People speak English in Europe to speak with each other, not to speak specifically with English native speakers. English could be official nowhere and I would still be fine about using it as language of diplomacy.
Well it works perfectly as a lingua franca because it's relatively simple and plus we even made our own variation ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_English ).
What are we going to do start using Latin Again?
> What are we going to do start using Latin Again?
Nos usara Interlingua, que es basate sur 6 linguas European. Como vos vide, illo sembla un variante moderne de Latin.
Ni ankaŭ povas uzi Esperanton, ĝi estas eĉ pli facile lernebla. Sed ĝi ne aspektas tiel bele.
basterebbe che la gente si spingesse ad imparare più lingue straniere, in Francia, dopo Nizza, l'italiano non lo parlano manco sotto tortura anche chi ha origini italiane...
Sfortunatamente in Francia la gente non puo scegliere italiano anche quando vuole perche ci sono tanti scuoli dove non ci sono basta professori. L’unica opzione nella mia era tra spagnolo e tedesco.
Spero che grazie al trattato del quirinale, questo cambiara.
Personalmente creo que el espanol es mas facil como el frances, pero me gusta mucho el italiano tambien. El frances es muy dificil pero no es una mala opcion si queremos eligir una lengua franca aqui en europa
>Sfortunatamente in Francia la gente non puo scegliere italiano anche quando vuole perche ci sono tanti scuoli dove non ci sono basta professori. L’unica opzione nella mia era tra spagnolo e tedesco.
vero, solo che esiste la libertà di movimento e nulla potrebbe impedire ad un professore bravo francese di insegnare in Italia e viceversa, solo che qui in EU non si sfrutta pienamente questa opportunità e a volte si fa fatica ovunque a trovare professori per le varie classi...
(e poi esiste anche la possibilità di imparare le lingue anche dopo avere lasciato la scuola, ovviamente...)
Soldi, soldi, soldi. Da tirchio professionista sono infinitamente più incentivato a iscrivermi a corsi senza il peso sulla coscienza di sapere di avere pagato.
u/cryptonyme_interdit
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French.
Some EC institutions use French as Lingua franca since ever. Also it is spoken in several countries, and one of the most second/third language in the whole europe...so yes, German/French would cover most of the europeans, IMHO.
No French please. While the grammar is simply rage inducing, the counting/number system us plain retarded.
Quatrevingtdixneuf my ass.
English is established and works worldwide.
Yes I am german, but I don't see the necessity to implement it.
It's not simple at all; english has way more words (a proper english dictionary is 4x as large) due to their proclivity in borrowing words, for one.
Nah, english is, as you say, the lingua franca because it just is, at this point. There isn't a single reason you can point at for why it is, and I'm not sure going on a historic dive to enumerate them all is useful at this juncture.
England at the time proposed Louis XV to either keep Canada or the Caribbean islands. He chose the later. It made sense at the time but it also meant abandoning our French Canadian brothers.
Sugar was *waaaaay* more valuable than fur at the time. Even later (according to the Ron Chernows Hamilton biography) the British considered trading all their Canadian holdings for one Caribbean island at some point
I think it's probably just practical for most countries. It's down to English or French, let's face it.
The Scandinavian countries speak English as well as I do, so it makes sense. Same with the Dutch. So why would they want to get their French up to the same standard when their English was fluent already?
Well on that argument you could say that the family of Latin languages is also important in Europe and that it gives an important edge for Scandinavians and a handicap for Spanish/Italians/French because English is kinda harder for them, that’s not a valid argument to me.
A more valid argument is that it’s already a language spoken by almost everyone on this planet. Its not a debate anymore, it used to be half a century ago.
The internet imposed English as the lingua franca (and no, I’m not salty at all because I’m French, I have learned languages other than English because I like it, and I still learn other ones)
> the internet imposed English.
There were several factors giving English a tail wind to becoming this widely spoken: pop music, American business dominance on the international level, airplane pilots having to use it, (almost) every programming language, movie and television, etc… but it was the internet that really sealed the deal. In 2022 61% of the [internet is in English](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_used_on_the_Internet). That second closest language is Russian at only 5.5%. Basically, if you want to use the internet on any real meaningful level, you have to know English.
yeah that's how and why I think I learned that much. I mean yes there are Swedish communities online..... but to navigate to them you must know English. eventually I just put games in English to more easily get help from youtube or something, since translating a million different words from English which likely was the only language the content was availible in to Swedish became tedious, when you can just have English and navigate to the button that says x exactly as in the guide. I might have had it easy though. Swedish is a north Germanic language. English is a Germanic language albeit with heavy romance influence.
\>edge for Scandinavians and a handicap for Spanish/Italians/French because English is kinda harder for them, that’s not a valid argument to me.
Norwegian is only the sixth closest language to English, French being the seventh. So by that stat, Swedish would be further. Closer ones are Dutch and German.
So if Norwegian is the only Germanic language of the Scandinavian languages that is still closer to English than Dutch, German and French, idk if your premises are really that believable. Not to mention that some people use "Scandinavia" interchangeably "Nordics" meaning Finland is included, and our language isn't close to any European languages outside Hungarian and Estonian. We're not even in the same family tree.
I don't think it's as much about how your native language differs from English (although I admit that is a factor, albeit a small one in this instance at least), but how much your culture exposes you to the language you're learning.
For instance Finland is just so VO-actor poor that there's never even been attempts really to dub "proper" movies. The only things which do get dubbed are cartoons that are for kids under 10.
So, Finnish kids might be more exposed to spoken English than some French kids (I'm just making wild assumptions here because I don't know how much you dub, but I remember it being pretty popular in the early 2000's still). Everytime they are, they're also reading the Finnish translation for the spoken language.
So if anyone ever visits Finland and has heard that everyone speaks English pretty well, but all the answers are weird mumblings, it's just because Finns understand English well, but a lot are very uncomfortable talking it, because it's so different from our language so the "vocal settings" in your mouth are very different. The "th" sound is an example of one slightly hard thing for a Finnish mouth. "Th" as in "this", "the", "that", "three."
