is widely spoken as a second language. Most of these countries were once part of the British Empire, and thus are places where non-native speakers adopted or were forced to adopt English in order to engage with the trade and infrastructure of the colonies. In these nations, English is firmly entrenched in the cultural, political and social systems. They are referred to in Kachuru’s model as ‘norm-developing’ countries, as they are the places where English diverged and developed. The original British English underwent several local modifications while at the same time being enriched by imported words and changes in accent and syntax.
G
Lastly, there is the expanding circle, which is the largest of the three circles and includes countries where English is a foreign language but is increasingly essential for survival in the global world. They included countries from Europe, Latin America, the Middle East, North Africa and the Asia-Pacific, and are described as ‘norm dependent’ because they use the inner and outer circles to provide the so-called ‘correct’ models of the language. According to the model, the expanding circle relies on the inner and outer circles as a frame of reference for what proper English is.
H
But many today, including linguist H.G. Widdowson, insist that this is no longer the case. Widdowson points to a shift that occurred in the 20th century, from the ‘distribution’ to the ‘spread’ of English. He sees the original distribution as controlled by the colonial powers, where the inner circle passed on English to the outer circle in a relatively controlled manner. But the spread of English that has taken place in recent decades is uncontrolled and has been shaped by contact among different cultures, languages and users. And as English spreads ever outwards, the centre loses control and we see the language multiplying into many unique forms.
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