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"The English language was not around when Julius Caesar landed in Britain 2,000 years ago. Some 500 years later, Englisc, hardly comprehensible to modern ears, was spoken by a handful of people.
A thousand years after that, during the era of William Shakespeare, English was spoken by perhaps six or seven million Englishmen, and to quote a linguist at the time, "still of small reach, it stretched no further than this island of ours".
How times have changed. Around the 17th century, English started to be exported to all corners of the globe. By the end of the 20th century, it had become the most widely spoken and written language in the world. Today, English in one form or another is understood by at least four billion people on planet Earth, hardly 400 million of them native speakers. English is truly the first global language.
English is not perfect. In fact, its imperfections are a boon to the language. It is not guarded by any institution, such as our Dewan Bahasa dan Pustaka (DBP) or Academie Francaise. These are the custodians of Bahasa Melayu and French respectively. True, as early as 1660, John Dryden argued for an academy "to regulate" English usage. It did not happen.
Some 100 years later, Joseph Priestley, a grammarian, famously said an academy was "unsuitable to the genius of a free nation". According to the wisdom at the time, the best forms of speech "will, in time, establish themselves by their superior excellence" and in all controversies "it is better to wait the decision of time, which is slow and sure".
English evolved into a global language partly because of its "free spirit". English is the most fluid and democratic language because no one owns it. The users are the lords of the language. The users are reinventing the language all the time. A language needs to be dynamic to survive and English is one. After all, there are no pressures of common usage, dictates of an academy or demands of committees.
Compiling a corpus is tedious, laborious and at times, unnecessary. After all, new terms are coined at breakneck speed. No English dictionary or compendium of terminologies could keep up with new words and phrases. There is tremendous pressure on lexicographers to come out with dictionaries of new terms and phrases.
The Internet and mobile phones have given new meaning to the concept of language development. A new linguistic centaur is taking shape in cyberspace. The written language is undergoing "major shifts in form and function".
Some would argue that "SMS" is an aberrant world of abbreviations, numerals and pictorial icons. "Brevity" is the rule of the game on the Internet. Formal structures as we know them are being threatened. We are witnessing "anti-formal communication structures" being used widely.
The Internet and mobile phones have created totally different language structures. Some would even argue that formal language is on the brink of collapse.
And then there is Globish. It is a concept made famous by Jean-Paul Nerriere, a French-speaking retired IBM executive. He was observing non-native English speakers "communicating" with each other in formal meetings and conferences.
He described English "and its international deployment" as "the worldwide dialect of the third millennium". He noticed the kind of English being used by non-native speakers, especially in the Third World as no more than "decaffeinated English" with its own format and structures, most of which are informal yet understood.
Globish is as much "a subset of the English language" as it is perhaps the nuanced English being used by non-native speakers with limited vocabulary. Of course, Manglish or Singlish falls in a different category. Globish, on the other hand, is a linguistic tool for "easy English".
As Robert McCrum argued in Newsweek magazine recently, Globish is "a newly globalised lingua franca, essentially English merged with the terminology of the digital age and the international news media".
Some would hail Globish as a truly "natural language" as opposed to "constructed English". It is "a codification of a reduced set of English patterns as used by non-native speakers" of English. McCrum claimed "good Globish is correct English".
The issue is not so much what constitutes Globish, but the fact that Globish is gaining respectability as English. While formal English claims to have more than 500,000 words, Globish is comfortable with 1,500 words.
There is also a compelling argument that Globish is merely another form of language imperialism. But that simply does not hold water. English is a language that necessitates global communication in various forms and platforms.
True, there were attempts by English colonialists to change the natives through the learning of English. One Thomas Macaulay proposed in 1835 to create a generation of "new Indians" in India: "A class of persons, Indians in blood and colour, but English in taste and opinion, in morals, and in intellect."
It was a perverted view in social engineering. And it is also true that English was a tool effectively used to colonialise the minds of the natives in imperial times.
Globish, the way I look at it, is one of the many varieties of English that is redefining the language in today's world. Perhaps it is a sign of the times. And perhaps it is true Globish is another manifestation of "a downward spiral in English standards".
But English survived and flourished because of its readiness to adapt and accommodate. It became a global language largely powered by its users. In the case of Globish, the Internet and global media had been instrumental in its creation.
It is certainly not perfect, nor kosher to the purists, but it is contagious and astutely adaptable. Globish is here to stay for a simple reason: the English language is forever evolving. Its formal, standardised and authorised version can coexist with a localised, non-standard and indigenous one. Just like creole and pidgin, despite vehement protests from language guardians, have flourished in many parts of the world.
That is English."
Any other point of views?
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