English Language Imperialism Quotes

Finally, I would like to point out that now in the age of English, choosing a language policy is not the exclusive concern of non-English-speaking nations. It is also a concern for English-speaking nations, where, to realize the world's diversity and gain the humility that is proper to any human being, people need to learn a foreign language as a matter of course. Acquiring a foreign language should be a universal requirement of compulsory education. Furthermore, English expressions used in international conferences should be regulated and standardized to some extent. Native English speakers need to know that to foreigners, Latinate vocabulary is easier to understand than what to the native speakers is easy, child-friendly language. At international conferences, telling jokes that none but native speakers can comprehend is inappropriate, even if fun. If native speakers of English – those who enjoy the privilege of having their mother tongue as the universal language – would not wait for others to protest but would take steps to regulate themselves, what respect they would earn from the rest of the world! If that is too much to ask, the rest of the world would appreciate it if they would at least be aware of their privileged position – and more important, be aware that the privilege is unwarranted. In this age of global communication, some language or other was bound to be come a universal language used in every corner of the world English became that language not because it i ~ Minae Mizumura

The English language was spoken and written - but at the time of Shakespeare it was not defined, not fixed. It was like the air - it was taken for granted, the medium that enveloped and defined all Britons. But as to exactly what it was, what its components were - who knew? ~ Simon Winchester

During the period of the Renaissance, the English language changed very swiftly in keeping with rapid social, economic and political changes. However, writers in particular soon came to realise that the vocabulary of the English language did not always allow them to talk and write accurately about the new concepts, techniques and inventions which were emerging in Europe. At the same time a period of increasing exploration and trade across the whole world introduced new words, many of which had their origin in other languages. Historians of the language have suggested that between 1500 and 1650 around 12,000 new words were introduced into English. ~ Ronald Carter

We only speak two languages here: English and profanity. ~ Kevin Constantine

I wanted to write for all children, even those kids who might see language as a threatening thing, even if English is their second language. ~ Ursula Dubosarsky

English should not stoop to embrace the lowest common denominator. Rather, society should step up and grant the language the respect it deserves. ~ Terry Fallis

My first language is both English and Spanish. My mom was raised in Los Angeles, so with her we spoke English, but my father was born in Cuba, so with him we spoke Spanish. ~ Jencarlos Canela

Remember that lettuce doesn't grow on a spruce; and it also doesn't rhyme with it. ~ Jakub Marian

The word pain does too much work, you know? It's like sorry, which really shouldn't have to carry both "I sympathize" and "this is all my fault. ~ Marieke Nijkamp

A translation needs to read convincingly. There's no limit to what can go into it in terms of background research, feeling, or your own interests in form and history. But what should come out is something that reads as convincing English-language text. ~ Jonathan Galassi

It wasn't that Henry was less of himself in English. He was less of himself out loud. His native language was thought. ~ Maggie Stiefvater

There are many words in the English language that you never want to hear you father say. Enema. Orgasm. Disappointed. ~ Lauren Oliver

Comparing your beloved to a red, red rose might be fine if you're writing a poem, but these thinkers believed more exact language was needed to express the "truth"-a term, by the way, distilled from Icelandic, Swedish, Anglo-Saxon, and other non-English words meaning "believed" rather than certain. ~ James Geary

One of the first things to understand was how people knew what language to speak to whom. Where I've lived in the American Southwest, choosing to speak English or Spanish based on how someone looks is risky. If you try English and they don't speak it, you can switch to Spanish if you know it. But if you start with Spanish, you might offend: 'You don't think I speak English?' This can be the case if you're Anglo, even if you speak Spanish very well and just heard the other person speaking Spanish. When I described such an scenario to Indians, they couldn't relate - to them, choosing the wrong language wasn't embarrassing or politically charged. Or so they said. ~ Michael Erard

No one's going to be able to operate without a grounding in the basic sciences. Language would be helpful, although English is becoming increasingly international. And travel. You have to have a global attitude. ~ Rupert Murdoch

He would not mind hearing Petrus's story one day. But preferably not reduced to English. More and more he is convinced that English is an unfit medium for the truth of South Africa. Stretches of English code whole sentences long have thickened, lost their articulations, their articulateness, their articulatedness. Like a dinosaur expiring and settling in the mud, the language has stiffened. Pressed into the mold of English, Petrus's story would come out arthritic, bygone(117). ~ J.M. Coetzee

I think my prose reads as if English were my second language. By the time I get to the end of a paragraph, I'm dodging bullets and gasping for breath. ~ Lynn Abbey

The standard modern measurement for inebriation is the Ose system. This has been considerably developed over the years, but the common medical consensus currently has jocose, verbose, morose, bellicose, lachrymose, comatose, adios.
This is a workable but incomplete system, as it fails to take in otiose (meaning impractical) which comes just after jocose. Nor does it have grandiose preceding bellicose. And how they managed to miss out globose (amorphous or formless) before comatose is beyond me. ~ Mark Forsyth

When the twins asked what cuff-links were for - "To link cuffs together," Ammu told them - they were thrilled by this morsel of logic in what had so far seemed an illogical language. Cuff+link = cuff-link. This, to them, rivaled the precision of logic and mathematics. Cuff-links gave them an inordinate (if exaggerated) satisfaction, and a real affection for the English language. ~ Arundhati Roy

I learned English at school, or at least that's how it started. Also, in Holland - as opposed to some other European countries - we don't dub anything, so as a kid growing up, always watching English and American movies in their original language really helped. ~ Michiel Huisman

