Re: Information on future English language development?

Joe wrote:
> ...  One thing I will say, though, is that
> English will change more in the next fifty years than it has in the last
> two hundred.  In my opinion.
I only agree with you partly there.  Due to increased global
communications, English could also be said to be changing less, as a
better connected language community makes change of language more
difficult: a new word will be very unlikely to spread fast enough to
last long.  There is also a less convincing argument that since the
whole of humanity has been discovered, then we cannot meet up with new
peoples who give us new words; we have taken all of everyone's words
that we want.
However, the increased number of new types of things will lead to many
new names being needed for them, or adaptations of old words, or borrowings.

--
Simon Richard Clarkstone
s.r.cl*rkst*n*@durham.ac.uk / s*m*n_cl*rkst*n*@hotmail.com

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