Name: Why Did English Become the International Language?
Uploaded: 2018-02-12T07:51:45.000Z
Duration: 7 min 25 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

Welcome to the Langfocus channel, and my name
is Po-ru.

“Why did English become the international
language?”

- That is the question we're going to answer today.

English is the de facto global lingua franca.

It is the language of global commerce, the
main language of international diplomacy,

the language of air traffic control, and the majority of of academic journals.

00:00:28,150 --> 00:00:31,570
Maybe most importantly for us, it's the most
common language on the internet, and it's

the language that international travellers
with different native languages use to communicate

(the very definition of a lingua franca).

But how did English reach this kind of status?

Well, it's partly because of the United States
of America's role as a global superpower.

In the 16th century England started to establish
overseas colonies, and by the end of the 18th

century the British Empire had grown quite
extensive, with colonies in a few parts of

India and Africa, in the Caribbean, Canada,
and what was to become the United States.

The British were not the only ones establishing
colonies, of course.

Much of present day Canada and the US was
part of New France, a large area that had

But these areas were lost to the British during
the 7 years war.

Much of what is now the southern and western
United States was colonized by the Spanish,

but these areas were taken in wars with Spain
and later Mexico.

The Dutch had also colonized the area of New
Netherland, but it was lost to the British

There were also non-British immigrants to
the British colonies, for example German speaking

For a long part of the USA's history, German
was its second most widely spoken language.

It declined in use during the first world
war, because of the stigma of being associated

So while there were numerous languages spoken
by settlers, English became the dominant language

The British kept on establishing colonies
after American independence, including much

larger areas of the Indian subcontinent and
Africa, Australia and New Zealand, and after

the first world war – in the Middle East.

including colonies on the Indian subcontinent,
in Africa, Australia and New Zealand, and

after the first world war in the Middle East.

In 1922 the British Empire covered almost
a quarter of the earth, and about 1/5 of the

Some of these countries became populated by
English settlers, and these are the countries

where English became the dominant language,
replacing many others.

Other countries were not populated by permanent
settlers, only by administrative, military,

In some of these countries, English did not
become the single dominant language, but became

a prestige language and a convenient lingua
franca that could facilitate communication

between linguistically diverse populations.

English was not the only colonial language
gaining a foothold throughout the world.

But along with Spanish, and French it was
one of the main ones, and its hard to imagine

a language other than one of these becoming
the global lingua franca.

Through the 19th century it was French, but
English began to surpass French in the 20th

By the time of the First World War, the United
States had become a strong economic power,

and its role in the war increased its political
influence in Europe.

After the war, the Treaty of Versailles was
written not only in French, but also in English.

This signalled the start of English as a language
of diplomacy.

But it was after WWII when English really
began to develop into the main global lingua

franca as the United States developed more
fully into a world superpower.

This is partly because after the war, the
United States' military maintained a presence

in Europe to assist in reconstruction efforts,
which greatly increased its international

And this didn't stop with Europe: American
economic, political, and military influence

over much of the world has been the reality
for decades.

As the United States grew in power, advancements
in technology gave rise to mass communication

American movies, tv, and music spread throughout
the world, exposing regular people to the

Rather than being just the lingua franca of
international business people and diplomats,

you can now stay at a youth hostel and communicate
with most of the other travellers in English.

This is largely thanks to mass communication,
as well as English as a second language classes

now being a part of the school curriculum
in many countries.

This is something that increased in response
to the growing importance of English.

One the last remaining obstacles to English
truly becoming the world language was the

Russian was the lingua franca in most of the
USSR's member states.

And scientific articles during that time were
written mainly in either English or Russian.

But the decline and ultimate collapse of the
USSR resulted in a decline in Russian as a

Today, over 96% of scientific articles are
written in English.

In the past couple of decades, globalization
has solidified the position of English as

a global language, with people from all over
the world interacting with each other more,

On top of that, the internet has accelerated
that trend.

English is the number 1 language online, and
people from all over the world are constantly

exposed to English online, and communicate
via social media with people from all over

All you have to do is take one look at the
comments on this channel, and you'll see that

English functions as the lingua franca of
much of the internet.

So in short, the reach of the British Empire
brought English to all 4 corners of the globe,

and the rise of America built upon that momentum.

And as the world has gotten smaller due to
technology and globalization, English has

But on top of the roughly 360 million native
speakers of English, there are over a billion

Some people say as many as 2 billion people
around the world speak English, I guess depending

Will English be the international language
forever?