Exercise 26. Translate the following words into English

Exercise 25. For each word 1-9 find the synonym A-I.

1. inhabitants		A. to adopt
2. to learn		B. facts, data
3. international		C. dominant
4. literary		D. worldwide
5. tongue		E. official
6. to accept		F. native speakers
7. formal		G. to master
8. main		H. bookish
9. information		I. language

Рідна мова, вивчати мову, особливий статус, декілька варіантів відповіді, навколо світу, континент, офіційна мова, міжнародний, послуги, туризм, популярна музика, красива мова, носії мови, напівофіційний, поширена у світі мова.

Exercise 27. Read and translate the Supplementary text 2 (ST 2).

WHY ENGLISH?

Language family:	Indo-European
	Germanic
	West Germanic
	Anglo–Frisian
Writing system:	Latin (English variant)
Official status:	Official language in 53 countries
Total speakers:	First language for 309–400 million
	Second language for 199–1,400 million

If English is not your mother-tongue, why should you want to learn it, or to give it special status in your country? There are several kinds of answers to be given.

Historical reasons. The movement of English around the world began with pioneering voyages to the Americas and Asia, and continued with the 19th-century colonial development in Africa and the South Pacific, and took a significant further step when it was adopted in the 20th century as an official or semi-official language by many newly independent states. English is now the dominant or official language in over 60 countries and is represented in every continent. This makes the term “world language” real.

Internal political reasons. English may play a role in providing a neutral means of communication between different ethnic groups within a country.

External economic reasons. The USA’s dominant economic position acts as a magnet for international business and trade. The tourist and advertising industries are particularly English-dependent. At the same time any multinational business wish to establish offices in the major English-speaking countries.

Practical reasons. English is the language of international air traffic control. It is the chief language of international business and academic conferences, and the leading language of international tourism.

Intellectual reasons. Most of the scientific, technological, and academic information in the world is expressed in English. Over 80 per cent of all the information stored in electronic systems is in English. Closely related to this is the desire to have access to the philosophical, cultural, religious, and literary history of Western Europe, either directly or through English translation.

Entertainment reasons. English is the main language of popular music and culture. It is also used as the leading language in satellite broadcasting, home computers, video games, as well as illegal activities (drugs etc.).

Some wrong reasons. It is sometimes thought that English has achieved its worldwide status because of its linguistic features. People have claimed that it is a more logical or more beautiful language than others, easier to pronounce, simple in grammatical structure, or larger in vocabulary. This kind of reasoning is naive: there are no objective standards of logic and beauty to compare different languages. English, for example, may not have many inflectional endings, but it has a highly complex syntax. Languages fall and rise in the world esteem for many kinds of reasons – political, economic, social, religious, literary – but linguistic reasons do not rank highly among them (from The Cambridge Encyclopedia of The English Language / David Crystal).

Дата добавления: 2014-11-29