I wonder if there would be an oppression of language in the NAC. With the
absorbing of central and south America, the predominate languages would be
Spanish and Portuguese (by sheer numbers alone). Would the NAC have declared
an "official language" of English, or would it become a
multi-lingual society? If an official language was declared, how
stringently would it be enforced. I can think of numerous times in history
where conquered peoples were prohibited from using their native tongue.
Related: What percent of the population of central and south America do you
think that the LLAR was able to get off Earth?
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Brian Bell bkb@beol.net
http://members.xoom.com/rlyehable/
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> -----Original Message-----
> >
Old
> ethnic rivalries (French vs. German, for example)?
I doubt that there would be much language supression. English would probably
be the most common language (business, military, etc), but Spanish and
Portugese would be common in South America as an every day language. I would
bet most of these folks would speak English (as a second language)- if
for anything than to compete in the job market! Both the US and the UK (not to
mention Canada) are pretty free societies, so I seriously doubt that there
would be much supression of native languages (other than to keep from having
to publish driver's licnese tests in a dozen languages:). As for population
for the LLAR... who knows- several million at least.
> I doubt that there would be much language supression. English would
I'll second that. In Canada, the Francophone population is a minority
(I
believe) yet within many regions, French is the language of everyday use.
Still, even Quebec separatists (a nationalistic Francophone group) admit that
Quebec businessmen should know English in order to pursue the business
opportunities provided by the huge US market to the south. To reiterate,
French (or Spanish, Portuguese, Japanese, Mandarin Chinese, etc.) between
friends, but English (or an equally common language) as the default language
of business.
Oppression? In India, there are now what, 8 official languages? Including
English. The Brits there didn't stop everyone using their own languages, they
just insisted that governing be done in English...
Remember that these days, worldwide English is becoming the lingua franca for
business, aviation, computers, etc... There are more English speakers in China
now than there are in Great Britain (since vast numbers of Chinese are
learning English as a second language, not specifically to get along better
with the English speaking western nations, but because they can use it to
speak to everybody else...).
Many people (well, in govt and business) in South America are learning English
for the same reasons. I think much of that population by the late
21st century will speak some to good English already - before the NAC
take over.
English would, I'm sure, remain the dominant language of the NAC, by virtue
of its vested position in the real power base (the Brit/Can/Americans
who run everything) at the very least.
On the other hand, in Canada, we run things with two official languages (well,
at the Federal level anyway... there is only one officially
bilingual province - New Brunswick - but most of the others offer at
least some govt services in the other official language). If the people
running the NAC are being generous when they set things up, they could decide
that high level government could operate in 3 or 4 languages (English and
Spanish for sure, and maybe French and Portuguese). Then the regional
governments could operate and provide services in the language of the majority
in their area (and probably English... no real reason for the Argentinians to
provide govt in French...). I'd imagine that the military
would operate with one language though - like NATO airforces do now -
everyone speaks English so that there are fewer mixups in command and
control....
Having said that, I heard a story once about a joint military exercise in
the US that had Australian (I think), US, British, (and one other -
maybe Israeli) troops all operating together. They found that language was
still a barrier, 'cause the Americans had a really hard time understanding the
Brits over the radio.... Same with the Brits and people speaking with southern
US accents...
> I wonder if there would be an oppression of language in the NAC.
See the ongoing discussion of transportation capabilities. I bet not much
as a percentage of the total - few millions maybe, max.
In the 17th and 18th centuries "French" was the official language of
diplomates and royality. Even many awards and titles in many countries was in
French. But industry and interenational trade, the most industrialized country
would influzence which language to use, being England and US the most
economically strongest countries in the late
19th and turn of the century. In Sci-Fi, advanced tech worlds the
region/country that is the most strongest economically should be the
predominate language of the world.
> Adrian Johnson wrote:
Including
> English. The Brits there didn't stop everyone using their own
> Having said that, I heard a story once about a joint military >exercise
Interesting enough, I'm a southerner who has just returned from a trip to the
UK and I learned that I couldn't understand anyone there who was from any
where north of London... but I found that after a couple of pints that I could
easily understand this girl I met from Yorkshire!;) LOL!
Seriously though, I noticed that in the US Army that regional accents tend to
get blurred and that 'army speak' tends to take over. After a few years
in military service even yankees could understand us southerners- plus
we used the same 'slang' (milspeak like AO, and so on)... I would imagine that
> Having said that, I heard a story once about a joint military
Hey, WE sometimes have trouble understanding those from north of Norwich or
west of Colchester.... Anyway, it's all flat caps and whippets north of
Watford Gap, innit? (We're an insular lot, us East Anglians).
<VERY BIG GRIN just in case anyone with a sense-of-humour bypass is
reading....!>
Jon (GZG)
> Seriously though, I noticed that in the US Army that regional accents
> Ground Zero Games wrote:
> Hey, WE sometimes have trouble understanding those from north of
"There's trouble up't Mill." "Pardon?" "One of t'crossbeam's gone out askew on
t'treadle"
or alternately
"Ere all, see all, say nowt Ate all, sup all, pay nowt
> At 10:26 AM 10/17/99 +1000, you wrote:
What was it Disraeli said? That the English are the "mongrel race of
Europe"...a little bit of this, a little bit of that, and language bits from
everywhere...
hmmm.
...English is the Borg of languages...
> Adrian Johnson wrote:
> ...English is the Borg of languages...
Extremely well put. I must remember this phrase, it expresses the situation
exactly.