English as an international language

English as an international language

Abdullah Seed Almourai

Historical aspect

• the number of English speakers during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I ranged between five and seven million
• while in 1952during the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, the number reached 250 million.
• English usurps French as the language of power when it is used for the first time at the opening of parliament in 1362.

Industrial Revolution

• During the 19th century, Britain becomes the world's leading industrial and trading nation
• Industries were able to produce a huge amount of products and this made them look for more customers.
• At some point sealing products to British people was not enough anymore and they had to expand their market, so their start to contact people all around the world.
• other countries bought machines from Britain

British Empire – Colonies

• there are two different moments in British History when it comes to colonies
• The first period is about 17th and 18th century that was about United States
• The second period is about 18th and 20th century
• Britain defeating France in Napoleonic Wars, First World War…

“The empire on which the sun never sets”

Colonialism effects

• The status of English as an International language is the result of the British colonial expansion during the last two centuries in North America, Oceania, West Africa, South Asia, and South America.

British Colonialism in the Americas

• The significance of this war is that the British military forces were able to neglect any French effect in the North American region.

British Colonialism in South Asia

• The English language was taught in Indian schools and institutes and was an official language in the country.

The British colonialism effects

• The English language has been perceived by the natives of the British colonies as the language of elite and power.
• countries as Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Papua Guinea, and Solomon Islands adopted English in schools.
• In British colonies, whether in Africa, Asia, Australia, or America, native languages came in contact with the English language.
• The British colonial activity resulted in what is linguistically labelled as "Language contact". In sociolinguistics, "language contact" is " the use of more than one language in the same place at the same time" (Thomason, 2001)