Anyone conversant in English (was: Tagalog) here?

phoglund@xxxxxx:

Padraic Brown wrote:
On 16 Apr 2007 03:26:48 -0700, phoglund@xxxxxx wrote:
English has long ago ceased to belong to native speakers alone. It's
us - the second-language speakers - who will set the standards from
now on, not them. We outnumber them.
Could be -- but the misuses of ESL users won't become Standard. They
will always be the subject of how _not_ to use the language.

You are being very unrealistic now, my friend. The language will
become increasingly tolerant of irrelevant solecisms which do not

That looks like an instance of "language" used in the sense of "speech
community".

impair the mutual understanding - such forms as "runned" and
"teached", for instance. Eventually they will become standard, and
"run" and "taught" will pass into obsolescence.

Or -ed will pass into obsolescence. "Ran" seems to have already.


If you're happy being continually misunderstood and degraded as an
ignorant and uneducated foreigner, then be our guest! If I were to
visit Finland, I would make an honest attempt to learn some Finnish,
and would graciously accept correction by native speakers. If Finnish
ever became the dominant language in the world, I would understand
that it is important to learn it properly.

You are missing the point. I - and the rest of global second-language
speakers of English - am not in the position of a guest in an
Anglophone country. I am making use of English as a global auxiliary
language on the Internet, and the majority here are people like me.
In a sense, I am not visiting your country - you are at least as much
visiting mine. I do not need to accept instruction or correction from
anybody here - the Internet is mine no less than yours, and I am no
less instrumental in setting the future standards of this variety of
English than you are.

As long as large numbers of people speak non-auxiliary English outside
the net, chances are that those will continue to set the standards
within the writing community of the Internet. Tolerance to those who
can't or won't comply with all details of the standard won't
necessarily change the standard. In the case of English, _ex_change of
standards is actually more likely to happen some time.

This attitude of mine will eventually prevail among Internet users,
and you will be left in the minority. I don't really think I am doing
anything else than stating a fact. You might see our variety of
English as debased, inferiour, or pidginised; but eventually, it will
be the only show in town, if English survives as a globally dominant
language.

It's really the English-speakers, not the abstraction of English
language, that are globally dominant. We can be rather sure the
dominance won't last forever, but it's difficult, maybe impossible in
principle, to predict when and how the demise will happen.

Jens S. Larsen

.

Relevant Pages

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  • Re: Anyone conversant in Tagalog here?
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