Why is English Special

[Dr. Jamshid Ibrahim]

Why is English Special?
English is special for a variety of reasons. Those I know are:

1. English vocabulary is huge. Putting all European languages into one wouldn't be a match. According to language databases English has more than one million even without taking into consideration compounds or derivatives.

2. English is a wedding of two most important world langauges (economic and political powers) namely German and French. Moreover, there are borrowings from almost all languages in the world. This makes English truly global and the language of doubles (double words, meanings...)
Thus it is a powerful tool for expressing subtle differences and shades of meaning.
Just take:

Germanic (poor farmers) and (the rich) Romance
Consider the following words for names of animals and their meat:
Cow---------------------beef
calf----------------------veal
sheep-------------------mutton
pig/sow/swine----------pork

And now the following alternatives:
give up-----------------abandon
give in------------------surrender

3. English is global (see my views on this issue in a different thread).

4. Easy and difficult to learn
Easy because the Germanic endings were lost and gender is not an issue like the German or French article. Difficult because it is so subtle and huge. The spelling is chaotic and not consistent with the pronunciation or simply take the tenses or the prepositions!

5. The English alphabet doesn't have difficult diacritical signs like the French accent or the German Umlaut or other ligatures which make them cumbersome. It is easy and simple.

Could anybody make some additions?
Thanks
Regards
Jamshid

[Billyum]

Originally Posted by Dr. Jamshid Ibrahim

Why is English Special?
English is special for a variety of reasons. Those I know are:

1. English vocabulary is huge. Putting all European languages into one wouldn't be a match. According to language databases English has more than one million even without taking into consideration compounds or derivatives.

2. English is a wedding of two most important world langauges (economic and political powers) namely German and French. Moreover, there are borrowings from almost all languages in the world. This makes English truly global and the language of doubles (double words, meanings...)
Thus it is a powerful tool for expressing subtle differences and shades of meaning.
Just take:

Germanic (poor farmers) and (the rich) Romance
Consider the following words for names of animals and their meat:
Cow---------------------beef
calf----------------------veal
sheep-------------------mutton
pig/sow/swine----------pork

And now the following alternatives:
give up-----------------abandon
give in------------------surrender

3. English is global (see my views on this issue in a different thread).

4. Easy and difficult to learn
Easy because the Germanic endings were lost and gender is not an issue like the German or French article. Difficult because it is so subtle and huge. The spelling is chaotic and not consistent with the pronunciation or simply take the tenses or the prepositions!

5. The English alphabet doesn't have difficult diacritical signs like the French accent or the German Umlaut or other ligatures which make them cumbersome. It is easy and simple.

Could anybody make some additions?
Thanks
Regards
Jamshid

I don't think English is any more special than any other language, Jamshid. Every language serves its users in a perfectly adequate fashion.

English is complex in some respects and simple compared to other languages in other respects; as you've pointed out. It's rather ironic that learning a language is difficult only for adults. For young children, it's a piece of cake.

[Dr. Jamshid Ibrahim]

Hi Billyum
Thanks for your post. The word "special" in my post doesn't mean "better" but different. In view of the history of English and its globalisation and dominance it plays a very special role. This development is unique in human history. Never before has a language acquired so much power and dominance. It has already become Lingua France in the world. Moreover, because of its history it has borrowed words from nearly all languages in the world. Its vocabulary is so huge that even if you put all other European languages in one doesn't make a match. It lost all difficult case endings and its alphabet doesn't have any difficult diacritical points as in French or German which make written communication more difficult.. Is this phenomena not special? Perhaps I should use another word not to give room for misunderstanding. What do you think?

Have you read my post on linguistic predictions? I would love to hear some response from you although I know it is too long and perhaps this platform isn't the right place for such articles.
Thanks and my best wishes
Jamshid