The Future of World Englishes

 

Two scenarios have been advanced about English's future status as the major world language: it will ultimately fragment into a large number of mutually unintelligible varieties (in effect, languages), or it will converge so that differences across groups of speakers are largely eliminated.

English as the language of 'others'

If English is, numerically speaking, the language of 'others', then the center of gravity of the language is almost certain to shift in the direction of the 'others'. In the words of Widdowson, there is likely to be a paradigm shift from one of language distribution to one of language spread:

"When we talk about the spread of English, then, it is not that the conventionally coded forms and meanings are transmitted into different environments and different surroundings, and taken up and used by different groups of people. It is not a matter of the actual language being distributed but of the virtual language being spread and in the process being variously actualized. The distribution of the actual language implies adoption and conformity. The spread of virtual language implies adaptation and nonconformity. The two processes are quite different."

In this new paradigm, English spreads and adapts according to the linguistic and cultural preferences of its users in the Outer and Expanding circles (refer to Kachru's Three Circles of English). However, if English is genuinely to become the language of 'others', then the 'others' have to be accorded – or perhaps more likely, accord themselves – at least the same English language rights as those claimed by mother-tongue speakers.

Another world language?

The other potential shift in the linguistic center of gravity is that English could lose its international role altogether, or, at best, come to share it with a number of equals. Although this would not happen mainly as a result of native-speaker resistance to the spread of non-native speaker Englishes and the consequent abandoning of English by large numbers of non-native speakers, the latter could undoubtedly play a part.
As evidence that English may eventually give way to another language (or languages) as the world's lingua franca, David Crystal cites Internet data:

"When the internet started it was of course 100 percent English because of where it came from, but since the 1980s that status has started to fall away. By 1995, it was down to about 80 per cent present of English on the internet, and the current figures for 2001 are that it is hovering somewhere between 60 percent and 70 percent, with a significant drop likely over the next four or five years."

On the other hand, there are at least 1500 languages present on the internet now and that figure is likely to increase. Nevertheless, Crystal predicts that English will retain its dominant presence.

World English vs. World Englishes vs. Global Englishes

The notions of World English and World Englishes are far from similar, although the terms are often mistakenly used interchangeably. World English refers to the English language as a lingua franca used in business, trade, diplomacy and other spheres of global activity, while World Englishes refers to the different varieties of English and English-based creoles developed in different regions of the world. Alternatively, the term Global Englishes has been used by scholars in the field to emphasise the more recent spread of English due to globalization, which has resulted in increased usage of English as a lingua franca.

Lingua Franca

 

A lingua franca (/ˌlɪŋɡwə ˈfræŋkə/), also known as a bridge language, common language, trade language or vehicular language, is a language or dialect systematically (as opposed to occasionally, or casually) used to make communication possible between people who do not share a native language or dialect, particularly when it is a third language that is distinct from both native languages.

Lingua francas have developed around the world throughout human history, sometimes for commercial reasons (so-called "trade languages") but also for cultural, religious, diplomatic and administrative convenience, and as a means of exchanging information between scientists and other scholars of different nationalities. The term originates with one such language, Mediterranean Lingua Franca.

The use of lingua francas has existed since antiquity. Latin and Koine Greek were the lingua francas of the Roman Empire and the Hellenistic culture. Akkadian and then Aramaic remained the common languages of a large part of Western Asia from several earlier empires.Examples of lingua francas remain numerous and exist on every continent. The most obvious example as of the early 21st century is English. There are many other lingua francas in particular regions, such as French, Spanish, Urdu, Hindi, Portuguese, Russian, Arabic, Mandarin, and Swahili.

In certain countries, the lingua franca is also the national language. Urdu is the lingua franca of Pakistan as well as the national language.

 

English as a Lingua Franca

English as a lingua franca (ELF) is the use of the English language as a Koiné language, "a common means of communication for speakers of different first languages". ELF is also "defined functionally by its use in intercultural communication rather than formally by its reference to native-speaker norms" whereas English as a foreign language aims at meeting native speaker norms and gives prominence to native speaker cultural aspects. While lingua francas have been used for centuries, what makes ELF a novel phenomenon is the extent to which it is used – both functionally and geographically. A typical ELF conversation might involve an Italian and a Dane chatting at a coffee break of an international conference held in Brussels, a Spanish tourist asking a local for the way in Berlin, or a Punjabi Indian negotiating with a Tamil Indian salesperson at Chennai.

Global spread of English

The First dispersal

 

English is transported to the 'new world'

The first diaspora involved relatively large-scale migrations of mother-tongue English speakers from England, Scotland and Ireland predominantly to North America and the Caribbean, Australia, South Africa and New Zealand. Over time, their own English dialects developed into modern American, Canadian, West Indian, South African, Australian, and New Zealand Englishes. In contrast to the English of Great Britain, the varieties spoken in modern North America and Caribbean, South Africa, Australia, and New Zealand have been modified in response to the changed and changing sociolinguistic contexts of the migrants, for example being in contact with indigenous Native American, Khoisan and Bantu, Aboriginal or Maori populations in the colonies.