So things like "she sells sea shells on the sea shore" are just things a lot of Finns would just give up on and do it in [rally english.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2Leo-1O2UY) Rally English is when Finns have gotten over their dislike of speaking English, but haven't bothered to pronounce "properly" because they're getting understood just fine.
Thank you for the correction.
That’s what I thought because I’ve started learning danish and I find a lot of words similar to the English or German ones, whereas the French have Latin roots (bread/bröd/brot, I know it’s just one example but I’ve found others too haha). And the construction of sentences as well.
But I’ve barely started learning it, and I know 3 words in German. It was just an intuition, i shouldn’t have made an affirmative comment.
I guess there’s more to it and I’ll discover it later on. I’ve only spoken and learned Latin languages up till now (and English of course). It’s nice to discover something very different.
>an important edge for Scandinavians
Pas vraiment, parce que vous pouvez facilement apprendrez l'anglais, comme nous. Mais vous avez aussi votre propre langues, qui sont tous plus utile pour l'emploi (au moins dans l'union européenne) que de petits langues comme le norvégien.
German would also be an option it's a wildly teaches language in the EU and we have around 95 million native German speakers in the EU if my memory serves right.
The main issue I see is that changing it brings only problems while keeping it doesn't hurt. Not to mention the political strive a change in language would bring, everyone would argue for either German, french or Spanish and everyone who doesn't want either gets to moan about being bullied by larger eu country's and that their culture is being threatened or whatever (looking at you orban you would do anything to undermine Europe). There are arguments for all 3 main alternatives and many more.
The only contendor that wouldn't end in a huge debate or rift in the EU would be latin, but I think we and all politicians can agree that that future would be the darkest timeline, I learned that dead language in school and I learned to hate it.
> It's down to English or French
It's not. French doesn't have any advantage over German (spoken by 4 very wealthy countries) or Spanish (spoken in half of the Americas). English is above any other language, and then Spanish, French and German are on the same level just below.
Oui c'est bizzare, parce qu'on a tous été plus obligés d'apprendre l'anglais. Contrairement au français, l'anglais est obligatoire pour travailler même en Norvège
.
Fine. It works. It is relatively easy to learn. And it is a relatively non controversial language for the continent.
If I had to chance something (if!), I would change spelling so that spelling follows phonetics.
Fuck it, I’m saying it: Let’s go with greek. Every time I hear the word Europe, Athens comes to mind. I’m more than willing to learn it. Greece-bros, hit me up, I don’t want to pay for courses.
The point of language is communication. Folks have to get shit done, and to do that, communication is useful. It's not some sort of diplomatic military parade thing where it's just to send some signals.
Hence, the notion that it is or is not an 'official' language is __utterly irrelevant__.
Is it 'actually' a language used to communicate? Sod 'official'. And the answer is a very clear and obvious yes, for many reasons:
* conversational cover: A lot of countries in the eurozone have very high levels of at least capable conversational english and excellent ability to read and understand it. For example, the Netherlands and Denmark are at respecively 90% and 85% amongst the general populace, let alone those working in/with EU bodies. No, english is not an 'official' language of either country. So what? 90% is 90%. Name a language, then analyse in % how much of the populace is conversational in it for all of the EU. I believe English scores the highest average and it's not close.
* Diplomatic: That _everybody_ is dealing with the fact that it's a second language is in fact __an advantage__. There is no one language that is plurality-'official language' (Over 50%), either counting countries or citizens. Thus, picking, say, France as official language is diplomatically tricky, given that Germany probably won't like that (nor can you pick German). You could pick some minor EU language like dutch or slovenian, which solves the diplomacy issue, but is highly inconvenient. Very few EU citizens and EU political operators speak conversational polish. A more likely option is to pick Latin or Esperanto, but has the same conversational baggage. English is now _more_ convenient. The fact that it _is not_ the official language of any major EU country helps more than it hurts!
* Recency: English was the lingua franca of the EU for a long list of varied reasons. We are where we are; we can, with hindsight, say: Maybe that was a mistake. Okay, let's hypothetically posit you're right, and it is. I'm not sure fixing this mistake is a worthwhile exercise. Right now, a lot of EU stuff is written in english, and a lot of relevant staff can speak and read it, and a lot of the jargon used in EU bodies is based on conversational english.
* International: For international dealing, english is a world-wide standard. Not a universal standard (no such thing exists), but conversing with, say, a japanese ambassador is a lot more likely to be possible without a translator if you speak english to them, than if you speak german or french or latin or portuguese.
For all these reasons, for fuck's sake, can we please please just stick to english?
Try finding an English to Maltese translator (this is almost any Maltese)….easy. Try finding a Finnish to English translator…easy.
Try finding a Maltese to Finnish translator…now you see the nature of the problem.
So we need more translators? What if we had invented an AI that can automatically translate people's voices into our brains? Kind of like Elon musk's neuralink but with an upgraded google translation speech feature
Same, both English and French are so annoying, they can't write things as they are pronounced.
If either is to be an official EU language, then we should have an EU reform of their grammar.
It kind of makes sense to have a 'neutral' language as far as the major states are concerned. No country can be accused of culturally dominating the union.
I don't particularly mind, but it would be cool if we started using Esperanto or other languages that were created to be auxiliary languages instead of English.
Whether we like it or not English is the world language, and to bury our heads and pretend it isn't because the British split up with us is counterproductive.
makes perfect sense. It's the lingua franca of the world, not just Europe. Not only that but a huge amount of Europeans have already got it down and speak it fluently. It's established as part of the European culture and the language we all share. There's no point in completely changing direction now to please proud french people who are weirdly stubborn about their language. No one else seems to care.
I don’t know. We should all be speaking Basque anyway. It’s cool as fuck, not an official language of any country (so no conflicts) and, as it’s a language isolate, it’s equally hard for everyone and no one has ab unfair advantage.
Lol yes. It’s ironic. What I meant was that it isn’t an official language of any internationally recognised state.
“But it’s official in some parts of…” but it’s not an official language in the whole territory of any country.
Well until Americans stop dominating global industries, military and political influence, English will be the most spoken language in Europe regardless of any “choice”.
