The History of English  Old English (450-1100 AD)   Middle English (1100-circa 1600 AD)   Modern English (1600-circa 2000)   Global English (since 2000)

 

 Global English 

• A global lingua franca for communication between speakers of many languages

 

• Its main use around the world is between non-native speakers

 

• Over 1,500 million speakers of English as a first, second, or foreign language

 

• Even the United States – with some 230 million English speakers in the year 2000 – must now be seen as using a minority dialect of World English

 

• The development of Global English no longer reflects the influence of a single (British or American) point of origin

 

• The centre of gravity of the English language is steadily shifting from the native speaker to the non-native speaker

 

• People who use English as a second or foreign language are now very much in the majority, with three non-native speakers in the world for every one native-speaker

 

• In the next 10-15 years the majority of the world's population could speak English