The Benefits Of English As A Foreign Language

Although I am Chinese, I am writing this essay in English. In fact, I spend most of my time communicating with others, expressing myself, and learning new knowledge in English. Regardless of my race, I, similar to many people across the world, use English as a primary language in my daily life. Most will agree that English is the international language of the world. To this day, English has been the most widely spread language around the globe. It is the official language of over 50 countries and the third most spoken language worldwide (Lewis, 2010). However, despite the contributions English has made to the merging of a global village, the spreading of English will lead to the displacement of local languages and cultural identities. It threatens

The dominance of a global language will also cause cultural identities to be displaced; this is because identities and languages are inseparable, the shift of local languages will have the same dislocation on cultural identities. A half native Canadian friend of mine, who ancestors belong to the Homalco tribe, once told me that she felt pity and regretful about the fact that she was unable to speak her tribe’s dialect and would never be able to learn it as the dialect has recently extinct in 2012. In addition, she said that most people have a language they want to learn that connects them to their culture, and the only one she had is lost. This shows that when people use less of a certain language, or even stop using it, they will weaken the sense of belongingness to that certain culture. Language can help individuals link to their cultural backgrounds, and develop cultural identities, but this is not always achievable since many languages and dialects are becoming extinct due to the spread of English as discussed in the previous argument. As a result, when local languages are dislocated by English, cultural identities will also be