LING1901 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Mutual Intelligibility, English Language In England, International Communication
16 May 2018
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Monday, 8 August 2016
LING1901 LECTURE 3
A MULTILINGUAL WORLD
-Languages of the world
•Between 6000 and 7000 languages in the world
-Includes sign languages
•Language vs dialect usually defined based on mutual intelligibility, but this is tricky
-If two people can understand each other, their languages are mutually intelligible
-Dialect means variety, not inferiority
-ex/ Linguistically, Mandarin and Cantonese are different languages, but politically they are dialects of
Chinese
•Geographical distribution of living languages
-Languages who currently have speakers
•When a language is dead, it means no one speaks the language
•Top five world languages (numbers of speakers)
-Chinese (1,213 million speakers)
-Spanish (329 million)
-English (328 million)
-Arabic (221 million)
-Hindi (182 million)
-Understanding world languages
•The concept of ‘world language’ is related to its global function
-Use for global communication
-English is most widely used language for global communication
•International communication
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Document Summary
Languages of the world: between 6000 and 7000 languages in the world. Includes sign languages: language vs dialect usually de ned based on mutual intelligibility, but this is tricky. If two people can understand each other, their languages are mutually intelligible. Ex/ linguistically, mandarin and cantonese are different languages, but politically they are dialects of. Languages who currently have speakers: when a language is dead, it means no one speaks the language, top ve world languages (numbers of speakers) Understanding world languages: the concept of world language" is related to its global function. English is most widely used language for global communication. If both sides share the same language, the choice of language is natural. If both parties are native speakers of different languages, they may have to decide on a common language to communicate. International languages: a language with no native speakers at all can well be an international or world language.
