LING 115 - Midterm 2 Review
Global language - correct answer ✔A language which has a special role and
dominant widespread use throughout the countries of the world
Mother tongue - correct answer ✔First home language
Mother tongue most spoken - correct answer ✔Spanish; mother tongue in
20+ countries
In how many countries is English an official language - correct answer ✔over
70
Countries where English was newly recognized as official language - correct
answer ✔Rwanda
Namibia
Main competitors to English in terms of being official language - correct
answer ✔French
German
Spanish
Russian
Arabic
3 ways languages can have a special status in a country - correct answer
✔1. If it is the mother tongue
2. If it is recognized as an official language
3. If it is strongly promoted in education
,Most widely taught foreign language in schools throughout the world (+
example) - correct answer ✔English, Algeria replaced French w/English as
chief foreign language
Number of people who speak English fluently or competently - correct answer
✔between 1.2-1.5 billion people,
nearly a quarter of the world's entire population
What is directly linked to success of a language as a widespread form of
communication? - correct answer ✔Military
Economic
Cultural power of its speakers
Success of a language NOT due to what? (+ example) - correct answer ✔A
language being linguistically easy to learn and use, Latin
How did English spread? - correct answer ✔-18th & 19th centuries b/c of
military and colonization by British
-Britain became world's leading industrial and trading country (beginning of
19th)
-USA had a larger population than any country in w. Europe & economy
thriving (end of 19th)
-Leading role of USA in world's economy led to the growth and spread of
English (20th)
Linuga franca - correct answer ✔Language used because of need for
communication between people of different mother tongues
, Need for global lingua franca stressed by what? - correct answer ✔-
Increased availability of international air travel
-Development of modern international communication systems (email,
internet, phone)
Possible dangers of a global language - correct answer ✔-More restricted
cultural knowledge
-Less awareness of other ways of life
Is language death a danger of global languages? (+ examples) - correct
answer ✔No; more concerned with local languages.
-Existence of Sorbian in Germany challenged by the growth of German as a
national lang
-Existence of Galician in Spain threatened by Spanish
**These not threatened by development of English as a global language
Could Chinese replace English as global language? Why or why not? - correct
answer ✔Not likely; tone language, difficult in terms of pronunciation and
writing system
Ways English could possibly be replaced as global language - correct answer
✔1) different language
2) machine translation
Is machine translation plausible replacement? - correct answer ✔Not at the
moment, still primitive, not advanced enough vocally
Why did English become the world's first really global language? - correct
answer ✔Early british empire included crucial territories:
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