Language Travel: Who Owns the English Language?

In my recent book, Teach American English Around the World I make a specific case that North Americans should consider teaching English globally. This "portable profession" offers the opportunity for travel, adventure and authentic cultural experiences. But I do not claim that the USA owns the English language.

Language Imperialism
While I make a specific case for American English, the language should not be a conduit for North American neocolonialism. I profoundly respect the British origins of American English, and recognize that the latter’s popularity is a function of population and proliferation. The United States is home to four times more native speakers than Britain. Combined they make up about 70% of the 320 million people who speak English as a first language.

Quality, a Global Demand
English_no matter where it is spoken as a first language_is governed by set rules and reasons, no matter how arcane they may seem to the untrained. Certainly the unwieldy number of accents, dialects, and slang may suggest otherwise, but in his book, English Syntax, author Roderick Jacobs shows that all native English speakers adhere to the same grammar units and syntax. Jacobs considers the question: "Can we really say there is a single, uniform language, English, rather than a cluster of languages, each with its own special properties?" Jacobs believes that factors such as age, sex, social status, regional origin and the context of the utterance influence grammatical forms, vocabulary and pronunciation. "So to hear a cloth weaver from the north of Scotland, a country lawyer from Alabama, and a sheep rancher form Australia, can cause a non-native speaker of English to wonder about any so-called uniformity of English," says Jacobs.

But English speakers, whatever their background, show consistent intuitions about sentence structure and word combinations. An utterance like this one "She is liking very much of her staying in this country" would be identified by any English speaker as a non-native utterance, says Jacobs. Though there are some grammatical differences among English dialects, they share core grammatical units and relations, and those enable us to identify a single language.

International Language
It is historically true that British trade followed by colonial and imperial expansionism brought English around the world. We have just reflected that because of the military and economic strength of the United States of America, English is the lingua franca of the present historical moment as we begin the second millennium. However we still may ask the question who owns this international language?

We have already seen that the Philippines, India and Nigeria use English in everyday life. When a Japanese engineer wants to speak to a Mexican engineer they will probably use English. They will bring their business and cultural experience with them when they use the international language. I would like to state as many others have before me, that an international language belongs to its users not to the countries whose national languages have become internationalized. I am a native speaker of American English but I am clearly not a native speaker of English as an international language. The concept of a native speaker of an international language is a contradiction in logic and I fully agree with Julian Edge in his book Essentials of English Language Teaching when he writes: "When we accept that an international language belongs to its users, we can also say that:

People who learn an international language are claiming something, which naturally belongs to them. The important issue is not one of native/non-native speaker as an accident of birth, but of ability to use that language internationally. Native speakers of national influences (British, American, etc.) are only partners in the international language. They also have to learn communication strategies if they are to use it effectively."

New Englishes
Each country which claims to use English accurately and fluently will provide a slightly different accent. Certainly the people of India and Pakistan have an accent of their own and are not trying to imitate British or American English. We notice that in the United States there is now widespread acceptance of Spanish-accented English. Since the United States is home to the third largest population of Spanish speaking people in the world, this Spanish sound English can be accepted on the same level as a Boston, Biloxi, London or Toronto accent.

Conclusion
The point of this brief article is to raise our level of awareness and reflection that while the international language today is English certainly no one owns it. It will have its own individual characteristics by the nation and language groups that use it. While we acknowledge and accept new regional accents the English language still demands like any other world language that it is used correctly and accurately.