Will Chinese Replace English As A Lingua Franca? скачать в хорошем качестве

Will Chinese Replace English As A Lingua Franca?

Mandarin (/ˈmændərɪn/ ⓘ; simplified Chinese: 官话; traditional Chinese: 官話; pinyin: Guānhuà; lit. 'officials' speech') is a group of Sinitic dialects that are natively spoken across most of northern and southwestern China. The group includes the Beijing dialect, the basis of the phonology of Standard Chinese, the official language of China. Because Mandarin originated in North China and most Mandarin dialects are found in the north, the group is sometimes referred to as Northern Chinese (simplified Chinese: 北方话; traditional Chinese: 北方話; pinyin: Běifānghuà; lit. 'northern speech'). Many varieties of Mandarin, such as those of the Southwest (including Sichuanese) and the Lower Yangtze, are not mutually intelligible with the standard language (or are only partially intelligible). Nevertheless, Mandarin as a group is often placed first in lists of languages by number of native speakers (with nearly one billion). Mandarin is by far the largest of the seven or ten Chinese dialect groups; it is spoken by 70 percent of all Chinese speakers over a large geographical area that stretches from Yunnan in the southwest to Xinjiang in the northwest and Heilongjiang in the northeast. This is generally attributed to the greater ease of travel and communication in the North China Plain compared to the more mountainous south, combined with the relatively recent spread of Mandarin to frontier areas. Most Mandarin varieties have four tones. The final stops of Middle Chinese have disappeared in most of these varieties, but some have merged them as a final glottal stop. Many Mandarin varieties, including the Beijing dialect, retain retroflex initial consonants, which have been lost in southern varieties of Chinese. The Chinese capital has been within the Mandarin-speaking area for most of the last millennium, making these dialects very influential. Some form of Mandarin has served as a lingua franca for government officials and the courts since the 14th century.[3] By the early 20th century, a standard form based on the Beijing dialect, with elements from other Mandarin dialects, was adopted as the national language. Standard Mandarin Chinese is the official language of the People's Republic of China[4] and Taiwan,[5] as well as one of the four official languages of Singapore. It is also used as one of the official languages of the United Nations.[6] Recent increased migration from Mandarin-speaking regions of China and Taiwan has now resulted in the language being one of the more frequently used varieties of Chinese among Chinese diaspora communities. It is also the most commonly taught Chinese variety. English is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family. Originating in early medieval England,[3][4][5] today English is both the most spoken language in the world[6] and the third most spoken native language, after Mandarin Chinese and Spanish.[7] English is the most widely learned second language and is either the official language or one of the official languages in 59 sovereign states. There are more people who have learned English as a second language than there are native speakers. As of 2005, it was estimated that there were over two billion speakers of English.[8] English is named after the Angles, one of the ancient Germanic peoples that migrated to the island of Great Britain, and its speakers are called Anglophones. The English language holds a special place in many nations of the world, whether as an official or joint-official language defined by law (such as in India, Ireland, or Canada), or as the sole or dominant language for historical reasons without being explicitly defined by law (such as in the USA or UK).[9] It is a co-official language of the United Nations, the European Union, and many other international and regional organisations. English accounts for at least 70% of speakers of the Germanic language branch. Old English began as a group of dialects emerging among the West Germanic-speaking Anglo-Saxons who settled Britain. The late Old English period absorbed some grammar and core vocabulary from Old Norse, a North Germanic language.[10][11][12] Then, the Middle English period borrowed words extensively from French dialects, which contributes approximately 28% to Modern English vocabulary, and from Latin, which also provides about 28%.[13] Thus, despite a majority of its vocabulary coming from the Romance branch of the Indo-European language family, Modern English is genealogically classified under the Germanic branch. It exists on a dialect continuum with Scots and then is most closely related to the Low Saxon and Frisian languages. #mandarin #english #common