(not) everyone needs English

discussion board number 18

There are more than six billion people in the world and around 450 million of them can speak english. Recent surveys have predicted there will be 1 billion people speaking English ,as their first or second language in upcoming years. Is this a clue that everyone is now really considering English as global language?





We have already known about global village , free trade and everything related to globalisation, that requires us to be more competitive human resources. One way to bring us closer into the international community is to learn English and apply it on our everyday life. Institutions are now expanding bilingual teaching,they combine English with mother language,even starting from kindergarten, to prepare their pupils entering a new-blast surroundings. They include English as basic subject in every grade in order to get their students become more familiar with the language. However, for those that has been grown in '60 and below, (of course in Non-English speaking countries), might be feel abandoned with global advancement, because the did not have opportunities to speak English. Some people are able to send their children for studying overseas,or learning English, but for those who do not put great consideration to this matter, they will be swallowed up by time as it moves so fast under our recognition.


For example, I'm a lucky person, because i was raised in a family that loves literatures and books. My father is my idol when i was little because he seems know everything .But, as I grow, i have started to look into different views, i have read many books and used web as my sources, and i'm no longer see my father from the same perception because there is dictinctive acceleration on improvement in news and literatures published English and in my mother language .
We always use communicative function in getting and grasping new informations,especially in academic life, whether we study in national universities, but almost all books are written in English.


However, for some people live in remote areas, still can survive without learning English. They feel enough to run their vernacular life, they do not dream about tomorrow and just live for today. We can not insist our egoism , stating that they have to learn English, because, somehow, to learn something is a choice.


There are some people , too, using English just for fun, to express themself with a different characters, in certain limitations, just expressing simple words like "Hello" and "I love U" , especialy on cyber world , anonymous opinions and unscrupulous people that use English ( in this case, contains negative conotations). They understand short sentences and they also do not need to learn English formally, just for chit-chat.


FInally, i conclude, there are different purposes between one and another in learning English. Some people feel they really need to expand their English for business, academic, trade , global marketing and so on. But, there are some people that use English just in colloquial expression, and the other that feel their life is enough without learning English..................................