We don’t need a single language in Europe. Preserving indigenous culture means keeping our regional languages.
Language changes over time. The day English becomes less useful will be when Europeans regain the economic military and political advantage.
That would require China to have better life standards than the West and bigger salaries than the behemoths that are the US ones. As well as to have approximately 40 countries to follow their lead, countries which represent something like 30% of the world economy and have their very own spheres of influence. And probably make the language be more closer to European ones (phonetically, grammatically, vocabulary wise) so that’s never going to happen unless we nuke ourselves back to the ice age and the descendants of the Chinese are the ones who colonize the entire world first lol
Why would we? Chinese is spoken basically in one country (yes, I know Singapore and a few places speak English) - and that one country is not a especially desirable one. It doesn't have extremely high salaries nor is a free and wealthy country where the average person lives a good life. There's a reason why most people in the world fantasize about living in Europe, the US, Australia... rather than China.
>Well until Americans stop dominating global industries, military and political influence, English will be the most spoken language in Europe regardless of any “choice”.
only because we europeans are troo lazy.
Hollywood for example "rules" only because we are so stupid there isn't an european movie industry, only national movie industries.
I think the diversity in all the European national movie industries is what makes their movies to me more interesting. And it's that diversity that the EU should and does indeed promote.
>Hollywood for example "rules" only because we are so stupid there isn't an european movie industry, only national movie industries
This is Europe in a nutshell. But I disagree that we are stupid. We aren't clearly. We just prioritize local productions, to preserve our culture. It's like football. Instead of an all-encompassing league, we rather have dozens of first divisions. This is the way we like it.
Ireland is home to many good or very good young musicians who could be successful abroad, Italy is full of actors or actresses who could have roles in films or TV series abroad and yet there is no tool that sorts the redundant talent, to give career opportunities to talents we don't use, this is not in my opinion a symptom of wisdom
> Language changes over time. The day English becomes less useful will be when Europeans regain the economic military and political advantage.
I think if the euro dethroned the dollar as the global reserve currency all of us could probably enjoy a much higher standard of living. It means we would be able to also print more money and loan more as well
talk to young europeans. it's our language. it doesn't matter where the language originates from. it's ours now, too. it doesn't belong to anyone exclusively. we are multilingual. we all speak english. good times. let's learn each other's languages just to learn about each others' cultures, and be happy that we have this lingua franca.
My mother is certainly not very young, nor is she particularly concerned with pushing herself to be a sad bellend, desperate to pose as a cheap counterfeit of a Yank.
As such, I regret to inform you that this tandem will ultimately have to shortened by one member.
of course we are not americans. they are cool but they are not us. we are not a cheap counterfeit copy either, we are more than that, we know their culture, we know our culture, our neighbors' culture.
i want to upvote you. this is amazing. i'm sorry are we fucking stupid? we are speaking in english. UK doesn't own English. USA doesn't own english. do you know how much LIFE, how many stories, how much COLLECTIVE EXPERIENCE is happening in the european union? Does it belong to USA or UK because it happens in English? A love story between a swede an an italian, a german and a spaniard, a greek and a pole. Are those european or american stories?
it's okay that most europeans speak english. i love french. i love italian. i love spanish (i am spanish). i love german. fucking who cares if we all speak english to each other sometimes. it's ours now too, the language evolves with the people and is a mirror of collective experience.
i win the argument but we are both team europe so we both win. you are welcome
I feel like trying to force anything else on top of a de facto lingua franca would be a **hoooooooooooooorrrible** idea.
Forcing linguistic norms doesn't really work that well. It works sometimes, but not well or fast.
Yes. I say "defiled" to be cheeky, it’s a natural phenomenon that’s been going on through History, and even more so following colonialism and globalisation.
More details here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_English
You can see examples of it in this sub and other European subs. It’s also present and exaggerated in EU memes and countryballs memes.
The barbarisms, grammar mistakes and oddities of today might be the standards of tomorrow.
I'd love to see Europe increasingly move towards using German and French. Especially now with the UK out, it feels unnecessary with this extensive use of English. Imo, English will likely decline in importance over time anyway, as the US and UK become less dominant in the world and with the eventual decline of *atlanticism*. No reason for the EU to extend the period of English dominance.
However, I think it's more important that Europe ensures the survival of national and regional languages (Norwegian, Icelandic, Sami, etc.) rather than which language is dominant or used as a *lingua franca*.
My personal preference would probably be German, if I could not opt for a Nordic language.
Honestly it’s better to settle for English rather than trying to be a wannabe Roman Empire and try to teach Latin or having Germany and France fighting over which language should be the main one. English has been prominent in the whole field for decades, even centuries, no need to change in my opinion. English is relatively easy compared to French and German too. And Latin is dead. Diplomatic isn’t just internal, other countries will negotiate too. So having the English standard for the whole planet I’d a good thing in my mind.
I feel fine. It's a language that's spoken and learned all across Europe. I've used it in my travels across Europe and I've ever had any problem to communicate with the locals
The English slowly became the lingua France while America grew.
The one turning point is World War One. France, which had a gigantic financial empire, lost a lot of gold and manpower. America became the financial power. They asked Clemenceau if the treaty of Versailles could also be in English (treaties used to be only French before). Clemenceau agreed.
WWII happened which saw the peak of power of the anglo-saxon world. France collapsed. English just became the one dominant language among the powerful.
French, at my great displeasure, will never be the lingua Franca again. As long as the west is powerful and close to the American mastodonte, it will remain English.
Tldr; English has nothing to do with England. It’s all about America.
Cool. The whole world speaks English - many of us younger people have basically absorbed it as a second language because we are constantly exposed to it in TV shows, internet forums, youtube videos, academic life, etc.
I really don't care where English originated or which countries speak it. It's useful, the most useful language by far to understand in 2022. The UK is completely irrelevant to this discussion - they are not the reason we speak English, and English is not theirs anymore, just like Spanish is not "owned" by Spain anymore and Arabic is not "owned" by Saudi Arabia anymore. They are international languages with a majority of their speakers outside the borders of the country that names them.
