Miskevich A. M., Yatsevich N. S.

Polessye State University, Belarus

English as universal world-wide language

Today English is the language of the world. It is only in the course of the last hundred years that English has become a world language. English is the official language of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, of the United States of America, of Australia and New Zealand. It is used as one of the official languages in Canada, the Republic of South Africa and the Irish Republic. English is also spoken as a second language in the former British and US colonies. English is the major international language of communication in such areas as science, technology and business. It is the language of literature, education, modern music, and international tourism. English is the major language of diplomacy. It is one of the official languages of the U.N.O. and other political organizations. English has become now the language of international communication. At present no other language on the Earth is better suited to play the role of world language.

People who speak English fall into one of three groups: those who have learnt it as their native language, those who have learnt it as a second language in a society which is mainly bilingual and those who are force to use it for a practical purpose - professional or educational.

FACTS ABOUT ENGLISH LANGUAGE:

· English is the most widespread language in the world and is more widely spoken and written than any other languages.

· Over 400 million people use the English vocabulary as a mother tongue, only surpassed in numbers, but not in distribution by speakers of the many varieties of Chinese.

· Over 700 million people speak English as a foreign language.

· English is undoubtedly the richest in vocabularyamong all the world’s languages (over 2,700); Oxford English Dictionary lists about 500,000 words,full Webster's Dictionary count more than 425 000 words and a half-million technical and scientific terms still uncatalogued.

· Three-quarters of the world’s mail, telexes cables are in English.

· More than a half of the world’s technical and scientific magazines are in English

· English is the medium for 80% of the information stored in the world’s computers

· English is the language of Christianity; it is the ecumenical language of the World Council of Churches

· Five of the largest broadcasting companies in the world (CBS, NBC, ABC, BBC and CBC) transmit in English, reaching millions and millions of people all over the world.

· The main language used throughout the world on the Internet is English. The media that make up the Internet are overwhelmingly american in origin, so it is no wonder that the mother tongue of the Web is English.

The use of the English language would open the possibility to:

· Have access to the greatest choice of cheap, affordable science publications, best suited to their needs

· Have access to the latest development in business knowledge in a global economy based on knowledge and innovation

· Have access to the experiences of other emergingeconomiec like India or Brazil, best suited to the problems of developing countries

· Have access to more markets and opportunities from all over the world both for exports and imports enhancing considerably their economical condition

· Promote their local culture and to have access to all the other cultures of the world

·Be more independent as they build more even international relations

In the British Council reports says that by 2020, two billion people will be studying English. The National Journal reports that only 10% of native-born Americans can speak a second language, compared to 56% of European Union citizens.

There are other languages that are quite simple and synthetic, with almost no verb conjugation, no declension, such as Asian languages like Thai and Chinese, but they are written with complicated scripts and are tonal languages. However if Chinese were to be written with the Latin alphabet, it could potentially become a universal language.

There are other strong languages that, due to population and economic power, could be universal languages, but they have a number of disadvantages when compared with English.

Some examples:

· Japanese: has very regular verbs but also a very complicated script.

· Chinese: no conjugations or declension, but a very complicated script and tones.

· German has many more inflections than English.

· The major Romance languages, such as French, Spanish and Portuguese, have fewer inflections than most of languages, but their verb conjugation is very complicated.

· Russian has both complex verb conjugations and numerous noun declensions.

Nowadays when science and technology are progressing so fast all kind of specialists need English in their work.

Belarus is integrating into the world community and the problem of learning English for the purpose of communication is especially urgent today.

In conclusion, one should say that English is not an easy language to learn. It may seem easy in the beginning, but then the bridge between basic knowledge and mastery takes a long time to cross. We wish to cross this bridge and it will give usa great satisfaction. We will be able to speak to people from other countries, to read foreign authors in the original, which makes our outlook wider. English knowledge today is absolutely necessary for every educated person, for every good specialist.