Now that Stevenson is dead I can think of but one English- speaking author who is really keeping his self-respect and sticking forperfection. Of course I refer to that mighty master of language and keen student of human actions and motives, Henry James. ~ Willa Cather

Creoles tend to express variations in time by having a string of helping verbs rather than by having complicated word formation rules. In other words, they are more like English in this respect than like a language such as Italian:
English: I thought she might have been sleeping.
Italian: Pensavo che dormisse.
The idea of potential (in the English "might"), completed or whole action (in the English "have"), and stretched-out activity (in the English "been") that go with "sleeping" are all expressed in the ending on the Italian verb dormisse. (Dorm is the root for "sleep"; isse is the ending that carries all the meaning about the time frame.) ~ Donna Jo Napoli

English is the easiest language to speak badly. ~ George Bernard Shaw

Kyle had to give her credit; it took skill - plus no
heart and a serious abuse of the English language
to break up with someone in fewer than 140
characters. ~ Julie James

Apparently Arnold was inspired by President Bush, who proved you can be a successful politician in this country even if English is your second language. ~ Conan O'Brien

There is reinforcement in such familiar back-formations as Chinee from Chinese, Portugee from Portuguese. ~ H.L. Mencken

Joyce's writing in Dubliners contains some of the most unshowily beautiful sentences in the English language. I learned from him that if you write a good, clean line of English, you can get under a reader's skin. The reader won't even know why, but there you are. Didion, Berger, the many others I mentioned above, and many, many poets I haven't mentioned. Writers of this calibre are the moving targets the rest of us are always chasing. ~ Teju Cole

The English language is full of words that are just waiting to be misspelled, and the world is full of sticklers, ready to pounce. ~ Mary Norris

Indian writers have appropriated English as an Indian language, and that gives a certain freshness to the way we write. ~ Vikas Swarup

I thought English is a strange language. Now I think French is even more strange. In France, their fish is poisson, their bread is pain, and their pancake is crepe. Pain and poison and crap. That's what they have every day. ~ Xiaolu Guo

[T]here are not many words in the English language more lacklustre and less sexy than 'employer'. ~ Roberta Pearce

This is another paradox, that many of the most important impressions and thoughts in a person's life are ones that flash through your head so fast that fast isn't even the right word, they seem totally different from or outside of the regular sequential clock time we all live by, and they have so little relation to the sort of linear, one-word-after-another word English we all communicate with each other with that it could easily take a whole lifetime just to spell out the contents of one split-second's flash of thoughts and connections, etc. -- and yet we all seem to go around trying to use English (or whatever language our native country happens to use, it goes without saying) to try to convey to other people what we're thinking and to find out what they're thinking, when in fact deep down everybody knows it's a charade and they're just going through the motions. What goes on inside is just too fast and huge and all interconnected for words to do more than barely sketch the outlines of at most one tiny part of it at any given instant. ~ David Foster Wallace

I'm keen on making English language movies. English is still the global language and we can't change that. ~ Bruno Zheng Wu

Of village: it is not called so because its inhabitants are of higher age on average; in fact, there is no connection between the words "village" and "age" whatsoever. ~ Jakub Marian

I phoned the Admiral back.
'It's no use, Admiral, the French speak nothing but French.'
There was a short pause on the end of the line then his voice rattled into life like a sabre.
'They're lying, Tim!'
'What?'
'The French Navy must by law speak English, as English is the international maritime language of the sea.'
'Has anyone told the French that?'
The line went dead for a moment before he thundered, 'Yes Nelson. At the battle of Trafalgar.'
I tried to stifle an irresistibly British giggle not knowing if the Admiral was making a joke or not. I got it right. He was serious. ~ Tim FitzHigham

Its very variety, subtlety, and utterly irrational, idiomatic complexity makes it possible to say things in English which simply cannot be said in any other language. ~ Robert A. Heinlein

The English love for privacy is proverbial, and has not been exaggerated. A stranger who strikes up a conversation is looked upon with suspicion - unless he happens to be an American, when his ignorance of good manners is indulged. ~ Henry Steele Commager

If there is ever a fascist takeover in America, it will come not in the form of storm troopers kicking down doors but with lawyers and social workers saying. I'm from the government and I'm here to help. ~ Jonah Goldberg

I have always felt cookbooks were fiction and the most beautiful words in the English language were 'room service. ~ Erma Bombeck

The Americans set up impromptu checkpoints along the roads and erected stop signs in English - a language and script that not all Iraqis understood. Cars that failed to stop before the checkpoint were fired upon. I witnessed two entire families killed at the same checkpoint within twenty minutes of each other. ~ Lynsey Addario

I believe in the capacity of India to offer nonviolent battle to the English rulers. ~ Mahatma Gandhi

If English is here to stay, the least we Indians can do is to promote Hinglish. The best of two languages will make Hinglish user-friendly. ~ Tapan Ghosh

There are approximately 1,010,300 words in the English language, but I could never string enough words together to properly express how much I want to hit you with a chair." (Alexander Hamilton, to Thomas Jefferson) ~ Alexander Hamilton

The Divinity could be invoked as well in the English language as in the French. ~ Wilfrid Laurier

A sad truth of human nature is that it is hard to care for people when they are abstractions, hard to care when it is not you or somebody close to you. Unless the world community can stop finding ways to dither in the face of this monstrous threat to humanity those words Never Again will persist in being one of the most abused phrases in the English language and one of the greatest lies of our time. ~ Paul Rusesabagina