It’s impossible to find a language in which the world can communicate across linguistic borders. For the time being, we make do with English, but that was a bad solution even before the two major Anglophone countries contracted Mad Voter Disease. The language gives a 6% minority of the world population an edge that leaves most of the other 94% impotent and frustrated.
Of course, any world language spoken natively by some would be a weapon of mass destruction in their hands, leaving all others vulnerable and exposed. In amiable conversation, that’s sort of okay – people don’t nuke their friends. But as soon as there’s conflict of interest, the natives win every time. It’s a fact of life and every international negotiator knows it. Personally, I remember participating in a discussion on a UK radio station a few years ago, in which my English opponent was talking absolute, utter and demonstrable rot. I would have devastated the fellow in any other language I speak. But the shots I fired in what happened to be his first language were barely audible amidst his relentless bombing.
So we need something better, but what? Machine translation has potential, but let’s not put our hopes too high in the short term. Esperanto lacks the political, economic and cultural clout. Mandarin then? Who knows. Frankly, I hope not.
There is a solution though. It’s fairer than what we have at present and more realistic than the alternatives. It’s this: not one world language, but two.
One of these would, at this point in history, still be English. As for the other, let’s call it WL. It could be Spanish, it could be Hindi, it could even be Mandarin, never mind how I feel about it. It’s not the exact choice that matters, it’s the fact that, once we all speak both WL and English, we will never be forced to speak to anyone in their mother tongue again. It will become a matter of basic civility to shut up in one’s first language except in the company of those who prefer to use it – mostly fellow native speakers. At long last, the verbal battle field will be level.
But isn’t it simply too difficult to learn two foreign languages, you wonder? Before answering it (in the negative), let me point out that native English speakers would have to learn only one. But more importantly, multilingualism used to be common in Europe and it still is in Africa, India and many other, smaller regions, so learning two languages is perfectly feasible. Moreover, learning English will become easier as soon as we no longer have to listen to people using obscure idioms, talking at breakneck speed and frowning at our grammar – the native speakers that is, and especially the monolinguals among them.
I guess monolingual native English speakers they are to be pitied rather than censured. But they do cause the problem, and now we have the solution. I can’t wait for WL to emerge. I’m hoping it will be Spanish. But I’ll welcome any of the major languages. Communicating in Mandarin, Arabic or Russian, spoken as a second language by both parties, is preferable to being outtalked and patronised by native English speakers.
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Update, in response to questions I’ve received by email: no, native speakers of English do not necessarily use more obscure idioms or talk faster than native speakers of other languages – though the high incidence of monolingualism makes them somewhat more likely to do so. But more importantly, their tendency to do so in conversations with second-language speakers is more of a problem than in others, because theirs happens to be the language of international communication.
Also, English-speakers are far from being the only ones among whom we’ve seen recent outbreaks of unsavoury populism. It’s just that this blogpost happens to be about this language. One of the reasons why the 20th century saw a tremendous rise of English was the endless stream of popular and enviable cultural products from the States, and to a lesser degree from the UK also. Trump and Brexit have badly damaged the image of these countries outside their borders. Of course, this doesn’t immediately stop English from being the world language and things may yet swing back, but recent events surely lessens its appeal – and its appeal is what it ultimately owes its status too.
