[Paleopsych] World language change

[G. Reinhart-Waller]

Not being a scholar of world language changes, I could hazard a guess 
that the language used on the internet could become the dominant one.  
So far that language is English and the next closest  is German as 
determined by the number of web sites is either of the two languages.  I 
read somewhere that the number of German websites is less than 15% of 
total. 

About China, likely that country will become a major economic force in 
the next few decades but learning to read and write Mandarin is a fairly 
daunting task.  My guess is that an easier language such as English will 
remain as the favored internet lingo.

Gerry Reinhart-Waller

Christian Rauh wrote:

>I was wondering how does a world language change? And how will that
>process occur in our current time. Faster I would guess?
>
>The world language has always been the language of whoever is most
>influential. Latin when the Catholic Church was running things, French
>when France was bullying around, then English when the England Empire
>was always sunny, and now US English.
>
>But how does that world language change process occurs?
>
>Imagine the Chinese became the new superpower as some people are afraid.
>How will the world language change to Chinese? Are going to see so many
>chinese webpages that we'll all enroll in Chinese classes? Books and
>articles would start being published mostly in Chinese?
>
>Has anyone studied these world language transitions?
>
>Christian
>
>Steve Hovland wrote:
>  
>
>>And English is not pure, so it's an example of what 
>>world languages have always been.
>>
>>Steve Hovland
>>www.stevehovland.net
>>
>>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From:	Lynn D. Johnson, Ph.D. [SMTP:ljohnson at solution-consulting.com]
>>Sent:	Saturday, March 12, 2005 8:40 AM
>>To:	The new improved paleopsych list
>>Subject:	Re: [Paleopsych] The next world language
>>
>>A colleague who is an international business consultant says same. 
>>English is lingua franca everywhere, from Asia to Europe. He said he was 
>>at a meeting with both German and French workers, and they speak English 
>>as the common language. I love English. Here is a great resource:
>>    http://www.etymonline.com/
>>
>>That said, here is a quiz:
>>
>>What do you call someone who speaks three languages?
>>    Trilingual
>>
>>What about someone who speaks two languages?
>>    Bilingual
>>
>>And what do we call someone who speaks one language?
>>    American
>>
>>Lynn
>>    -former trilingual
>>fluent in English, capable in Spanish, German has almost totally 
>>disappeared. If we could only get a lot of illegal Germans waiting on me 
>>at McDonalds's I could get my German back quickly.
>>
>>K.E. wrote:
>>
>>
>>    
>>
>>>hi,
>>>
>>>
>>>This is what the world of commerce is speaking.
>>>
>>>Linguisitics
>>>http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/Linguistics/Home_Linguistics.html
>>>
>>>see: Netglish
>>>
>>>"Nine out of ten computers connected to the internet are located in 
>>>English-speaking countries and more than 80% of all home pages on the 
>>>web are written in English.
>>>
>>>More than four fifths of all international organisations use English 
>>>as either their main or one of their main operating languages.
>>>
>>>At the moment no other language comes anywhere near English. The next 
>>>biggest is German. But less than 5% of web home pages are in German. "
>>>
>>>Karen Ellis
>>>
>>><>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>
>>>The Educational CyberPlayGround
>>>http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/
>>>
>>>National Children's Folksong Repository
>>>http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/NCFR/
>>>
>>>Hot List of Schools Online and
>>>Net Happenings, K12 Newsletters, Network Newsletters
>>>http://www.edu-cyberpg.com/Community/
>>>
>>>7 Hot Site Awards
>>>New York Times, USA Today , MSNBC, Earthlink,
>>>USA Today Best Bets For Educators, Macworld Top Fifty
>>><>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<>~~~~~<> 
>>>_______________________________________________
>>>paleopsych mailing list
>>>paleopsych at paleopsych.org
>>>http://lists.paleopsych.org/mailman/listinfo/paleopsych
>>>
>>>
>>>      
>>>
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>>
>
>  
>
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