History

Main article: History of the English language .
English is a West Germanic language whose origin is in the dialects Anglo-Frisian that have been made ​​on the island of Britain by Germanic tribes came to settle, and then strongly influenced, especially at the lexical level, languages ​​by settlers from Scandinavia , Normandy and northern France in general in the Middle Ages and the modern French . As with other languages, borrowing from Latin and Greek have enriched the lexicon steadily until today. Other Romance languages ​​and dialects of the former colonies have influenced British English in a much less significant. By cons, these are real influences in different English-speaking countries (influence of the languages ​​of substrate ), which are therefore varieties that can in turn mark the British English (American English for example).
Classification

English is a Germanic language family, in which the languages ​​are closest to the Frisian and the Scots , but nevertheless suffered a number of times the influence of other Germanic languages ​​such as Old Norse , in various languages Romance , especially the French , Latin Roman influence that we see not only the words that are a priori of lexical borrowing ( seen or appointment , French expressions used in English embargo of the Spanish , cupola , portfolio or stiletto of Italian), but also in many words etymon Latin (as expect ← exspectare , school ← schola , or scuttle ← scutella ). A very large number of loans to French kept their original spelling (queue, table, intelligent, center, attention) but are pronounced differently.
Geographical distribution

English in the world. Dark blue, countries where English is official or de facto official. In light blue, countries where it is the official language (except for Quebec , a province) but not the first language spoken.

Pie chart gives the relative proportions of speakers with English as mother tongue in the major English-speaking countries of the world.
Official status
Main article: English (official) .
Countries where English is the first language.
Australia ( Australian English )
Bahamas
Canada (in equal status with French)
Barbados ( Caribbean English )
Bermuda
Belize ( Belize English )
Dominique
U.S. ( American English ), without official recognition.
Grenade
Guyana
Ireland
Jamaica ( Jamaican English )
Malta
New Zealand ( New Zealand English )
Antigua and Barbuda
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Singapore
Trinidad and Tobago
United Kingdom ( British English )
English is also the official language of some villages in the Dominican Republic , near the border of Haiti (where they speak an English xix th century, former slaves from the southern states of the United States who fled Civil War ).
English is also one of the first languages ​​of Belize (with Spanish), from Canada ( Canadian English , with French ), of India (Hindi and English and 21 other state languages), the the Irish (with the Irish ) from Singapore (with Malay, Mandarin and Tamil), of South Africa (with the Zulu , the Xhosa , the Afrikaans , and Sotho from north) and Egypt. This is the non-official language most used in Israel and the United Arab Emirates (language of communication of the population to 74% foreign). This is the common language on the island of St. Martin for under part of France and part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands .
In Hong Kong , is an official language and widely used in business. Learned from the nursery, it is the language of instruction in some primary schools, many secondary schools and all universities. A significant number of students gain a level of English speaker. This language is so widely used that it is inappropriate to say that it is a second language or foreign language. In Thailand , English is also used for business but after the Chinese.
Countries where English is an official language.
South Africa
Cameroon
Fiji
Hong Kong ( China )
Micronesia
Ghana
Gambia
Kiribati
Grenade
Liberia
Kenya
Namibia
Nigeria
Marshall Islands
Mauritius
Solomon Islands
India
Pakistan
Papua New Guinea
Philippines
Rwanda
St. Lucia
Samoa
Sierra Leone
Sri Lanka
Swaziland
Tanzania
Vanuatu
Zambia
Zimbabwe
Languages ​​derived
English has spawned:
many pidgins and Creoles ;
the Basic Français , artificial language created by CK Ogden and IA Richards in 1930 . This does not include more than 850 words: those that are essential to everyday life (expression of feelings included) plus those needed to set the remaining time of a conversation;
the special Français (English Special), composed of approximately 2000 words, excluding idioms and spoken at reduced speed (25% slower than normal diction), this variety of English is a language used by radio VOA ( The Voice of America ) for the distribution of emissions worldwide;
the simple Français , a language written in English Wikipedia, but with simple rules.
Spread of English [ change ]

