We’ve talked a lot about how language—words and grammar—changes over time (here’s one of my posts with links to many of the rest: “The Language Metamorphosis”), but this article takes a really long view: What will the English language be like in 100 years?
The global role English plays today as a lingua franca—used as a means of communication by speakers of different languages—has parallels in the Latin of pre-modern Europe.
Having been spread by the success of the Roman Empire, Classical Latin was kept alive as a standard written medium throughout Europe long after the fall of Rome. But the Vulgar Latin used in speech continued to change, forming new dialects, which in time gave rise to the modern Romance languages: French, Spanish, Portuguese, Romanian and Italian.
This, author Simon Horobin of Oxford University points out, indicates a future of multiple Englishes. (A look at this map—which shows, among other things, where English is spoken—plays into this idea too.) Chances are you already know at least one alternate English language now. 🙂
Tweet: Chances are you already know at least one alternate English language now.
Tweet: New interlanguages are emerging where English is a second language.
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