It is a commonly known fact that English is the dominant online language, and although Mandarin is following closely behind, in second place, experts seem to think that the dominance of English will continue. Although some suggest that Mandarin will overtake English into first place, with regards to number of users, by 2015, English will still be seen as the dominant language for anyone outside of China. English, however, is changing, and it is the internet that is largely responsible.
The Evolution of Language
When, in 1814, the United States emerged from the bruising independence war with Britain, there was a need to connect the country, and thus they went about developing an official language. It took Noah Webster 18 years to complete the first American-English dictionary, which made adjustments to their old adversary’s tongue; replacing ‘re’ with ‘er’ in theater, removing the ‘double l’ from words, such as traveler, and taking the ‘u’ out of color.
Today, there are many forms of English spoken worldwide, and indeed the ‘Webster Dictionary’ is on its 11th edition. There is now; American English, Pidgen English, Hiberno English, Manx English, Carribean English, and many more different styles and dialects of the language. Indeed, large translations, of numerous texts, such as The Bible, exist between different varieties of the same language.
The newest form of the language, which is evolving at a much faster rate than any of the other forms, is ‘Internet English’. This new adaptation of the language, is even leading many to suggest that it is changing the English language permanently. Why is this form of the language becoming so popular, and where does it come from?
Internet English
The internet is leading to a number of new realities within the English language. First of all, it is bringing the different dialects together more often, and thus American English and British English are increasingly adopting each other’s vocabulary.
Words and phrases, such as; ginger – for hair, chat-up, go missing, sell-by date, twee, gastro-pub, and snog are just some of the words that have made the leap across the pond, from British English to American English over the past 12 months. There are of course a number that have jumped the other way too, although the current trend is for more Britishisms to be adopted by the US, than the other way round.
Also, a number of unofficial English dialects, such as; Hinglish, which merges Hindi and English and Singlish, which does the same with Singaporean and English, are appearing in written form. This is meaning that their influence is spreading further, and thus many are now becoming more established.
How Does This Change English Though?
There are already more second-language English speakers, than there are natives, and this, in itself, is seeing the evolution of the language shift in direction. With many of them using the language to communicate with other ‘second-language’ speakers, over the internet, this is breeding a new form of the language.
With no real guidelines or constraints on how English is used online, this is leading to the growth of such unofficial dialects. Technology companies are fuelling this growth further by allowing individuals to add new words to dictionaries, that don’t already exist. Many websites and apps are also now seeing the benefit of having their website content written in this ‘online English’, as opposed to any official dialect, as, fundamentally, this reaches more of the English language internet users.
There is a common belief that this evolution could eventually lead to ‘Internet English’ becoming an official Creole, and one which would likely have many more speakers than any other official dialect.
“Most people actually speak multiple languages – it’s less common to only speak one,” says Robert Munro, a computational linguist from California.”English has taken its place as the world’s lingua franca, but it’s not pushing out other languages.”
Rather, other languages are pushing their way into English, and the internet is seeing this happen in a collaborative way. Words from all manner of English dialects may become popular and thus embraced within this new language, and soon large translations may exist to rewrite English-language web content in this way.
In Conclusion
As much as this may pain the purists, British English looks set to become a minority dialect within its own mother tongue. Internet English looks set to take over, and it may not be long before this is standardised and officially evolved, as new words enter from multiple directions.
Large translations of many bodies of work, into this new language, will occur online, and may even eventually become so widespread, that they are used in offline content too. A standardised dictionary may form and thus, fundamentally, this could see the make-up of a ‘Global English’, which will overshadow its own roots, in Britain.
With non-native English speakers already outnumbering natives, this ratio is only set to sway further. Britain may soon lose all ownership over its own language and many will have to adapt the way they teach, learn and communicate, in order to keep up with the shift.