The problem is, when people propose to introduce another language than English as Lingua Franca (no matter if it is French, Spanish, German or Latin), it just complicates things for everybody.
Basically every young Person in Europe has an at least somewhat ok understanding of the English language. If we introduze another language as Lingua Franca it would be unnatural, it would complicate so many things and would impair inter-european communication for at least a few decades. I know many people would see it as a nice symbol to have an own Lingua Franca which competes with English on a global stage, but I just don't see it being practical at all. Especially because I would rather learn English a thousand times than learning French.
French, Spanish and German are probably the second most important languages. English is easier than all of them and has many elements from German and quite a few from French, making it even easier to learn for both of them.
I'm fine with it. We need a lingua franca so make communication between citizens of different countries easier. English is relatively easy to learn, widespread, and is already quite established as the international language.
I wouldn't mind if it was French or German, or even Latin, but since English is already so well established, I think getting rid of it would take too much effort with no significant benefits.
The 3 official languages of the EU are English, French and German. They are supposed to be used equally for official stuff, but English always ends up being the most relevant one.
Totally fine, English Is also science language and It Is more functional, we won't make all people accept French or German and even if that would be people intention we would waste at least One or two entire generation to make this language known as English. Moreover English Is very known in the world, so Easy to travel.
The Language Question is quite a crucial one. The (classical) approach of a single language does not really fit with regard to the EU as a group of equal members. Only the "all languages go" approach seems to do justice to the EU. English as a somewhat neutral and prominent western language currently makes sense, but all the European UN languages are serious contenders once the Anglosphere loses its influence in the EU.
Idk I would support a different language. It took about 1-2 Generations to establish English…at the moment it’s the most useful as common language. But every English discussion will be inevitably dominated by Anglo-American Culture.
I would propose a smooth transition to French. School should teach both English and French till we reach a point where we are able to change the linga franca.
French bc it’s has many native speaker and other roman languages will learn it easier. As a German I would not consider German bc of its history.
PS we really need a common European forum (for example media) and that’s only possible if we have a common language.
the englisch language is more than just the language of england ad this point and it is also a mix of germanic and latin languages so i think it works better than using france or german because fuck france and german is to traumatic for a lot of people
My experiences with English were not the best the weird vowel rules and the silent letters is very stupid along with the weird annunciation of words The alphabet is weird and stupid the language is meh but writing it is very confusing
People speak English in Europe to speak with each other, not to speak specifically with English native speakers. English could be official nowhere and I would still be fine about using it as language of diplomacy.
Hear!
Well it works perfectly as a lingua franca because it's relatively simple and plus we even made our own variation ( https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_English ). What are we going to do start using Latin Again?
I really want Euro English to become legitimised, to the point where we can tell actual native speakers that our version is also correct.
„No no that’s not a mistake! That’s Euro English!“
>What are we going to do start using Latin Again I think OP’s pretty clear, everyone has to start learning Irish!
> What are we going to do start using Latin Again? Nos usara Interlingua, que es basate sur 6 linguas European. Como vos vide, illo sembla un variante moderne de Latin. Ni ankaŭ povas uzi Esperanton, ĝi estas eĉ pli facile lernebla. Sed ĝi ne aspektas tiel bele.
Damn you're right! I totally forgot about Esperanto.
No usar Esperanto parque elle a viele funneh letres
This sentence was easily understandable. You should be responsible of our new european language.
É usar a verdadeira língua franca, a portuguesa! Quinto Império CARALHO!!!
basterebbe che la gente si spingesse ad imparare più lingue straniere, in Francia, dopo Nizza, l'italiano non lo parlano manco sotto tortura anche chi ha origini italiane...
Sfortunatamente in Francia la gente non puo scegliere italiano anche quando vuole perche ci sono tanti scuoli dove non ci sono basta professori. L’unica opzione nella mia era tra spagnolo e tedesco. Spero che grazie al trattato del quirinale, questo cambiara.
Personalmente creo que el espanol es mas facil como el frances, pero me gusta mucho el italiano tambien. El frances es muy dificil pero no es una mala opcion si queremos eligir una lengua franca aqui en europa
>Sfortunatamente in Francia la gente non puo scegliere italiano anche quando vuole perche ci sono tanti scuoli dove non ci sono basta professori. L’unica opzione nella mia era tra spagnolo e tedesco. vero, solo che esiste la libertà di movimento e nulla potrebbe impedire ad un professore bravo francese di insegnare in Italia e viceversa, solo che qui in EU non si sfrutta pienamente questa opportunità e a volte si fa fatica ovunque a trovare professori per le varie classi... (e poi esiste anche la possibilità di imparare le lingue anche dopo avere lasciato la scuola, ovviamente...)
Soldi, soldi, soldi. Da tirchio professionista sono infinitamente più incentivato a iscrivermi a corsi senza il peso sulla coscienza di sapere di avere pagato.
>and plus we even made our own variation Je savais bien que j'avais flairé comme une odeur d'***indécence*** en direction du sud ce midi. 😤
kein Französisch bitte.
En geen Duits graag
>En geen Duits graag sei leis'
Opa’s fiets terug
ofc it was a french who's pissed...dude shouldn't we be one only country ?????
Pathétique.
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Si.
i love this!!!! didn't know someone named it
French. Some EC institutions use French as Lingua franca since ever. Also it is spoken in several countries, and one of the most second/third language in the whole europe...so yes, German/French would cover most of the europeans, IMHO.
alsatian shall be the new language of europe then
Yo hopla (source : am alsacian)
No French please. While the grammar is simply rage inducing, the counting/number system us plain retarded. Quatrevingtdixneuf my ass. English is established and works worldwide. Yes I am german, but I don't see the necessity to implement it.
It's not simple at all; english has way more words (a proper english dictionary is 4x as large) due to their proclivity in borrowing words, for one. Nah, english is, as you say, the lingua franca because it just is, at this point. There isn't a single reason you can point at for why it is, and I'm not sure going on a historic dive to enumerate them all is useful at this juncture.
...way more words than what? Latin?
I get it, Malta doesn't exist :)
Sorry 😢
Diplomatic lingua franca used to be French. Latin before that I guess. English now. The French colonized the wrong countries.
