English as a lingua franca for Europe: Encyclopedia II - English as a lingua franca for Europe - The motivation for ELFE

English as a lingua franca for Europe - The motivation for ELFE

The member states of the European Union use a wide variety of languages, and although the EU attempts to respect all of them by providing translation services, this generally consumes large amounts of time and money, and the benefits of a lingua franca: a common language that can be used by everyone to communicate with everyone else, are obvious.

Despite controversy, English has already assumed the position of a European lingua franca to some extent. According to a Eurobarometer survey in 2001, 47% of EU citizens spoke English well enough to hold a casual conversation, a higher proportion than any other language in Europe. English is also the most commonly taught second language to children in Europe, largely because of the enormous impact of the United States in politics, economics and culture around the world.

There are, however, problems with the idea of Europe simply adopting an already existing form of English (such as British English or American English) for use as its lingua franca, some of which are listed below.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "The motivation for ELFE", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki