Re: Language Replacement (Re: French and US high school language instruction)

Quoting Jan van Steenbergen <ijzeren_jan@...>:

>  --- "Thomas R. Wier" wrote:
> > An interesting prediction made from this theory is that the
> > English language will *not* replace languages on the
> > European continent since American and British military
> > contingents are placed only sparsely, and are not intended
> > to be permanent settlements.)
[snip]

> In the west, however, the popularity of the ever-present American
> culture has a deep impact on language. In the Netherlands, this
> influence is obvious. Our vocabulary, including a lot of slang
> words and technical terms, is fuller and fuller of English loanwords
> and expressions, and in many cases the English word became more
> fashionable than the Dutch equivalent. Many people believe that
> Dutch is just an insignificant provincial language, not worth
> for any foreigner to learn. No purist has been able to stop this
> development until now.
The future of English influence on the languages of continental
Europe is quite another issue.  It may be unlikely that these
languages will be replaced entirely, but I find it highly likely
they will continue to undergo lexical grammatical shift towards
English models.  Why, just the other day, I was reading _Der Spiegel_
online, when I happened upon the following sentence:

  "Nur etwa hundert durch die US-Botschaft ausgewählte Amerikaner
 bekam Bush an seinem Ankunftsabend im Restaurant Tucher am
 Brandenburger Tor zu sehen..."

 "Only about 100 Americans selected by the US Embassy got to
 see Bush on the evening of his arrival at the Restaurant Tucher
 by the Brandenburg Gate..."

What was I to make of that "bekam" + zu construction?  I am not
a native German speaker, but this looked suspiciously like the
equivalent construction "got to" in the English translation provided
above.  If this is in fact an "Anglicismus", then it shows that
the hegemony (not: conquest) of English is spreading quickly apace.

> I hope this text wasn't too boring for anyone who cared to read it :)
Oh, far from it. I'm always fascinated by the various responses
that different societies put up to powerful foreign influences.
In Japan, their answer has been (in panic, last year) to propose
making English coofficial with Japanese on the grounds that it will
make Japan more competitive; in France, retrenchment and linguistic
nationalism have been the response. All very interesting.

=====================================================================
Thomas Wier          "...koruphàs hetéras hetére:isi prosápto:n /
Dept. of Linguistics  mú:tho:n mè: teléein atrapòn mían..."
University of Chicago "To join together diverse peaks of thought /
1010 E. 59th Street   and not complete one road that has no turn"
Chicago, IL 60637     Empedocles, _On Nature_, on speculative thinkers

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