Summaries of synthesis sources

Global English

This article, called “Global English,” was written by David Rohde and is available to read on PBS.org. Its purpose is to show how the English language is spreading through the world, and the changes that the spread brings to the language. Rohde says that the English purists blame America for this degradation but proves this to be false by showing that the degradation is caused by outside influence on the language. The article starts off by presenting new words that have sprung up around the world showing how the language is changing. The change is presented as a problem that needs to be kept up with in this quote: “The Oxford English Dictionary [is] struggling to keep up with the ‘morphing’ of the mother tongue.” It is changing much more rapidly because there are so many more people using it. When non-native speakers talk to each other, they make up words and idioms to suit their needs. The three types of English that linguists see are original, pidgin, and broken Englishes. People who use these other Englishes are not aware of the meanings of words beyond their common uses. He uses “hardware” as an example of one of the words that have more than one meaning. It lacks use of some of those meanings so those meanings are lost. The English language is also used for trade throughout the world and, therefore, has a great deal more value as a language than the others. This makes English a language that is important to have spread, and thus Rohde says, “The spread of English can’t be halted.” This also means that the change cannot be halted.

Rohde looks on the other side of the matter and states that some people see the English language crushing the other languages by invading and taking over as the main dialect. Multi-culturists are trying to stop the spread of English. They say that English could commit linguistic genocide or “linguicide,” meaning that the other languages will die because no one speaks it anymore. They also say that the people have a right to the language they use, and that the English language is infringing on that right. 

Politics and the English Language 

George Orwell’s “Politics and the English Language” was originally published in the journal Horizon in 1948. It depicts the degradation of the English language and the political uses of that degradation. Orwell began by showing five examples of poor English (par. 3). All of these quotes had the main problem he was writing against, which was, as he put it, “The writer either has a meaning and cannot express it, or he inadvertently says something else, or he is almost indifferent as to whether his words mean anything or not” (par. 4). Several dying metaphors, pretentious words, and other things were listed as language to avoid (pars. 5-8). These expressed the problem clearly. Orwell used a verse from Ecclesiastes and a modern English version of the verse (par. 9) to show the readers the confusion and lack of imagery of today’s English.

George Orwell went on to say, “… political writing is bad writing” (par. 12). The political agendas are clouded by complex language. The people may not understand the laws or the details about war and after war situations. He said, “… if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought” (par. 15), meaning that the people reading confused language will become confused. This was to present the awareness of the effects bad writing can have. Orwell asserted that everyone has the potential to commit these errors in language (par. 15), but this could be reversible with determination (par. 16). He ended by sharing six guidelines (par. 17) that can help the average political and non-political authors avoid bad writing.

Works Cited

Orwell, George. “Politics and the English Language.” Horizon April 1946: 252-265. Print.

Rohde, David. “Global English.” PBS: Global American; The Christian Science Monitor. 2003. Web. 18 October 2015.