The Second dispersal

 

English is transported to Asia and Africa

The second diaspora was the result of the colonization of Asia and Africa, which led to the development of 'New Englishes', the second-language varieties of English. In colonial Africa, the history of English is distinct between West and East Africa. English in West Africa began with trade. particularly the slave trade. English soon gained official status in what are today Gambia, Sierra Leone, Ghana, Nigeria and Cameroon, and some of the pidgin and creoles which developed from English contact, including Krio (Sierra Leone) and Cameroon Pidgin, have large numbers of speakers now.
As for East Africa, extensive British settlements were established in what are now Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Malawi, Zambia and Zimbabwe, where English became a crucial language of the government, education and the law. From the early 1960s, the six countries achieved independence in succession; but English remained the official language and had large numbers of second language speakers in Uganda, Zambia, Zimbabwe and Malawi (along with Chewa).
English was formally introduced to the sub-continent of South Asia (India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan) during the second half of the eighteenth century. In India, English was given status through the implementation of Macaulay 'Minute' of 1835, which proposed the introduction of an English educational system in India. Over time, the process of 'Indianisation' led to the development of a distinctive national character of English in the Indian sub-continent.
British influence in South-East Asia and the South Pacific began in the late eighteenth century, involving primarily the territories now known as Singapore, Malaysia and Hong Kong. Papua New Guinea, also a British protectorate, exemplified the English-based pidgin - Tok Pisin.
The Americans came late in South-East Asia but their influence spread like wildfire as their reforms on education in the Philippines progressed in their less than half a century colonization of the islands. English has been taught since the American period and is one of the official languages of the Philippines. Ever since English became the official language, a localized variety gradually emerged - Philippine English. Lately, linguist Wilkinson Daniel Wong Gonzales argued that this variety has in itself more varieties, suggesting that we move towards Philippine Englishes  paradigm to progress further in Schneider's dynamic model after gathering evidences of such happening.
Nowadays, English is also learnt in other countries in neighbouring areas, most notably in Taiwan, Japan and Korea, with the latter two having begun to consider the possibility of making English their official second language.

World Englishes

World Englishes is a term for emerging localized or indigenized varieties of English, especially varieties that have developed in territories influenced by the United Kingdom or the United States. The study of World Englishes consists of identifying varieties of English used in diverse sociolinguistic contexts globally and analyzing how sociolinguistic histories, multicultural backgrounds and contexts of function influence the use of English in different regions of the world. Currently, there are approximately 75 territories where English is spoken either as a first language (L1) or as an unofficial or institutionalized second language (L2) in fields such as government, law and education. It is difficult to establish the total number of Englishes in the world, as new varieties of English are constantly being developed and discovered.

History of English

English is a West Germanic language that originated from the Anglo-Frisian dialects brought by Germanic invaders into Britain. Initially, Old English was a diverse group of dialects, reflecting the varied origins of the Anglo-Saxon kingdoms of England. Eventually, one of these dialects, Late West Saxon, came to dominate.

The original Old English language was then influenced by two further waves of invasion: the first by speakers of the Scandinavian branch of the Germanic language family, who conquered and colonized parts of Britain in the 8th and 9th centuries; the second by the Normans in the 11th century, who spoke Old Norman and ultimately developed an English variety called Anglo-Norman. For two centuries after the Norman Conquest, French became the language of everyday life among the upper classes in England. Although the language of the masses remained English, the bilingual character of England in this period was thus formed.

During the Middle English period, France and England experienced a process of separation. This period of conflicting interests and feelings of resentment was later termed the Hundred Years' War. By the beginning of the 14th century, English had regained universal use and become the principal tongue of all England, but not without having undergone significant change.

During the Renaissance, patriotic feelings regarding English brought about the recognition of English as the national language of England. The language was advocated as acceptable for learned and literary use. With the Great Vowel Shift, the language in this period matured to a standard and differed significantly from the Middle English period, becoming recognizably "modern".

By the 18th century, three main forces were driving the direction of the English language:

1- To reduce the language to rule and effect a standard of correct usage.

2- To refine the language by removing supposed defects and introducing certain improvements.

3- To fix English permanently in the desired form.

This desire for system and regularity in the language contrasted with the individualism and spirit of independence characterized by the previous age.

By the 19th century, the expansion of the British Empire, as well as global trade, had led to the spread of English around the world. The rising importance of some of England's larger colonies and former colonies, such as the rapidly developing United States, enhanced the value of the English varieties spoken in these regions, encouraging the belief, among the local populations, that their distinct varieties of English should be granted equal standing with the standard of Great Britain.