Movies no longer the lingua frana

At Paul Hartmann's today in Heidenheim the Marketing woman I am teaching Business English could not understand why at a meeting tomorrow with colleagues from Spain, Sweden, France and the Czech Republic, English has to be spoken. "Why couldn't they speak German?" she asked. After all, Hartmann is a German company.

I continue to wonder why English has become the lingua franca of commerce and why Europeans force themselves to learn this language. Gore Vidal once said that movies are the lingua franca, but no more. Now it is Business English with all its idiotic terminology: joint takeover, merger, subsidiary, headquarters, stocks, initial public offering, etc.

Another pupil, this one at Ernst & Young, also said today that Business English had become all the rage in Germany just over the last 10 years. Prior to that, there was not that much concern about speaking English at the workplace.

The widespread use of English is slowly squeezing out languages around the world. Approximately 20 languages disappear each year according to a recent newspaper article. And with the language goes a whole other way of life, of consciousness, of interpreting the world and universe. Mourn the loss of linguistic diversity by learning a new language! Your world will never be the same!