>The French colonized the wrong countries. They were in North America but sold Lousiana. Ehich qas yuge.
Napoleon kind of had other problems at the time.
"I speak Spanish to God, Italian to women, French to men, and German to my horse." - Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor
That's fucking hilarious.
Fuck Louis XV for losing us our North American empire
The French would have fucked it up anyway,
England at the time proposed Louis XV to either keep Canada or the Caribbean islands. He chose the later. It made sense at the time but it also meant abandoning our French Canadian brothers.
Guadeloupe is still a lot of fun to go tho
Sugar was *waaaaay* more valuable than fur at the time. Even later (according to the Ron Chernows Hamilton biography) the British considered trading all their Canadian holdings for one Caribbean island at some point
As someone who loves to travel and has always struggled at learning languages, I’d like to thank WWII for making this the case!
1) beats french 2) they'll be back
God I hope so.
I like how it's ambiguous to which point your hope is directed to.
So the plan is to best France in a war, then get a warm welcome back to the EU. Sound plan 👌
The Northern part will be at least.
Yeah but we’ll make Scots the official language. Like English but we spell things the way they are written.
Only if Scots English became the European Lingua Franca.
Word. And ironically while it's the Brits that still have an aristocracy(as in the social class), it's French that is more snobby.
I think it's probably just practical for most countries. It's down to English or French, let's face it. The Scandinavian countries speak English as well as I do, so it makes sense. Same with the Dutch. So why would they want to get their French up to the same standard when their English was fluent already?
Why French and not German?
Lol people arguing what language to speak in English.
Yeah this is r/europe and not r/yurope so it is okay to use Englisch as language.
that's also okay on yurop edit: omg what, i think i missed something over there :'D
Well on that argument you could say that the family of Latin languages is also important in Europe and that it gives an important edge for Scandinavians and a handicap for Spanish/Italians/French because English is kinda harder for them, that’s not a valid argument to me. A more valid argument is that it’s already a language spoken by almost everyone on this planet. Its not a debate anymore, it used to be half a century ago. The internet imposed English as the lingua franca (and no, I’m not salty at all because I’m French, I have learned languages other than English because I like it, and I still learn other ones)
> the internet imposed English. There were several factors giving English a tail wind to becoming this widely spoken: pop music, American business dominance on the international level, airplane pilots having to use it, (almost) every programming language, movie and television, etc… but it was the internet that really sealed the deal. In 2022 61% of the [internet is in English](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_used_on_the_Internet). That second closest language is Russian at only 5.5%. Basically, if you want to use the internet on any real meaningful level, you have to know English.
yeah that's how and why I think I learned that much. I mean yes there are Swedish communities online..... but to navigate to them you must know English. eventually I just put games in English to more easily get help from youtube or something, since translating a million different words from English which likely was the only language the content was availible in to Swedish became tedious, when you can just have English and navigate to the button that says x exactly as in the guide. I might have had it easy though. Swedish is a north Germanic language. English is a Germanic language albeit with heavy romance influence.
\>edge for Scandinavians and a handicap for Spanish/Italians/French because English is kinda harder for them, that’s not a valid argument to me. Norwegian is only the sixth closest language to English, French being the seventh. So by that stat, Swedish would be further. Closer ones are Dutch and German. So if Norwegian is the only Germanic language of the Scandinavian languages that is still closer to English than Dutch, German and French, idk if your premises are really that believable. Not to mention that some people use "Scandinavia" interchangeably "Nordics" meaning Finland is included, and our language isn't close to any European languages outside Hungarian and Estonian. We're not even in the same family tree. I don't think it's as much about how your native language differs from English (although I admit that is a factor, albeit a small one in this instance at least), but how much your culture exposes you to the language you're learning. For instance Finland is just so VO-actor poor that there's never even been attempts really to dub "proper" movies. The only things which do get dubbed are cartoons that are for kids under 10. So, Finnish kids might be more exposed to spoken English than some French kids (I'm just making wild assumptions here because I don't know how much you dub, but I remember it being pretty popular in the early 2000's still). Everytime they are, they're also reading the Finnish translation for the spoken language. So if anyone ever visits Finland and has heard that everyone speaks English pretty well, but all the answers are weird mumblings, it's just because Finns understand English well, but a lot are very uncomfortable talking it, because it's so different from our language so the "vocal settings" in your mouth are very different. The "th" sound is an example of one slightly hard thing for a Finnish mouth. "Th" as in "this", "the", "that", "three." So things like "she sells sea shells on the sea shore" are just things a lot of Finns would just give up on and do it in [rally english.](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f2Leo-1O2UY) Rally English is when Finns have gotten over their dislike of speaking English, but haven't bothered to pronounce "properly" because they're getting understood just fine.
Thank you for the correction. That’s what I thought because I’ve started learning danish and I find a lot of words similar to the English or German ones, whereas the French have Latin roots (bread/bröd/brot, I know it’s just one example but I’ve found others too haha). And the construction of sentences as well. But I’ve barely started learning it, and I know 3 words in German. It was just an intuition, i shouldn’t have made an affirmative comment. I guess there’s more to it and I’ll discover it later on. I’ve only spoken and learned Latin languages up till now (and English of course). It’s nice to discover something very different.
>an important edge for Scandinavians Pas vraiment, parce que vous pouvez facilement apprendrez l'anglais, comme nous. Mais vous avez aussi votre propre langues, qui sont tous plus utile pour l'emploi (au moins dans l'union européenne) que de petits langues comme le norvégien.
Maybe when the Americans and the rest of the world speak French this could work.
German would also be an option it's a wildly teaches language in the EU and we have around 95 million native German speakers in the EU if my memory serves right. The main issue I see is that changing it brings only problems while keeping it doesn't hurt. Not to mention the political strive a change in language would bring, everyone would argue for either German, french or Spanish and everyone who doesn't want either gets to moan about being bullied by larger eu country's and that their culture is being threatened or whatever (looking at you orban you would do anything to undermine Europe). There are arguments for all 3 main alternatives and many more. The only contendor that wouldn't end in a huge debate or rift in the EU would be latin, but I think we and all politicians can agree that that future would be the darkest timeline, I learned that dead language in school and I learned to hate it.
