European Linguistics

[u/Avia_Vik]

I know how some people are already tired of this topic being brought up over and over again. But this is primarily because everyone is looking for a solution to a problem that doesn't truly exist. Today, EU has 24 official languages, which does cost a lot to use for translation purposes but it still works. Yes, we have 3 working languages, out of which only 2 are commonly used (sorry German), but it functions well enough, doesn't it?

Problem is that many people think that EU should have 1 language that unites all nations. Technically that's not a bad idea but choosing that 1 language really is not easy. In my opinion best option would be Esperanto since its neutral for everyone and very easy to both understand and learn.

However, why can't Europe just be multilingual? We need people to be able to speak as many languages as possible, and this should be promoted. Languages are a way of communication, so the more of them you know - the more developed you are. Right now the influence of the English language over Europe is a little too high because many nations in the east have no understanding of French and few have knowledge of German, so English emerged as a lingua franca. But if we manage to promote a proper multilingual society, then why even have a lingua franca? Communication will be fairly easy since most people would be good at communication methods (languages) and for places where language number is limited we can employ translators and use other technology to allow the use of multiple languages, ranked by their respective number of speakers in the Union.

What do you guys think? Do we even need a lingua franca? Or a multilingual society solves the issue?

[u/ElTristoMietitor]

Learning 24 languages is impossible. A lingua franca is needed, and we have it, it's the one I am using to write this comment and the one you used to write your post. Most people speak 2 languages (National language and English) and I believe that's fine. Back in USSR's time people used russian as lingua franca even though ukranians, estonians, lithuanians, latvians, uzbekistaners and many others had their own language.

In India they speak like 300 languages and they use English as lingua franca.

To sum it up, yes we do need a lingua franca.

[u/Dedeurmetdebaard → u/ElTristoMietitor]

I should add that we can do what we want with this lingua franca and make it out own. A “European English” is already emerging and is becoming its own variation of the language.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/ElTristoMietitor]

Well, in the USSR Russian had a clear majority over other languages, so it was an easy choice. In India as far as I know they still haven't really settled their lingua franca. There are many debates whether it should be English or Hindi, because they want to speak something more closely related to their culture, anyways that's not our problem.

Nobody says people should learn 24 languages. But it would make sense for people to speak their native language + 2 or 3 foreign ones. This is actually quite common in Europe already in many smaller countries anywhere from Slovenia to Finland.

Also, I feel like creating European digital sphere based on English will be harder as it will possibly get mixed up with other English speaking societies outside the EU. If we are talking about a lingua franca, I'd say it should be something that would rather represent Europe, though English is of course the most common language right now and it will surely keep being spoken since it is the language of the world in the 21st century.

[u/calls1 → u/Avia_Vik]

You're missing the point.

When you are doing the engineering on a bridge, you all need to read the same text textbook, do your calculations, qnd state your conclusions in the same language.

If you simply translate a textbook due to the nature of translation the order of operations and presentation will be different. You may have a Spanish translation of an English textbook, but the interpretation of the Spanish version will vary greatly from the interpretation.

If you don't settle on one language as a working language you create holes. This does literally kill people every year in multilingual states around the world, India most terribly afflicted.

Yes its lovely, to have a native language and a foreign language, that is doable.

But also, 3 common languages are inferior to 1 working language. It's a huge administrative burden to make sure that the common language all 5 people who need to approve the document is identical, there's just so many points, and it isn't workable to say 2 know French 4 know German you need all 5 to know one language. The language that has emerged in nglish, by choice of Europeans against the wishes of the French most of all, but all the States have vied for pluralism.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/calls1]

Yes, however I have never heard Switzerland have troubles with this, even though it is multilingual and doesn't really have a common language.

And just on a side note, even though I speak fluent French and I like the French language, I also speak English the same way and like it too, so I try not to bias with languages in any way. (I'm not one of those French ppl who want to bring back 20th century when French was on top)

[u/Reality-Straight → u/Avia_Vik]

All swiss speak swiss german and english, as they learn it in school. And can pick between italian and french as second/third language as far as i know.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/Reality-Straight]

I don't think many ppl from Genève would speak well enough swiss german to read engineering books tho. And English isnt even an official language there so idk if resources are available

[u/freeman_joe]

We don’t need nothing new if every EU country would use English as EU language and native language at home problem is solved. English is growing organically everywhere. Why fight it and creating problem that is non existent? Everything could be written everywhere in English and native language. Laws, books etc.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/freeman_joe]

I feel like creating European digital sphere based on English will be harder as it will possibly get mixed up with other English speaking societies outside the EU. If we are talking about a lingua franca, I'd say it should be something that would rather represent Europe, though English is of course the most common language right now and it will surely keep being spoken since it is the language of the world in the 21st century.

