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EU Leader Says English Is Losing Importance (politico.eu)
An anonymous reader writes: Jean-Claude Juncker, the European Commission president, opted to deliver a speech in French on Friday morning because he said "English is losing importance" in Europe. He gave the comments, which are unlikely to mend fences after a war of words between Brussels and London over Brexit negotiations, at the "State of the Union" conference in Florence's Palazzo Vecchio -- an annual event for European dignitaries. Juncker said he was opting for French because "slowly but surely English is losing importance in Europe and France has elections this Sunday and I want the French people to understand what I am saying about the importance of the EU." He spoke in English.
What people may not be aware of, is that computer languages, especially HTML and JavaScript will require people who want to enter the IT field to know at least elementary English. The keywords in HTML tags recognized by all browsers around the word are in English, as is the JavaScript language. While there are some interpreters of compiled languages like C++ in other languages (Chinese for C++ examples exists) the more popular languages have English keyword bases. (see like of non-English based computer languages: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...)
since this is the case, any country wanting "in" on the booming IT industry will have to know some basic English. The English speaking community got the core computer programming/formatting languages out first and as usual, first to publish will have more control it long term.
"Imagination is more important than knowledge" - Einstein
Cow says, "eat mor chikin".
"I don't know, therefore Aliens" Wafflebox1
english is waning...you go right ahead and believe that
This may be true one day. But my money would be on Chinese, not French, as the successor.
He is not really French, he is from Luxembourg where French is one of 3 official languages. This is like calling an Irishman a Brit, or an Englishman. Only 16% of the population are native French speakers, although 96% of the population is fluent in French. The primary native language is Luxembourgish, which is closer to German than French.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Luxembourg
Don't know if this is true, but it's a damn good story:
At a NATO military conference, the French admiral was complaining, "Why do we have to speak English at all of these events?"
The Dutch admiral replied, "Because the British, Canadians, and Americans made sure we don't have to speak German."
You're perhaps right that it makes English less important in the political side of the EU but, as oh_my_080980980 pints out, English will continue to be the language of communication between those who need a common language in the EU as they're not going to magically cease doing business with British businesses or those affiliated with English speaking organizations. I think we can look at the airlines to disprove this chap's point. If you listen to ATC from anywhere in the world it's in English. An Iranian airline flying through Slovakian airspace will communicate with ATC in English, using feet as a measurement unit for altitude. OK, the point about feet is immaterial but it always used to bug me when the Discovery Channel replaced the original narration and translated aircraft altitude into meters, smacked of ignorance and assumption to me.
But does it really? Let's remove the UK from the EU. The remaining population: Are they more likely to speak English or french?
Outside of France, Belgium and Luxembourg which shared common territories recently enough that the language is adopted in the country who else speaks French:
Netherlands 29%
Roumania 17%
Ireland 17%
Italy 16%
Portugal 15%
Germany 14%
Austria 11%
The rest 10%
So way to go, your speech was not understood by the vast majority of the population. Now let's do the same thing to English.
Ireland 95%
Netherlands 90%
Sweeden 86%
Denmark 86%
Austria 70%
Finland 70%
Slovenia 59%
Germany 56%
Belgium 52%
I'm not going to list all the rest, but not a single country in the EU has less than 20% proficiency in English.
For one, English is still the language of the United States who is still and exceedingly important trade and military partner with most of the world. That alone makes English pretty important. Likewise while the UK may be leaving the EU, they'll still be trading with the EU, nothing really changes there.
However the real importance of English comes not from the nations where it is the primary language, but all the nations where it isn't. The reason is that while English is only the 3rd or 4th most spoken first language it is, by a mile, the most spoken second language in the world. When people from different nations get together to do business, English is generally the language they use. Chinese is not widely spoken in Japan and Japanese is sure as hell not popular in China, but English is a common second language in both and so usually used when companies from the two nations do business.
In the EU it is even more important as there are a ton of primary languages. If you wanted to do business in the native language of all EU nations you'd need to speak Dutch, French, German (a couple variants thereof), Danish, Irish, Greek, Portuguese, Finnish, Swedish, Hungarian, Greek, Turkish, Czech, Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Maltese, Polish, Slovak, Slovene, Bulgarian, Romanian, and Croatian. While you can find people with that kind of language skill, they are very rare and very sought after. Getting one for your firm is unlikely... However English is a popular second language in all those places, so you can do business in that. You can have people from Germany, Croatia, Greece, and Spain all at a table and English is a language they can probably all use whereas the likelihood that they all speak each other's native tongue is pretty low.
English has become the language of common exchange, and nothing seems to be changing that. Should another language take over for that, French is not likely to be it, much though the French may wish it was.
If you have a speech on the importance of the EU and you want to direct it at a French population who are about to go to the polls, and the outcome of those polls could determine the future of the EU, what's more important? That you speak in English or in French?
Context, it fucking matters.
He is anything but a moron.
If you read the article, he spoke in English because he wanted the English to understand him, and it's not like the majority of the UK speak ANY second language.
How do you expect to have an effective negotiating team when the people on the opposite side of the table can understand everything you say, but also have private conversations right in front of your face because you don't know any second language? Make fun of you with a straight face? Say that the only difference between you and a bucket of shit is the bucket? Debate strategy in private without leaving the room or whispering amongst themselves? Call you a dumb f*ck to your face?
"Transparent" is a shit show that trades on every stereotype going. A man in drag is NOT a transsexual.
The guy is from Luxembourg, not France.
Quebec's Language Act
Doing Business in Quebec
Website in English?
If your trademark isn't french, add french to it
Language Police
C'est l'état de la grenouille. Mort à la liberté~~