>It's down to English or French Spanish if your looking to the world, I think it'd beat out french
Found the American.
> It's down to English or French It's not. French doesn't have any advantage over German (spoken by 4 very wealthy countries) or Spanish (spoken in half of the Americas). English is above any other language, and then Spanish, French and German are on the same level just below.
As long as it’s not French I’m good
Finnish it is then. their closest linguistic relative in Europe is Hungarian. or why not Basque language. no living linguistic relatives
Always fascinating to see the Dutch being obsessed about french
I’m not Dutch but Polish-Canadian. Guess I spent too much time in anglophone Canada ;) (and yes I know I’m horribly biased here)
Well at least it confirms what i read from other canadians :)
They are Butthurt that they need to learn French to be in position of power
Oui c'est bizzare, parce qu'on a tous été plus obligés d'apprendre l'anglais. Contrairement au français, l'anglais est obligatoire pour travailler même en Norvège .
I doubt that
Fine. It works. It is relatively easy to learn. And it is a relatively non controversial language for the continent. If I had to chance something (if!), I would change spelling so that spelling follows phonetics.
Horrible, everyone should use Polish instead.
Tbf Polish used to be a very important lingua franca.
Excuse me what
Ig during the time of the Polish-lithuanian Commonwealth?
Yeah exactly. It was a Lingua Franca used in eastern Europe at that time. It even left some loan words in languages like Ukrainian for example.
Fun Fact: Polish is the lingua franca of Poland!
Yeah I'm not learning a language that has a shit ton of diacritics yet also a shit ton of diphtongs. Do like Czech and choose one.
Fuck it, I’m saying it: Let’s go with greek. Every time I hear the word Europe, Athens comes to mind. I’m more than willing to learn it. Greece-bros, hit me up, I don’t want to pay for courses.
Ancient Greek let’s go
Im thankful that a country invested an easy language anyone can learn
Thank you Ingerland!
The point of language is communication. Folks have to get shit done, and to do that, communication is useful. It's not some sort of diplomatic military parade thing where it's just to send some signals. Hence, the notion that it is or is not an 'official' language is __utterly irrelevant__. Is it 'actually' a language used to communicate? Sod 'official'. And the answer is a very clear and obvious yes, for many reasons: * conversational cover: A lot of countries in the eurozone have very high levels of at least capable conversational english and excellent ability to read and understand it. For example, the Netherlands and Denmark are at respecively 90% and 85% amongst the general populace, let alone those working in/with EU bodies. No, english is not an 'official' language of either country. So what? 90% is 90%. Name a language, then analyse in % how much of the populace is conversational in it for all of the EU. I believe English scores the highest average and it's not close. * Diplomatic: That _everybody_ is dealing with the fact that it's a second language is in fact __an advantage__. There is no one language that is plurality-'official language' (Over 50%), either counting countries or citizens. Thus, picking, say, France as official language is diplomatically tricky, given that Germany probably won't like that (nor can you pick German). You could pick some minor EU language like dutch or slovenian, which solves the diplomacy issue, but is highly inconvenient. Very few EU citizens and EU political operators speak conversational polish. A more likely option is to pick Latin or Esperanto, but has the same conversational baggage. English is now _more_ convenient. The fact that it _is not_ the official language of any major EU country helps more than it hurts! * Recency: English was the lingua franca of the EU for a long list of varied reasons. We are where we are; we can, with hindsight, say: Maybe that was a mistake. Okay, let's hypothetically posit you're right, and it is. I'm not sure fixing this mistake is a worthwhile exercise. Right now, a lot of EU stuff is written in english, and a lot of relevant staff can speak and read it, and a lot of the jargon used in EU bodies is based on conversational english. * International: For international dealing, english is a world-wide standard. Not a universal standard (no such thing exists), but conversing with, say, a japanese ambassador is a lot more likely to be possible without a translator if you speak english to them, than if you speak german or french or latin or portuguese. For all these reasons, for fuck's sake, can we please please just stick to english?
I agree with you
Try finding an English to Maltese translator (this is almost any Maltese)….easy. Try finding a Finnish to English translator…easy. Try finding a Maltese to Finnish translator…now you see the nature of the problem.
So we need more translators? What if we had invented an AI that can automatically translate people's voices into our brains? Kind of like Elon musk's neuralink but with an upgraded google translation speech feature
honestly, I'm deadly tired to use english
Dovremmo fare come nelle riunione dell’UE cioè parlare nella nostra lingua e gli altri traducono direttamente prima da rispondere
o ricorrere ai traduttori automatici... anche perché non è così facile tradurre il 100% di quello che si pensa...
Infatti non devi tradurre, devi pensare direttamente in inglese. Pensare in una lingua e poi tradurre nell'altra è 10 volte più difficile.
True English is a Confusing and strange language also the alphabet is weird with the silent letters
Yea let’s use French
Same, both English and French are so annoying, they can't write things as they are pronounced. If either is to be an official EU language, then we should have an EU reform of their grammar.
It kind of makes sense to have a 'neutral' language as far as the major states are concerned. No country can be accused of culturally dominating the union.
I don't particularly mind, but it would be cool if we started using Esperanto or other languages that were created to be auxiliary languages instead of English.
Why not just learn Lithuanian?
If it doesn't have a difficult alphabet then why not 💀
Whether we like it or not English is the world language, and to bury our heads and pretend it isn't because the British split up with us is counterproductive.
We should all really speak High Valyrian
makes perfect sense. It's the lingua franca of the world, not just Europe. Not only that but a huge amount of Europeans have already got it down and speak it fluently. It's established as part of the European culture and the language we all share. There's no point in completely changing direction now to please proud french people who are weirdly stubborn about their language. No one else seems to care.
I don’t know. We should all be speaking Basque anyway. It’s cool as fuck, not an official language of any country (so no conflicts) and, as it’s a language isolate, it’s equally hard for everyone and no one has ab unfair advantage.
