What is the next global lingua franca and why?

[tarvos]

After the climate change flood, the only country that has fought water all its life, the Netherlands, will be alive still. Thus Dutch is the language of the future.

Alternatively, the Greenlanders, who have been living in barren circumstances for centuries, will vie for power with us.

[AML]

After the climate change flood, the only country that has fought water all its life, the Netherlands, will be alive still. Thus Dutch is the language of the future.

Alternatively, the Greenlanders, who have been living in barren circumstances for centuries, will vie for power with us.

This is the best argument yet.

[eido]

Or you could answer like me as I did when I was fourteen. I used to watch an anime called Hetalia. It was about the personification of nations. Naturally, though, as it was an anime, all the characters spoke Japanese. So the lingua franca was Japanese. When I wrote that Japanese was the "universal language" on Tumblr, people got pissed at me. It was only a joke, though.



^This anime got me obsessed with Iceland. Got me, not continued it. It's pure, I promise, this obsession.

[tarvos]

After the climate change flood, the only country that has fought water all its life, the Netherlands, will be alive still. Thus Dutch is the language of the future.

Dutch? You must be joking!

Within six or seven generations it will disappear from certain urbanized areas. In the long run it will turn into a sociolect for the poor and may be the official SECOND language of the Netherlands!

This has already begun a long time ago. As you know, most of the higher education programs are taught in English (you can even study Dutch literature in English!) I see a trend that even bachelor programs will be taught completely in English in 50 years with some exceptions. I have never seen anyone using the Dutch version of any software (and many software are not even available in Dutch).

Remember that Brussels transformed from an exclusively Dutch-speaking city to a bilingual city with French as the majority language and lingua franca. Remember that less than 100 years ago, more than a third of France's population spoke Occitan, and this percentage dropped to less than 5% in the 1990s because nearly all education and media is conducted in French.

What most people don't realize, is that the internet and TV speeds up those developments enormously. You can't compare language developments from the past with those we see now.

Sweetie, I am Dutch And I think you quite missed the latent humour in my post.

[mick33]

After the climate change flood, the only country that has fought water all its life, the Netherlands, will be alive still. Thus Dutch is the language of the future.

Alternatively, the Greenlanders, who have been living in barren circumstances for centuries, will vie for power with us.

This would actually be good news for me, I knew there had to be a good reason I have been dabbling with Dutch again lately . If, however by some cruel twist of fate (maybe climate change could usher in a new Ice Age ) Dutch does not become the language of the future, I will be working tirelessly to make Finnish the final lingua franca that will dominate the world forever!

[Theodisce]

After the climate change flood, the only country that has fought water all its life, the Netherlands, will be alive still. Thus Dutch is the language of the future.

Dutch? You must be joking!

Within six or seven generations it will disappear from certain urbanized areas. In the long run it will turn into a sociolect for the poor and may be the official SECOND language of the Netherlands!

This has already begun a long time ago. As you know, most of the higher education programs are taught in English (you can even study Dutch literature in English!) I see a trend that even bachelor programs will be taught completely in English in 50 years with some exceptions. I have never seen anyone using the Dutch version of any software (and many software are not even available in Dutch).

Remember that Brussels transformed from an exclusively Dutch-speaking city to a bilingual city with French as the majority language and lingua franca. Remember that less than 100 years ago, more than a third of France's population spoke Occitan, and this percentage dropped to less than 5% in the 1990s because nearly all education and media is conducted in French.

What most people don't realize, is that the internet and TV speeds up those developments enormously. You can't compare language developments from the past with those we see now.

Brussels is hardly representative as the transition took place within the context of a country were French and Dutch are spoken by, respectively, roughly 40% and 60% of the population. I cannot find an example of a monolingual country that witnessed this kind of transition.

As for the next lingua franca I don't even dare to guess. Nobody would have expected that an obscure idiom spoken by a pack of Romans would acquire and keep this status for centuries.

[SGP]

As for the next lingua franca I don't even dare to guess. Nobody would have expected that an obscure idiom spoken by a pack of Romans would acquire and keep this status for centuries.

Now someone gave a partial answer to a previous question maybe without even realizing it .

And about Mandarin... still wondering how probable exactly it would be that, even if it doesn't become a global lingua franca (I for one am at least not assuming it), this language would get something like an additional international significance for those who do inter-country communication? Really wondering about that one because tonal languages still are the most difficult type to me. Relatively speaking. Although I don't label neither Mandarin nor Cantonese as Genuinely Difficult to Learn.

As for me, not calling any tribe/... a pack.
But it is very true that many unexpected things could happen.

[tarvos]

Sweetie, I am Dutch And I think you quite missed the latent humour in my post.

I said "you must be joking"

If you knew that, why did you take it seriously? You think I don't know what goes on here?

[reineke]

Sweetie, I am Dutch And I think you quite missed the latent humour in my post.

I said "you must be joking"

If you knew that, why did you take it seriously? You think I don't know what goes on here?

SGP should analyze this exchange.
It looks like "Hashimi" does not understand that he was signalling the opposite of what he was trying to say. Or is he? That's the trouble with emoticons.

Anyway, in a Mad Max scenario, the winner will need to be able to secure the food source (ie all those plump Dutch people). I hear that the French will eat just about anything...

In a constant progress scenario, we could be looking at a world of Englishes and a handful of macrolanguages. Approximately half of the world's population are native speakers of IE languages. If we look at L1 + L2 numbers, population growth rates, immigration patterns, who owns most land etc. Mandarin looks more like the last stronghold.

[SGP]

Sweetie, I am Dutch And I think you quite missed the latent humour in my post.

I said "you must be joking"

If you knew that, why did you take it seriously? You think I don't know what goes on here?

SGP should analyze this exchange.

I just did. Not At All Kidding. Link Provided Below But Not Selling Any Artificial Sweetener Biscuits, Or Any Other Biscuits For That Matter.

https://forum.language-learners.org/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=9406&p=122232#p122232

@Reineke der Fuchs: This time, that [action of yours] really was rather "foxy" / ausgefuchst.