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Lingua Franca Essay

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A Lingua Franca is a language that is spoken by people who do not share a native language. But, as you may have noticed, English is very commonly spoken as a lingua franca, but why is this so?

First of all, we should briefly discuss the history of the English Language. Well, this is quite a long story, so I’ll try to shorten it so you don’t fall asleep at your monitors. English originated from the combination of closely related dialects, now called “Old English”, which were brought to Britain by Anglo-Saxons in the fifth century. English was later heavily influenced in the ninth and tenth centuries due to Viking invasions. However, modern English mostly arose due to the influence of Shakespeare and the King James Version of the Bible.

Now …show more content…

You have probably heard the phrase “the sun never sets on the British Empire”. This is no exaggeration. The phrase was used to describe the British Empire because it was so large, that the sun was always shining on at least one of its territories. By 1922, the British Empire was so vast that it governed half a billion people, a fifth of the population at the time, and covered a quarter of Earth’s total land area. Because of this, Britain, and therefore the English language, had a very extensive influence over a large portion of the world. This led to English being spoken globally, as the colonies of the British Empire developed English as the lingua franca. Now, the British Empire is no more, so why is everyone still speaking English? Well, though the English left the colonies, the English language didn’t. As you are probably aware, English is still spoken today as a first language in Australia, the Bahamas, Barbados, Canada, New Zealand, Singapore, Trinidad and Tobago, and of course, the United States of America, as well as many more. As you may also be aware, English is spoken very commonly but not as a first language in Botswana, Cameroon, Ghana, Hong Kong, India, Kenya, the Philippines, Sri Lanka, South Africa, Zimbabwe, and many more. Now, English being spoken in the USA brings me to my next point, American

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