Globish or broken English

Globish is a simplified English (broken English) used by people from different countries to communicate with one another. We have just talked about that in Boulogne sur mer polyglot café. I don't like it because I think it doesn't sound nice but it is practical that's all !

I do hate this!

It's like fast-food and sms's: a language minus everything cultural, everything subtle, everything smart!

Yes Gérard, I agree with you ! Anyway it is the only way to communicate (They told me yesterday in Boulogne sur mer). Foreigners can't understand properly constructed sentences nor the English or American accent. In meetings for instance, people need to quickly communicate. I hate it because like you I am passionate about languages. What then is the solution"

There are languages which were created recently to ease communication: these "artificial" languages don't have a 1000-year culture behind them.

I found the discussion very interesting, a bit long though, and I will remember two things :
- Learning a foreign language is a life-time effort...
- Do we really need to speak English perfectly, to know the ancient culture of the English-speaking countries, in order to do business with other countries, such as China, Japan, South America ? Globish or broken English may be satisfactory for that purpose, no ?


The purpose of languages is above all to communicate. As long as we reach that level, we can choose, either to remain there and we are happy to exchange with people using the same language, be they native-speakers or not, or if we are passionnate as we are as polyglots, we can choose to deepen the study and become perfect, and learn the culture, etc.... to please ourselves.

Ghislaine,

No need to learn about ancient culture to communicate or do business.
However, present culture is needed (how to behave, how to be polite, etc.) and avoid to ruin pronunciation, vocabulary and grammar is the least of respect.
My elder son is happy to travel abroad (Russia, China, Korea including North, Jordan, etc.) and uses English to communicate. He doesn't care about improving his language as most people in these countries wouldn't understand English better (on the opposite); the worst country -according to him- was Sri Lanka. English is not their official language but I thought that, as neighbors of India, they would speak better than Globish: no article, usually no verb...

Hi everyone,

I laughed when, after several minutes of explanations by the French contact, the Brit asked him to give a few examples: the words, the pronunciation of the guy were already a perfect example of poor English (though better than Globish).

Here is another interesting article about broken English after Brexit
https://www.google.fr/amp/s/www.politico.eu/article/brexit-eu-official-language-english-should-stop-speaking-broken-clement-beaune/amp/

EU should stop speaking ‘broken English’ after Brexit, says French minister
France’s Clément Beaune pledges concrete action to enhance ‘linguistic diversity.’

Hi everyone
If the multiplicity of cultures is a necessary condition for successful human development, then the preservation of linguistic diversity is essential, since written and oral languages are the main mode of transmission of cultures
Each language is the vehicle of a culture that enriches the whole of humanity and it would be a pity to use only the dominant languages, especially when they are impoverished like the Globish or broken English. The English language should be used correctly