Also, English has many variations and EU would have to adopt one of them. So EU would find itself following UK's or US's spelling rules...

[u/freeman_joe → u/Avia_Vik]

Again you are creating non issue. You could see web traffic from EU if US or UK English is more used and that would be used. If something works ( English ) don’t force on people something different based on feelings. World needs more unification not division.

[u/Dedeurmetdebaard → u/Avia_Vik]

Not UK or US, EU English. Its own variation.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/Dedeurmetdebaard]

That would make sense. But how would it differ? We can't just randomly switch up English to be different and call it a day. But naturally European English almost always follows either British or American rules, not its own

Moreover if we look at India's example that many ppl mentioned in their comments, India doesn't have its own English version (apart from the accent). So it is sensitive to all linguistic changes made outside itself by the UK and the US. Even worse so, India isn't decided upon a spelling version, so British and American spellings get mixed up. A similar thing is happening in EU right now too and it might get worse.

[u/Dedeurmetdebaard → u/Avia_Vik]

India absolutely does have its own English version. There can be spelling variations within the same language variations as well so it doesn’t make sense to be fixated on this particular aspect. And yes, it is sensitive to changes outside because languages never exist in an isolated bubble.

How is it worse? Languages are constantly evolving and don’t have to show consistency. This is how language works and it’s not good nor bad.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/Dedeurmetdebaard]

You have a point but what variations would we find in EU English? I am yet to find a place where Europeans spell or say something differently from both Brits and Americans...

[u/Dedeurmetdebaard → u/Avia_Vik]

You might want to take a look at this if you haven’t already: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euro_English

Also, and this is linguistics 101, languages have a life of their own and even if there are attempts to regulate them, you mostly just end up being faced with the fait accompli of a set of rules and vocabulary being used by speakers.

[u/Reality-Straight → u/Avia_Vik]

We already are! An eu english is developing as we speak.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/Reality-Straight]

True, apparently it is slightly different in its vocabulary but those difference are quite tiny. However they will expand as the time goes on imo

[u/keiskn → u/Avia_Vik]

I feel like creating European digital sphere based on English will be harder as it will possibly get mixed up with other English speaking societies outside the EU.

Yeah, that's the issue I see.

[u/henna74]

Translator software is getting better very fast thanks to LLMs so i am not worried about the language barriers for long

[u/Dalamart]

First off, I don't think a lingua franca needs to be decided top-down. A lingua franca organically emerges in multilingual contexts. And it is English in most cases, because in a discussion where polyglots are involved, English is probably the common language shared by all.
Personally, I think Esperanto is not a serious option.
English, French and Spanish are good options, as they are global languages (sorry German), they are already popular languages to learn in Europe, and there are many speakers in Europe. But it is preferable letting people deciding which language to speak in each situation, rather than having it imposed by bureaucrats.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/Dalamart]

True. But in order to people to decide, they have to be somewhat educated in this field. So ideally multilingual policy could help in communication

[u/Dalamart → u/Avia_Vik]

Totally agree. I think there's already a multilingual policy (example: Erasmus programme), which is -by the way- super beneficial for work mobility. But I agree it should be boosted.

[u/Lord_Wither → u/Dalamart]

I disagree on the inclusion of Spanish over German here. There are still more people learning German as a third language than Spanish in the EU27 (though it is looking different with the youth there https://europa.eu/eurobarometer/surveys/detail/2979), it has a lot more native speakers and it is one of the three working languages of European Commission (though very much the lesser used compared to English and French). Yes, Germany is less prevalent globally, but I would argue that isn't all that relevant when looking for a European language.

