International English
International English is the concept of using the English language as a global means of communication similar to an international auxiliary language, and often refers to the movement towards an international standard for the language. Related and sometimes synonymous terms include: Global English, World English, Continental English, General English and Common English. These terms may describe the fact that English is spoken and used in numerous dialects around the world or refer to a desired standardisation.
There have been many proposals for making International English more accessible to people from different nationalities but there is no consensus; Basic English is an example, but it failed to make progress. More recently, there have been proposals for English as a lingua franca in which non-native speakers take a highly active role in the development of the language.
Historical context
Origins
The modern concept of "International English" does not exist in isolation, but is the product of centuries of development of the English language.The English language evolved in England, from a set of West Germanic dialects spoken by the Angles and Saxons, who arrived from continental Europe in the 5th century. Those dialects became known as Englisc, the language today referred to as Anglo-Saxon or Old English. However, less than a quarter of the vocabulary of Modern English is derived from the shared ancestry with other West Germanic languages because of extensive borrowings from Norse, Norman, Latin, and other languages. It was during the Viking invasions of the Anglo-Saxon period that Old English was influenced by contact with Norse, a group of North Germanic dialects spoken by the Vikings, who came to control a large region in the North and East of England known as the Danelaw. Vocabulary items entering English from Norse are thus attributable to the on-again-off-again Viking occupation of Northern and Eastern England during the centuries prior to the Norman Conquest. Soon after the Norman Conquest of 1066, the Englisc language ceased being a literary language and was replaced by Anglo-Norman as the written language of England. During the Norman Period, English absorbed a significant component of French vocabulary. With this new vocabulary, additional vocabulary borrowed from Latin, a simplified grammar, and use of the orthographic conventions of French instead of Old English orthography, the language became Middle English. The "difficulty" of English as a written language thus began in the High Middle Ages, when French orthographic conventions were used to spell a language whose original, more suitable orthography had been forgotten after centuries of nonuse. During the late medieval period, King Henry V of England ordered the use of the English of his day in proceedings before him and before the government bureaucracies. That led to the development of Chancery English, a standardised form used in the government bureaucracy.
The emergence of English as a language of Wales results from the incorporation of Wales into England and also dates from approximately this time period. Soon afterward, the development of printing by Caxton and others accelerated the development of a standardised form of English. Following a change in vowel pronunciation that marks the transition of English from the medieval to the Renaissance period, the language of the Chancery and Caxton became Early Modern English and with relatively moderate changes eventually developed into the English language of today. Scots, as spoken in the lowlands and along the east coast of Scotland, developed largely independent of Modern English, and is based on the Northern dialects of Anglo-Saxon, particularly Northumbrian, which also serve as the basis of Northern English dialects such as those of Yorkshire and Newcastle upon Tyne. Northumbria was within the Danelaw and therefore experienced greater influence from Norse than did the Southern dialects. As the political influence of London grew, the Chancery version of the language developed into a written standard across Great Britain, further progressing in the modern period as Scotland became united with England as a result of the Acts of Union of 1707.
English was introduced to Ireland twice—a medieval introduction that led to the development of the now-extinct Yola and Fingallian dialects, and a modern introduction in which Hiberno-English largely replaced Irish as the most widely spoken language during the 19th century, following the Act of Union of 1800. Received Pronunciation is generally viewed as a 19th-century development and is not reflected in North American English dialects, which are based on 18th-century English.
The establishment of the first permanent English-speaking colony in North America in 1607 was a major step towards the globalisation of the language. British English was only partially standardised when the American colonies were established. Isolated from each other by the Atlantic Ocean, the dialects in England and the colonies began evolving independently.
The British colonisation of Australia starting in 1788 brought the English language to Oceania. By the 19th century, the standardisation of British English was more settled than it had been in the previous century, and this relatively well-established English was brought to Africa, Asia and New Zealand. It developed both as the language of English-speaking settlers from Britain and Ireland, and as the administrative language imposed on speakers of other languages in the various parts of the British Empire. The first form can be seen in New Zealand English, and the latter in Indian English. In Europe, English received a more central role particularly since 1919, when the Treaty of Versailles was composed not only in French, the common language of diplomacy at the time, but, under special request from American president Woodrow Wilson, also in English – a major milestone in the globalisation of English.
The English-speaking regions of Canada and the Caribbean are caught between historical connections with the UK and the Commonwealth and geographical and economic connections with the U.S. In some things they tend to follow British standards, whereas in others, especially commercial, they follow the U.S. standard.
English as a global language
divides the use of English into three concentric circles.The inner circle is the traditional base of English and includes countries such as the United Kingdom and Ireland and the anglophone populations of the former British colonies of the United States, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, Canada, and various islands of the Caribbean, Indian Ocean, and Pacific Ocean.
In the outer circle are those countries where English has official or historical importance. This includes most of the countries of the Commonwealth of Nations, including populous countries such as India, Pakistan, and Nigeria; and others, such as the Philippines, under the sphere of influence of English-speaking countries. English in this circle is used for official purposes such as in business, news broadcasts, schools, and air traffic. Some countries in this circle have made English their national language. Here English may serve as a useful lingua franca between ethnic and language groups. Higher education, the legislature and judiciary, national commerce, and so on, may all be carried out predominantly in English.
The expanding circle refers to those countries where English has no official role, but is nonetheless important for certain functions, e.g., international business and tourism. By the twenty-first century, non-native English speakers have come to outnumber native speakers by a factor of three, according to the British Council. Darius Degher, a former instructor at Malmö University in Sweden, coined the term decentered English to describe this shift, along with attendant changes in what is considered important to English users and learners. The Scandinavian language area as well as the Netherlands have a near complete bilingualism between their native languages and English as a foreign second language. Elsewhere in Europe, although not universally, English knowledge is still rather common among non-native speakers. In many cases this leads to accents derived from the native languages altering pronunciations of the spoken English in these countries.
Research on English as a lingua franca in the sense of "English in the Expanding Circle" is comparatively recent. Linguists who have been active in this field are Jennifer Jenkins, Barbara Seidlhofer, Christiane Meierkord and Joachim Grzega.
English as a lingua franca in foreign language teaching
English as an additional language is usually based on the standards of either American English or British English as well as incorporating foreign terms. English as an international language is EAL with emphasis on learning English's different major dialect forms; in particular, it aims to equip students with the linguistic tools to communicate internationally. Roger Nunn considers different types of competence in relation to the teaching of English as an International Language, arguing that linguistic competence has yet to be adequately addressed in recent considerations of EIL.Several models of "simplified English" have been suggested for teaching English as a foreign language:
- Basic English, developed by Charles Kay Ogden in the 1930s; a recent revival has been initiated by Bill Templer
- Threshold Level English, developed by van Ek and Alexander
- Globish, developed by Jean-Paul Nerrière
- Basic Global English, developed by Joachim Grzega
With reference to the term "Globish", Robert McCrum has used this to mean "English as global language". Jean-Paul Nerriere uses it for a constructed language.