Liberal globalization, a catalyst for the spread of English [ change ]
The influence of English is growing for several decades due to the globalization of trade and technology, dominated by the major powers speaking language , the United Kingdom and the United States in particular. Writing in 1989 , Maurice Pergnier 3 , describes the situation as follows:
“The socio-economic supremacy of the United States, from which flows a powerful cultural hegemony, has made ​​English a few decades, the language of universal communication undisputed. There is little precedent (…) if we exclude the case (…) of Latin , from Late Antiquity to the Renaissance . ”
The dominance of English has replaced the French in the xx th century, following the two world wars which France has emerged battered and strengthening the political and economic clout of the United States .
The view that English is the language of universal communication undisputed, and choose the most suitable for international communication, is hotly contested (see Report Grin and Esperanto ).
The English held the positions of increasingly strong worldwide, particularly in Europe. The linguist Claude Hagege believes that the reason is the significant development in contemporary Europe, economic liberal , with English as the medium. The original liberal foundation in English, a natural solidarity uniting the English language and the free-trade ideology that has dominated the English conception of human relations and trade since David Hume (1740) and Adam Smith (1776) , which inspired the liberal doctrines of David Ricardo (1817) and John Stuart Mill (1848) 4 .
However, the demographics of Anglo-Saxon countries are less dynamic than that of emerging countries like China and India, the share of world population with English as their mother tongue will decrease from 9% in 2000 to 5% 2050 5 . In 2050, the most widely spoken mother tongue should always be the Mandarin , the four main languages ​​(English, Spanish, Hindi and Arabic) with approximately the same weight 5 .
Claude Truchot considers that the use of English words in the speech, which is a practice that has increased over the past fifteen years, is of dimension ideological , in that its purpose is to express modernity and the internationality avoiding the use of language 6 .
On 21 August 2002 , The Chained Duck reported that the fall in stock of Vivendi was originally the conference call “disastrous”, held August 14 in English by Jean-Rene Fourtou after the presentation of the accounts of Vivendi: “Far from reassure analysts, the press and investors, the statements of the new group’s president, made ​​in English, have accelerated the drop in the stock exchange. ” A director had said: “I do not want to mislead you, but boards are now held in English, and sometimes I do not understand in detail the decisions taken there. ”
A number of multinationals have refused the hegemony of English as illustrated in the words of Jean-François Dehecq, CEO of Sanofi-Aventis, said during an interview with the newspaper L’Expansion (27/06/2005 ) who asked him what was the language of his group, he replied: “It is certainly not English. A multinational is a company where everyone can speak their language. In a meeting, is the brains of people needed. If you force them to speak English, the Anglo-Saxons come with 100% capacity, people who speak very well, 50%, and the majority, with 10%. In all want to be Anglo-Saxon, it is not surprising that it is the Anglo-Saxons who win. ”
Dissemination in science and technology
The use of English words is significant in areas such as the computer , and telecommunications as was (and still is, for that matter) the Italian for music . But new technologies (DVD multi-lingual, global Internet) and the adaptation of firms to their customers (CNN broadcast in several languages, the software maker Microsoft Windows in several languages) have dealt a blow on the domination of English. English is since 1951 the language used in aviation, by decision of the ICAO . More and more research works (theses, studies, etc..) Are written in English or are the subject of a translation into that language.
In some non-English speakers (like Switzerland ), English became the official language in part of higher education.
Diffusion in international relations
During the xix th century, English has become the world instead of the language most commonly used in international meetings, even if multilingualism is the norm. While the French were up to the First World War the preferred language of diplomatic relations and contractual relations, the growing importance of English-speaking states in international relations has encouraged the use of English at the expense of French or the German.
Extension of the base of speakers
English is the second language, official or de facto , numerous states, including some with high population growth ( Nigeria , for example). This is the most widely learned foreign language in the world with an increasing number of learners and it benefits from a distribution in all countries on all continents, with a growing base of speakers Note 1 .
Some researchers [ref. needed] concerned about the risk of failure to control the language (changing meaning of words, grammatical simplifications, changes in pronunciation) noting the growing number of speakers have limited or poorly compared to the language number of speakers who learned English as their mother tongue .
According to the department of educational research in Hanover , there is a significant gap in the learning of English as a second language between the level that being to have the users and their true mastery. Thus, it was asked of students who practiced for 8 to 10 years to assess their skill level: 34% responded “very good” , 38% responded “good” , however, following a test evaluation it was found that only 1% of students mastered English very well, and only 4% had mastered long 7 , 8 .
As part of a study conducted in 2000 and published in the 26-27, 2002, Läkartidningen , magazine for physicians Sweden, 111 general practitioners in Denmark, Sweden and Norway have read the same review article for 10 minutes. Half has read in his mother tongue, the other half in English. Questions were asked immediately after the reading. In general, all physicians Danish, Norwegian and Swedish are fairly comfortable with the English language through the teaching received at school and also thanks to television, movies and songs. In addition, language is related to English. They also read books in English studies, subscribe to medical journals in English. In this study, physicians indicated that they all understood English. 42% of them reported that they had even read a weekly news in English. The study found that doctors who read the English text had lost 25% of the information from the same text read in their native language.
Controversy over the broadcast
In a speech to the United States in 2000, Margaret Thatcher linked the dominance of English on the political and economic domination of this country 9 : “In the xxi th century , the dominant power is America, the dominant language is the English, the dominant economic model is the Anglo-Saxon capitalism ” 10 .
Some researchers criticize the growing dominance 11 , they describe as linguistic imperialism Note 2 , and the risks that they believe may result, including the risk of hegemony (in English takes the place of other languages) or of social selection (you must speak English to be part of the elite).
With this in mind that is awarded in France the price of the rug English intended to criticize the French personalities that have a particular zeal in the unjustified use of English. Thus in 1999, Louis Schweitzer, former CEO of Renault, had received the award for having decided that communications between the limits of its multinational would be exclusively in English. However in April 2001, AFP informed him that he abandoned this course and acknowledged that English was more a handicap than a help: “Language was a problem a little more than what we thought. We chose English as the language of the covenant but this proved a handicap with a reduced yield of both sides. ”
Especially since the 1 st May 2008 , the London Protocol requires to know English or German for not breaking the law on patents [ref. required] , which violate the French Constitution which defines French as the national language.
There are studies, such as the report Grin , seeking to quantify this influence and to evaluate some alternatives.
Indirect influences
The influence of the English language (in fact the Anglo-American) reflects the economic and political power of the United States and their influence in the world, much more than that of the United Kingdom, the cradle of the English language. It is accompanied by a more general socio-cultural influence, exercised in addition to the language, the social learning and cinema 12 . It can have a significant impact on the lifestyles of non-English speaking countries, the phenomenon of Americanization Note 3 .
Writing and spelling