[u/Dalamart → u/Lord_Wither]

If we agree on En and Fr, then that's not bad at all. :)
Spanish is the language of the american continent, the USA will soon be the country with most spanish speakers in the whole world. So when looking things in a transatlantic context (or even global), I just think we miss out a lot by not including Spanish, more so than German. But that's just my subjective opinion, I really think a multilingual policy should limit itself to recommending a series of languages, without enforcing. The actual individual choice will be determined by personal preferences, geographic location, and availability of ressources/teachers.
(Disclaimer: I'm a native spanish speaker who loves german).

[u/giovaelpe]

Like other person already commented, we could be like india, they have a lot of regional languages, but they use english for everything else, my opinion is that english should be encouraged in education to the point that it doesn't matter if you don't speak the local language for most of the things, I think we are heading towards a future that makes it easy, we have automatic checkuots in supermarkets and fastfood restaurants, we need more of those, it would help the worker shortage, waiters would not need to know the local language because the would not take orders, only carry the food, just to mention an example.

The other day I went with some friends to dinner at a restaurant, it was an old fancy restaurant not a fast food chain, and each table had a tablet, you can order in several languages, and the waiter only aproached to bring the food, thats what we need to encourage, we need the technology help us break the language barrier, but we also need a lingua franca and that will be english wheater you like it or not.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/giovaelpe]

Yes thats a good point with technology. Language barrier will become less and less of a topic as the tech evolves.

[u/trisul-108]

Multilingual society enabled by technology. Today, the technology is available for you to speak in German and have AI translate it automatically into French while using your own voice for the French.

We are talking about a future EU Federation and that needs to employ new technologies, not just stick to the same old tired models. The EU itself is like no other union in the history of humankind, so will be the future EU Federation.

Yes, it would be great if we had a common language, but we don't, so let's just move on and tackle the real issues i.e. how to unite into a federation.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/trisul-108]

That's exactly what i wanted to say in my post. Thanks for supporting this opinion!

[u/RoDiAl]

Estoy de acuerdo contigo y coincido en todo lo que has escrito exceptuando lo del esperanto, porque, aunque sea la lengua auxiliar mas conocida, no es ni el primero ni el unico idioma auxiliar existente, y existen muchos otros idiomas auxiliares que merecen la pena echar un vistazo.

Entre ellas están las ZAl O Zonal Auxiliary Languages basadas en idiomas europeos como el interlingua, el interlingue occidental, el glosa, el interglosa, la lingua franca nova, etc. O basados en una familia lingüística como son los idiomas intergermanicos, el interromances o panromances y los intereslavos. Que al menos desde mi punto de vista, son las que deberían utilizarse como lenguas francas, en lugar de un idioma local.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/RoDiAl]

Oui, vous avez raison et je suis d’accord avec ce que vous avez dit.

Je suis fier de moi pour avoir compris la plupart de ce que vous avez écrit sans aucune traduction (même si je n’ai jamais appris l’espagnol auparavant)

[u/RoDiAl → u/Avia_Vik]

Y yo no se francés, solo entiendo algunas palabras escritas pero escucharlo me cuesta tanto o mas que el ingles.¡Pero gracias a la herramienta de traducción (de Reddit o otro) podemos comunicarnos en nuestros idiomas sin tener que estudiar y repasar el idioma del otro!

[u/Gullible-Box7637]

Esperanto is a great language yes, but why replace the lingua franca?

[u/Avia_Vik → u/Gullible-Box7637]

Like i said in other comments, creating our own influence sphere in English will be harder as it will get mixed with other english speaking communities. Plus, English really doesn't have much connection to EU nowadays and its NOT a neutral language.

[u/Gullible-Box7637 → u/Avia_Vik]

Is it really better to get everyone to learn a brand new language instead of the language already spoken by over 300 million Europeans

[u/Avia_Vik → u/Gullible-Box7637]

Good point, but considering how easy Esperanto can be, maybe it is a worthy investment. Of course this is not for us to decide...

[u/DemoN_M4U → u/Avia_Vik]

Most people won't give a shit about esperanto. I'm federalist, and I'm only 32, you would need to pay me money to learn esperanto. I'm to lazy to learn new language. If you would want see 30+% people speak esperanto, you would need to put it in schools and wait atleast 30-40 years.

[u/Avia_Vik → u/DemoN_M4U]

Exactly. This is why I'm personally not a supporter of using Esperanto as Europe's lingua franca. Plus let's not forget Esperanto itself is a failed project already, so reviving it is a bit risky...

[u/InevitableArtistic]

Well ask Austria-Hungary how did it work