Between Spanish and French
i always have my own opinion while chating with friends, one of the subjects that i disagree with most of my friend is (french is the second most spoken language after english)
i think that spanish comes in the second place,
well, i dont know if they mean that french language is tha second (official) language But im talking about what the language that is most spoken after English,
i would like to share my opinion with all of you (hoping someone will agree with me)
10 Answers
Actually Russian sounds pretty nice. A lady from Rusia refused to talk to me in English, so I had no choice but to learn a little bit of Russian-It did me no good; our frienship never became an international romance....too bad for me.
I think that Spanish is the only language that has world wide significanse, after English of course, . There are different figures of the amount of Spanish speakers my figure is 400 million of which the large majority live outside Spain; About120million live in Mexico which is the largest conglomeracion of Spanish speakers in the World.
I don't know for sure, either. But, I suspect Chinese.
French is widely spoken. Many international organisation still use French as one of the official languages such as UN or International Court if Justice. Spanish is a lingua franca for Latin American countries as you know. There are so many people in Latin America while there are only small amount of people in Quebec. In future, more and more people study Spanish and less study French because French is more difficult and looks old-fashioned. Anyway, some days I will learn French because it sounds nice to hear.
Some of South East Asian nations once were colonised by France but now not many people study French. Chinese is most spoken as a second language after English instead.
An[d] whip those Brits into shape!
Hehe.
But seriously, there would be no conflict. Just as the RAE acknowledges most dialectal differences, the IES (International English Society) could be descriptive, rather than proscriptive, in establishing rules and standards. But more importantly, it could help steer English toward being more consistent and logical, which it sorely needs to become. And this society should NOT be governed merely by native speakers from the US, UK, Canada, Australia, etc., but by people from all over the world, since English is, for better or worse, the lingua franca right now, and those people should have some say in the future development of the language. Native English speakers will surely howl at this idea, but it is actually to their benefit, because the simpler English is to learn and use, the more readily it will be accepted for international use, and the easier life will be for native speakers. In fact, I suspect that non-native speakers could probably make better suggestions for improvement than native speakers, because they have a different perspective on learning the language.
James Santiago said:
Samdie has given you an excellent answer, but I think one thing is clear: regardless of how you count speakers: French is NEVER going to be in second place, and will always be much farther down the list. 100+ years ago, French was the international language for business and diplomacy, but it hasn't held that distinction for a long time. This should settle your bar bets on this issue.
Of interest is that in the list given at the second linked site above, English is the only "world language" without a regulating body. I think it desperately needs one, and I wonder that nobody has managed to set one up.
An whip those Brits into shape!
I agree with James 100%.
Samdie has given you an excellent answer, but I think one thing is clear: regardless of how you count speakers: French is NEVER going to be in second place, and will always be much farther down the list. 100+ years ago, French was the international language for business and diplomacy, but it hasn't held that distinction for a long time. This should settle your bar bets on this issue.
Of interest is that in the list given at the second linked site above, English is the only "world language" without a regulating body. I think it desperately needs one, and I wonder that nobody has managed to set one up.
punisher said:
thanx for the informations samdie, i agree there are several ways to count speakers of a language. but lets put it this way===> if you have a choice to learn one language, which language would u choose,
i know it depends on what part of the world you live in but let us say in (general) what language you think it will be the most usefull for you (worldwide)?
I don't think that it's possible to give a "good" answer because there are so many possible reasons for wanting to learn another language. I started to learn Japanese because I was interested in their culture and, especially, their cinema and because I find Japanese (many) women to be especially attractive. However, someone else might think those reasons to be (at best) frivolous. I studied Arabic because (at that time) I had to choose between Spanish and Arabic and I was already reasonably proficient in Spanish and ready to try a non Indo-European language. In a thread about "What's a good language to study if you want to be a translator'" Chinese and Russian were suggested because they offer the best chances of providing well-paying jobs. For many people the main factor is friends/relatives who speak language X or the likelihood of traveling to country Y or having a strong interest in the literature of country Z. So many languages; so many reasons ...!
thanx for the informations samdie, i agree there are several ways to count speakers of a language.
but lets put it this way===> if you have a choice to learn one language, which language would u choose,
i know it depends on what part of the world you live in but let us say in (general) what language you think it will be the most usefull for you (worldwide)'
Try these:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_languages_by_number_of_native_speakers
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Major_language
(note there are several ways to count "speakers" of a language)