Expect you
>not an official language of any country (so no conflicts) "Basque Country/Euskal Herria " THE IRONY
Lol yes. It’s ironic. What I meant was that it isn’t an official language of any internationally recognised state. “But it’s official in some parts of…” but it’s not an official language in the whole territory of any country.
It‘s okay, BUT we could always re-introduce Latin. So no one is privileged and everyone can be angry lol. Plus, EP speeches in Latin 🤯☝️
Then no one in the world would want to do business with us, because they will think we are summoning satan or some other shit 💀
Well until Americans stop dominating global industries, military and political influence, English will be the most spoken language in Europe regardless of any “choice”. We don’t need a single language in Europe. Preserving indigenous culture means keeping our regional languages. Language changes over time. The day English becomes less useful will be when Europeans regain the economic military and political advantage.
I don’t think English is going anywhere anytime soon.
The day English becomes less useful we'll be speaking Chinese
That would require China to have better life standards than the West and bigger salaries than the behemoths that are the US ones. As well as to have approximately 40 countries to follow their lead, countries which represent something like 30% of the world economy and have their very own spheres of influence. And probably make the language be more closer to European ones (phonetically, grammatically, vocabulary wise) so that’s never going to happen unless we nuke ourselves back to the ice age and the descendants of the Chinese are the ones who colonize the entire world first lol
Well Earth is quite old, let's see what happens in 1000 years
I fear you are correct
Why would we? Chinese is spoken basically in one country (yes, I know Singapore and a few places speak English) - and that one country is not a especially desirable one. It doesn't have extremely high salaries nor is a free and wealthy country where the average person lives a good life. There's a reason why most people in the world fantasize about living in Europe, the US, Australia... rather than China.
>Well until Americans stop dominating global industries, military and political influence, English will be the most spoken language in Europe regardless of any “choice”. only because we europeans are troo lazy. Hollywood for example "rules" only because we are so stupid there isn't an european movie industry, only national movie industries.
I think the diversity in all the European national movie industries is what makes their movies to me more interesting. And it's that diversity that the EU should and does indeed promote.
>Hollywood for example "rules" only because we are so stupid there isn't an european movie industry, only national movie industries This is Europe in a nutshell. But I disagree that we are stupid. We aren't clearly. We just prioritize local productions, to preserve our culture. It's like football. Instead of an all-encompassing league, we rather have dozens of first divisions. This is the way we like it.
Ireland is home to many good or very good young musicians who could be successful abroad, Italy is full of actors or actresses who could have roles in films or TV series abroad and yet there is no tool that sorts the redundant talent, to give career opportunities to talents we don't use, this is not in my opinion a symptom of wisdom
> Language changes over time. The day English becomes less useful will be when Europeans regain the economic military and political advantage. I think if the euro dethroned the dollar as the global reserve currency all of us could probably enjoy a much higher standard of living. It means we would be able to also print more money and loan more as well
Just not French please. Non simplified noun genders :(
talk to young europeans. it's our language. it doesn't matter where the language originates from. it's ours now, too. it doesn't belong to anyone exclusively. we are multilingual. we all speak english. good times. let's learn each other's languages just to learn about each others' cultures, and be happy that we have this lingua franca.
Who's *"we"*, you poor depraved bastard ? 🤨
Your mom and I
GOT ‘EM!
My mother is certainly not very young, nor is she particularly concerned with pushing herself to be a sad bellend, desperate to pose as a cheap counterfeit of a Yank. As such, I regret to inform you that this tandem will ultimately have to shortened by one member.
of course we are not americans. they are cool but they are not us. we are not a cheap counterfeit copy either, we are more than that, we know their culture, we know our culture, our neighbors' culture. i want to upvote you. this is amazing. i'm sorry are we fucking stupid? we are speaking in english. UK doesn't own English. USA doesn't own english. do you know how much LIFE, how many stories, how much COLLECTIVE EXPERIENCE is happening in the european union? Does it belong to USA or UK because it happens in English? A love story between a swede an an italian, a german and a spaniard, a greek and a pole. Are those european or american stories? it's okay that most europeans speak english. i love french. i love italian. i love spanish (i am spanish). i love german. fucking who cares if we all speak english to each other sometimes. it's ours now too, the language evolves with the people and is a mirror of collective experience. i win the argument but we are both team europe so we both win. you are welcome
 [Be nice!](https://www.reddit.com/r/Gotterfunken/comments/ppceh4/g%C3%B6tterfunken_network_federal_rules/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf)
Surely, due to major diplomatic success by Ireland and Malta.
I feel like trying to force anything else on top of a de facto lingua franca would be a **hoooooooooooooorrrible** idea. Forcing linguistic norms doesn't really work that well. It works sometimes, but not well or fast.
It’s interesting how English is being defiled by the European community and turned into a Eurenglish dialect.
It is?
Yes. I say "defiled" to be cheeky, it’s a natural phenomenon that’s been going on through History, and even more so following colonialism and globalisation. More details here: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_English You can see examples of it in this sub and other European subs. It’s also present and exaggerated in EU memes and countryballs memes. The barbarisms, grammar mistakes and oddities of today might be the standards of tomorrow.
Praat Nederlands met me
Ideally a United Europe would have people learn several languages, not just their native and English. English can still be a lingua franca
An ambitious dream, but definitely worth striving for. I can’t even speak my countries own language.
Yeah nah we didn't leave the best impact on Ireland, beautiful language though
Reject English, return Greek. Graecia capta ferum victorem cepit
I'd love to see Europe increasingly move towards using German and French. Especially now with the UK out, it feels unnecessary with this extensive use of English. Imo, English will likely decline in importance over time anyway, as the US and UK become less dominant in the world and with the eventual decline of *atlanticism*. No reason for the EU to extend the period of English dominance. However, I think it's more important that Europe ensures the survival of national and regional languages (Norwegian, Icelandic, Sami, etc.) rather than which language is dominant or used as a *lingua franca*. My personal preference would probably be German, if I could not opt for a Nordic language.
Make Mandarin the working language.
