The Most Powerful Languages in the World
Delving into the most powerful languages in the world
There is no doubt that language is one of the most important factors that helped human beings to withstand, adapt, and learn in order to survive. And that is through a set of factors, skills, and methods that he learned, acquired, and passed on through time from one generation to another.
With these experiences, they knocked on the doors of science and benefit and came with his hands and mind to the fields of medicine, engineering, chemistry, psychology, sociology, etc. of the important contributions that raised his status and rose to what we are now.
There is no doubt that this mighty development and tremendous progress would not have occurred without one of the most important of these factors, which is the language.
What is the Language?
Language is a system of symbols that integrate together to form sentences. These sentences are used as a means of dialogue and exchange of information between humans. Language may be in a verbal form through sounds, letters, and symbols, or in a kinetic form such as gestures and signs.
Language is one of the most important tools of understanding and interaction between members of society in all fields of life. Where people’s activities are impossible without language.
The importance of language in preserving beliefs and restoring the products of spiritual culture and the human race is evident. The languages of the world are divided into language families, each of which contains a number of languages that are similar in origin and characteristics.
This article will be devoted to talking about the English language in terms of its history and importance, and then some phonetic abbreviations in the English language will be mentioned.
The Importance of Language
- Man has distinguished himself from other creatures thanks to language, as it is the way to communicate, understand and pass ideas.
- Language helps to transform ideas from mere mental fantasies to a tangible and practical reality.
- Language helps to express different feelings and feelings.
- Language is the legitimate inheritance of culture and the main incubator of heritage and the richness of language is the logical outcome of the richness of culture.
- Understanding the history of any nation or civilization is based on understanding and mastering the language of this nation.
- Language is a mirror of the value of the nation.
Languages Used Around the World
In our world, there are nearly seven thousand languages used around the world, and the reason behind this huge amount is the diversity and plurality of dialects, but in fact, many of these languages and dialects are no longer used all of them, as the languages of the world are limited to a certain group of languages now. It is definitely the most popular and used among people
To make it easier, we divided these languages into four groups.
- The first: it includes the living languages that are widely spread around the world and that we can learn, such as English, Spanish, Chinese and Arabic.
- The second: it is called extinct, and it is the languages that existed in the past and are no longer used because of the death of all those who spoke them or because of their evolution into another language, for example, the Iberian language in Spain in the seventh century BC, the Nabataean language in Jordan and the Arabian Peninsula, and the Phoenician language in Palestine.
- The third: it is called the minor languages, which are the languages spoken in small villages in isolated places around the world.
- The fourth: it is called Synthetic, and it is the languages that were synthesized by one person and did not develop like Esperanto, which was developed for medical and therapeutic purposes, and Edo and Interligo, which were developed for the same reason.
And because reality imposes a logic on us, researchers and scientists have been interested in the first group, which is the group of real languages, since they are the most widely spread languages and the vast majority of the earth’s inhabitants speak them.
Not only that, great events such as the invasion, wars, migrations, and the spread of religion helped in the expansion and expansion of these languages, as the Arabic language spread because of the Islamic religion, and the Spanish language spread in most of the Americas due to the invasions and expansion, and the British Empire, in particular, was responsible for the spread of the English language.
Cultural changes, such as the rise of Hollywood and the film industry in America and the spread of new technology and social media among people locally and globally, have also contributed to the strengthening and growth of the English language on a large scale.
The Most Powerful and Widely Used Languages in the World
Although the number of official languages in the United Nations is 6 (English, Spanish, French, Russian, Arabic, and Chinese), there are some languages more widely spread than some of these six languages.
Studies specialized in languages indicate that the most widespread in the world are the following.
1. English
It is the most widely used language around the world and is known as the language of the times and the language of technology, and it is used and spoken by more than a billion and a half speakers, as a native language or as a secondary language.
The proportion of English speakers around the world is approximately 25% of the world’s population, and thus the English language ranks as one of the most powerful languages in the world.