English uses the Latin alphabet (with, formerly, letters like ð or þ , see the history of the English language ). It uses signs diacritics for writing foreign words. His spelling is the result of a long historical process and there is often more exact match between it and the actual pronunciation.
From the sixteenth century, several people have proposed to simplify the spelling of English 13 , some of which Benjamin Franklin 14 , and George Bernard Shaw , have even proposed a phonetic writing, but without success. The word fictitious Ghoti was used as an example of the inadequacy of the current spelling.
Pronunciation

Main article: English pronunciation .
Vowels
The symbols in the list below are those of the International Phonetic Alphabet as used for the transcription of English (except the U.S.) by most dictionaries, specialized or not, since the late year 1970 .
Short vowels
ɪ f i fteen (fifteen), f i sh (fish), c. i ps (fries, chips)
ɛ: m e n (men) to the e t (left)
æ: m a n (man), c a t (chat)
ɒ: h o t (hot)
ʊ: g oo ds (goods) to p u t (to)
ʌ: s u n (sun), dr u nk (drunk)
ə: Sister e r (sister), th e dog (the dog)
Long vowels
ː i: s and Others (Wed) to r ea d (read)
ɑ ː c a r (car) of a rk (dark)
ɔ ː w a ll (wall), the aw (law)
ː u: m oo n (moon)
ɜ ː f i rst (first), b i rd (bird)
Diphthongs
aɪ: f i ve (five), h i gh (top)
eɪ: sn has ke (snake), n a me (name), Sh has kespeare
ɔɪ: oi the (oil), b oy (boy)
aʊ: c ow (cow) to c or s (allow)
əʊ or oʊ r oa d (drive), o ld (old)
ɛə: h I r (hair), b ea r (Bear)
ɪə: b ee r (beer)
ʊə: p oo r (poor)
Triphthongs
aɪə: f i re (fire), l ia r (liar)
aʊə: fl or r (flour), fl owe r (Flower)
eɪə: h I r (hair), pl aye r (player)
The sequences are sometimes called triphthongs actually made of two syllables: ie a diphthong followed by ə.
Consonants
The table below shows the system of English consonants with the symbols of the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA).
When a cell contains two sounds, the top one is voiceless (consonants “deaf” or “non-voiced,” as when one whispers) the lower is voiced (consonant “sound” or “voiced”).
bilabial labio-
dental dental alveolar post-
alveolar palatal velar glottal
occlusive p: p ie (pie)
b: to b ring (bring) t: t ear (tear)
d: har d (hard) k c at (chat)
ɡ: g lass (glass)
nasal m: m Other (mother) n = n o (no) N: na ng (song)
beaten ɾ
fricative f: f ly (fly)
v: li v ing (live) θ: ba th (swimwear)
ð: th in (then) s: to s LEEP (sleep)
z: no s e (nose) ʃ: sh ow (shoe)
ʒ: u s ual (usual) c x h
affricate tʃ: ch urch (church)
dʒ: bri dge (bridges)
spirant ɹ : r a (running) j : y ear (years)
lateral spirant l : l Abour (work)
labio-velar
spirant ʍ
w: to w ash (washing)
Grammar

