English Doomed as Global Language, Academic Says

[Coito ergo sum]

Err, Coito, You know that Latin was still the major language for international scientific publications in the early 1800s?
Latin remained an indispensable language for the literate centuries (heck, a millenium), after it died as a spoken language for the common people...

Yes, we all know that. Do you think the guy writing the article said that the the printing press accelerated the demise of the ecclesiastical and scientific latin? And, if he did say that, would he be correct? Given that the printing press was invented in the early 1400's - what decline did it hasten? The decline of the already dead spoken latin, or the decline of ecclesiastical and scientific uses of latin that didn't - as you pointed - decline for another 500 years after the printing press?

What really buried Latin was not printing, though,

Well, right. As a language, it was pretty much out of common use by the early 800s.

it was the rise of the bourgeoisie as a wealthy class that could afford learning to read without becoming Churchment. Those were the people, illiterate in Latin, who created a demand for books written/printed in a language they could read.

What killed Latin was the fact that it evolved out of existence into Spanish, Portuguese, French, Italian and some others. Even at the end of the western Roman Empire there was already a problem with provincial latin dialects becoming difficult to understand for Romans.

[Berthold]

Even at the end of the western Roman Empire there was already a problem with provincial latin dialects becoming difficult to understand for Romans.

Now if that is a sign of a language on its way down, things don't look too good for English.

[Warren Dew]

I admit I don't know squat about this subject, so forgive a possibly stupid question:
Is English, as arguably the most common language of software engineers, at all embedded in the structure/syntax of coding?

Structure - no. Syntax - at the source code level, yes, but foreign language compilers could fairly easily solve that.

[hadespussercats]

I admit I don't know squat about this subject, so forgive a possibly stupid question:
Is English, as arguably the most common language of software engineers, at all embedded in the structure/syntax of coding?

Structure - no. Syntax - at the source code level, yes, but foreign language compilers could fairly easily solve that.

Thanks for the info!

[Coito ergo sum]

Even at the end of the western Roman Empire there was already a problem with provincial latin dialects becoming difficult to understand for Romans.

Now if that is a sign of a language on its way down, things don't look too good for English.

Well, the reality is that 500 years from now it's highly likely that the languages in use today will all be just about gone- just like the English language went from Old English to Middle English to Modern English - Modern English will evolve away and eventually become as unrecognizable to us as Old English is. Heck, just going back to the 1500s, we'd have a hard time understanding people, just because that was the early part of the Great Vowel Shift, which changed the pronunciation of almost all words.

It's interesting to see movies where people go back in time, like the Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, or Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure - and the English folks in the middle ages are speaking modern English. The reality is that it would sound almost nothing like the English we're accustomed to.

[Ian]

Even at the end of the western Roman Empire there was already a problem with provincial latin dialects becoming difficult to understand for Romans.

Now if that is a sign of a language on its way down, things don't look too good for English.

Well, the reality is that 500 years from now it's highly likely that the languages in use today will all be just about gone- just like the English language went from Old English to Middle English to Modern English - Modern English will evolve away and eventually become as unrecognizable to us as Old English is. Heck, just going back to the 1500s, we'd have a hard time understanding people, just because that was the early part of the Great Vowel Shift, which changed the pronunciation of almost all words.

It's interesting to see movies where people go back in time, like the Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, or Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure - and the English folks in the middle ages are speaking modern English. The reality is that it would sound almost nothing like the English we're accustomed to.

This thread makes me want to have a Great Bowel Shift.

[Coito ergo sum]

Even at the end of the western Roman Empire there was already a problem with provincial latin dialects becoming difficult to understand for Romans.

Now if that is a sign of a language on its way down, things don't look too good for English.

Well, the reality is that 500 years from now it's highly likely that the languages in use today will all be just about gone- just like the English language went from Old English to Middle English to Modern English - Modern English will evolve away and eventually become as unrecognizable to us as Old English is. Heck, just going back to the 1500s, we'd have a hard time understanding people, just because that was the early part of the Great Vowel Shift, which changed the pronunciation of almost all words.

It's interesting to see movies where people go back in time, like the Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, or Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure - and the English folks in the middle ages are speaking modern English. The reality is that it would sound almost nothing like the English we're accustomed to.

This thread makes me want to have a Great Bowel Shift.

Your bowels are doomed.

[Hermit]

Well, the reality is that 500 years from now it's highly likely that the languages in use today will all be just about gone- just like the English language went from Old English to Middle English to Modern English - Modern English will evolve away and eventually become as unrecognizable to us as Old English is. Heck, just going back to the 1500s, we'd have a hard time understanding people, just because that was the early part of the Great Vowel Shift, which changed the pronunciation of almost all words.

It's interesting to see movies where people go back in time, like the Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, or Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure - and the English folks in the middle ages are speaking modern English. The reality is that it would sound almost nothing like the English we're accustomed to.

Let me recommend Melvyn Bragg's excellent The Adventure of English. It traces the permutations of the language since about 500AD, and includes by way of readings of snippets from Beowolf, bits from Chaucer's works and others, numerous samples of what it may have sounded like. It's a fascinating series for anyone interested in language.

[Warren Dew]

Well, the reality is that 500 years from now it's highly likely that the languages in use today will all be just about gone- just like the English language went from Old English to Middle English to Modern English - Modern English will evolve away and eventually become as unrecognizable to us as Old English is.

Widespread literacy has slowed down the evolution of language considerably. If this literacy is more than a temporary phenomenon, the next 500 years may look little like the last 500 years with respect to language.