2. Chinese
The number of Chinese speakers is 18.05% of the world’s total population, and their number exceeds approximately one billion people. The Chinese language is known as the Mandarin language, and as it is known and seen, China has the largest population in the world.
3. Hindi
It is a third with speakers amounting to 11.51% of the world’s population. It is the official language of India as well as in the Fiji Islands, as it is spoken by the people of Nepal, and a good percentage in South Africa and other regions of the world.
4. Arab
It occupies the fourth place among the most widespread languages and is spoken by residents in about 66 countries in the world, including all Arab countries, and the number of speakers is estimated by about 6.6% of the world’s population, and it became an officially approved language in the United Nations in 1974.
5. Spanish
Spanish is ranked fifth because 24 countries consider it the official language.
The percentage of speakers of it reaches 6.25 percent or about 400 million people. Besides Spain, the Spanish language is spread in Latin and Central America and is the second language in the United States after English.
6. Russian
It is the most widespread of the Slavic languages, and one of the most widely spoken languages in the world. The proportion of speakers of it is 3.95 percent. They are distributed in many countries of the former Soviet Union, including Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, and others.
7. Portuguese
The proportion of those who defy the Portuguese language reaches 3.26 percent of the world’s population distributed between Portugal, Macau, Angola, Venezuela, and Mozambique, but the most famous and largest Portuguese-speaking country is Brazil.
8. Bengali
It is eighth and has 3.19 percent of the world’s population speakers, of whom about 120 million are the total population of Bangladesh. It is also the language of West Bengal in India and is considered one of the world’s most widely spoken languages.
9. French
It is the official language in 32 countries in the world, and the percentage of speakers of it reaches 3.05 percent of the world’s population. As for the speakers of it, besides French, they are distributed among Canada, Belgium, Switzerland, Luxembourg, Monaco, and some African countries.
10. German
It is spoken by 2.77 percent of the world’s population, and it belongs to the West Germanic languages and is considered one of the most common mother tongues in the European Union, and among the most famous speaking countries besides Germany, Austria, and parts of Switzerland and Belgium.
6 Reasons for the Rapid Spread of the English Language
There are many reasons that have contributed greatly to making the English language one of the most powerful languages in the world, and it has become a global language of communication between people in all parts of the world.
- Easy to learn because English language structures and vocabulary are less complex than other languages.
- It is the language of work and international trade between countries and even individuals.
- The English language has undisputedly become the language of technology, communication, and information on the Internet, as it has become the common link across various social media platforms.
- The American film industry contributed to the delivery of the English language to every home, for free and for free.
- There is no doubt that tourism and travel, holding international seminars and conferences, as well as holding major sports tournaments, have greatly contributed to the rapid spread of the English language in order to enhance understanding and familiarity between peoples.
- Learning languages in general, and English in particular, has become a great opportunity to travel or study and join international universities and institutes, and then prepare for the labor market in the most prestigious jobs.
History of the English language
The English, Saxon, and Jute tribes began to migrate from their original places to the island of Britain in the middle of the fifth century, and when these tribes and their cultural components merged, Old English appeared, which in turn was influenced by Old Norse and then Danish.
Then, in the year 1066 AD, England was subjected to the Norman invasion, who was speaking a French dialect influenced by Norwegian, and their language became the language of conversation. In the Middle Ages, it acquired many of the elements of Latin languages and became further away from its Germanic origins, and the so-called great change occurred.
This is why the pronunciation of the vowels in the Latin alphabet that was used in English differs from that of other European languages.
Phonetic abbreviations in English
The phonetic abbreviations in the English language are used for the purpose of speed in writing, as well as they are used in the spoken language, knowing that these abbreviations are not considered official abbreviations and should not be used in the official language, and the following are some phonetic abbreviations in the English language:
- is = ’s
- am = ‘m
- are = ‘re
- have = ‘ve
- has = ’s
- had = ‘d
- will = ‘ll
- would = ‘d
- will not = won’t
- can not = can’t
- shall not = shan’t
Thanks for reading