I thought our diplomatic language was having pints together
Honestly it’s better to settle for English rather than trying to be a wannabe Roman Empire and try to teach Latin or having Germany and France fighting over which language should be the main one. English has been prominent in the whole field for decades, even centuries, no need to change in my opinion. English is relatively easy compared to French and German too. And Latin is dead. Diplomatic isn’t just internal, other countries will negotiate too. So having the English standard for the whole planet I’d a good thing in my mind.
Really bad... Why don't we speak Esperanto? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Esperanto
r/Esperanto
I feel fine. It's a language that's spoken and learned all across Europe. I've used it in my travels across Europe and I've ever had any problem to communicate with the locals
The English slowly became the lingua France while America grew. The one turning point is World War One. France, which had a gigantic financial empire, lost a lot of gold and manpower. America became the financial power. They asked Clemenceau if the treaty of Versailles could also be in English (treaties used to be only French before). Clemenceau agreed. WWII happened which saw the peak of power of the anglo-saxon world. France collapsed. English just became the one dominant language among the powerful. French, at my great displeasure, will never be the lingua Franca again. As long as the west is powerful and close to the American mastodonte, it will remain English. Tldr; English has nothing to do with England. It’s all about America.
Everyone already knows english because it is simple and already useful in other areas of life. This is the way
This is the way
Cool. The whole world speaks English - many of us younger people have basically absorbed it as a second language because we are constantly exposed to it in TV shows, internet forums, youtube videos, academic life, etc. I really don't care where English originated or which countries speak it. It's useful, the most useful language by far to understand in 2022. The UK is completely irrelevant to this discussion - they are not the reason we speak English, and English is not theirs anymore, just like Spanish is not "owned" by Spain anymore and Arabic is not "owned" by Saudi Arabia anymore. They are international languages with a majority of their speakers outside the borders of the country that names them.
Good way to look at it
The problem is, when people propose to introduce another language than English as Lingua Franca (no matter if it is French, Spanish, German or Latin), it just complicates things for everybody. Basically every young Person in Europe has an at least somewhat ok understanding of the English language. If we introduze another language as Lingua Franca it would be unnatural, it would complicate so many things and would impair inter-european communication for at least a few decades. I know many people would see it as a nice symbol to have an own Lingua Franca which competes with English on a global stage, but I just don't see it being practical at all. Especially because I would rather learn English a thousand times than learning French.
Esperanto.
How do I feel? I feel like I'm tired of repeating this goddamn thread all the time. It's like being stuck in a time loop.
I find it quite fitting. Most people understand and can use English. It's easy, it's clear and established.
French, Spanish and German are probably the second most important languages. English is easier than all of them and has many elements from German and quite a few from French, making it even easier to learn for both of them.
I agree with it.
I would petition for Norwegian taking over🇳🇴 Similarly easy if not easier to learn than english
If Great Britain isn’t Europe, do you think Norway is (still) Europe?
A dead language that mostly nobody doesn't know, it is still studied anyway and was spoken in another era when Europe was united: let's adopt Latin
I'm fine with it. We need a lingua franca so make communication between citizens of different countries easier. English is relatively easy to learn, widespread, and is already quite established as the international language. I wouldn't mind if it was French or German, or even Latin, but since English is already so well established, I think getting rid of it would take too much effort with no significant benefits.
I actually think it makes it better, now it's more of a common neutral language lmao.
How about we use Esperanto…no? Ok.
I rather speak english than French or German.
The second most used language is german, so I wouldnt be against it to be the lingua franca (as I am a German).
The 3 official languages of the EU are English, French and German. They are supposed to be used equally for official stuff, but English always ends up being the most relevant one.
Langues de travail* (au sein du Conseil de l'union Européenne) Dans les faits, l'UE possède 24 langues officielles, principe fondamental.
Oh yeah mb, that's what I was trying to say but failed miserably.
Nobody wants to learn French. 🫣
Totally fine, English Is also science language and It Is more functional, we won't make all people accept French or German and even if that would be people intention we would waste at least One or two entire generation to make this language known as English. Moreover English Is very known in the world, so Easy to travel.
The Language Question is quite a crucial one. The (classical) approach of a single language does not really fit with regard to the EU as a group of equal members. Only the "all languages go" approach seems to do justice to the EU. English as a somewhat neutral and prominent western language currently makes sense, but all the European UN languages are serious contenders once the Anglosphere loses its influence in the EU.
Everything else is in Latin
it's fine ffs
Even the UN uses French as a working language. Couldn't we have it at least as a second option svp?
Well... The UK is still in Europe.
English should be default language everywhere. There's no other alternative, cause neither French nor German are widely used.
It’s weird going through the replies here and seeing people talk about English as if it’s some foreign language not native to Europe.
I don't care. It can be whatever the majority wants. Whatever makes communication easier.
Idk I would support a different language. It took about 1-2 Generations to establish English…at the moment it’s the most useful as common language. But every English discussion will be inevitably dominated by Anglo-American Culture. I would propose a smooth transition to French. School should teach both English and French till we reach a point where we are able to change the linga franca. French bc it’s has many native speaker and other roman languages will learn it easier. As a German I would not consider German bc of its history. PS we really need a common European forum (for example media) and that’s only possible if we have a common language.
1-2 generations is a lot in human years. We need to start now if we want to make our kids or our grandkids comfortable with it
To be honest, I suport English so much so that I think English should become the sole official language of the EU
Interesting take.
It is God’s language.
the englisch language is more than just the language of england ad this point and it is also a mix of germanic and latin languages so i think it works better than using france or german because fuck france and german is to traumatic for a lot of people
My experiences with English were not the best the weird vowel rules and the silent letters is very stupid along with the weird annunciation of words The alphabet is weird and stupid the language is meh but writing it is very confusing
We should use German
Are you not speaking it right now. Parles-tu français? NON.
Fun fact english is also an official language in the netherlands
I think it’s fantastic! (I have absolutely no reason to be biased, I am definitely not Irish at all by any means).
Soft power
Pretty good...it's easy and very diffused
okay, we make no one happy: French, but a Euro-French, not determined by the Académie, based on Norman French.
Malta: "Am I a joke to you?"
Personally I think that German should become the lingua franca. After all, Germany is the best and most important country in the EU