Main article: English Grammar .
Conjugation
Main article: Conjugation English .
Glossary

Number of words
Unlike other languages, there is no official body that lists English words. As also the current importance of this language in scientific research that many words are created every day (some promise for wide distribution, while others use confidential), there is no complete list . Dictionary OED , one of the most comprehensive, lists more than 600,000 entries, including obsolete words, technical words and words from local dialects. This number seems to be confirmed by the Webster’s Third New International , which identified 450,000 words in 1961 . However, their inputs do not coincide completely and it is estimated that the combined reach is 750 000 words, total is higher than that found in other languages ​​15 .
This broad lexical base comes largely from borrowing by the English from the Norman Conquest , many words Franco-Norman . It has been estimated at xiii th century, 10 000 of these words were imported about 16 . They often duplicating the words of Anglo-Saxon existing: in some cases, one of the two words supplanted the other, while in many other cases the two continued to coexist, leading to a juxtaposition of different words relating to the same concept but with slightly different meanings. Thus, next to house , a word of Germanic origin (compare German Haus ), which means “house”, there are ‘ mansion , the original word Norman-French which means “great house”, a ” Manor ” 16 , or freedom and liberty , two very similar words, the first having a general sense and the second referring to a political system of rights and duties 17 . Similarly, we find pairs of words from different language groups, such as moon and lunar , tooth and dentist , weapon and Disarmament .
Origin of words
In 1973, Thomas and Dieter Wolff Finkenstaedt, based on 80 000 words of the Shorter Oxford Dictionary ( 3 th edition), established in Ordered Profusion distribution following 18 :
langue d’oil , the Norman mainly but there are also Picard and finally Old French: 28.3%
Latin , including scientific and technical words newly manufactured: 28.24%
Old and Middle English, Old Norse and Dutch : 25%
Greek : 5.33%
Etymology unknown: 4.02%
words derived from proper names: 3.28%
all other languages: less than 1% Note 4 .
These estimates should be taken with caution because many words have entered English via other languages ​​(eg Latin words through the Norman French). These problems of definition lead to different assessments. Thus the French linguist Henriette Walter says on its side more than two-thirds of English words are of French origin, while borrowing from French to English does not exceed 4% over 19 . The abundance of words, even common, from the French said that much of the vocabulary is more accessible to Francophones, however, as Germanic language speakers as Dutch, German or Scandinavian languages. There are words from the Old French ( enjoy , challenge , bacon ), but also of modern French contemporary view ( front , restaurant , yet ). Some words have been borrowed and then re-borrow the same “challenge” is a French word of English ( a challenge ) itself from the old French chalenge 20 , bacon also out of the use of French in the xvi th century income and “smoked” across the Channel in the late xix th Century 21 , etc..
The contribution of the Old Norse , following raids and settlements Vikings taking place at the end of viii th century to the end of x th century, is quite small numerically but gave modern English words some of its most currents: skirt , sky , skin , Both , Sami , get , again , cake , knife , etc. 22 and influenced phonetics, for example: Give instead of gi (e) f-an (g = y), sister to instead of the old English sweoster 23 .
Loans to Celtic languages ​​are extremely few: David Crystal believes they do not exceed two dozen, which is curious if it is true that these languages ​​dominated the British Isles before the arrival of the Saxons. A few words remain in modern English, as crag (rock) or galore (in abundance), sometimes in regional dialects, and especially in place names ( London , Thames , Kent ). Celtic roots are found as number and pen (Hill), Coombe or valley (valley), tor (rock) (in Torquay ), Don (river) (in Doncaster ), etc.. 24 .
Although English has absorbed many foreign words, the heart of Anglo-Saxon vocabulary is: the first 100 words of the Corpus of American English from Brown University , assembled in the 1960s, are Anglo-Saxon . The most common words in the English language (grammatical words as in , the , Be , or as lexical father , love , name , etc..) are words of Anglo-Saxon 25 .