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In the recent thread on Spanish in the U.S. I said I'd leave the debate on which other foreign language would be best to study for another thread. I decided to start one on a language that a lot of people feel is the big wave of the future - Mandarin Chinese.
Here's my prediction: Mandarin will be A language with growing clout in the global world (and a good one to study if you're so interested), but it won't become THE "universal" language like English is now (at least within our lifetime). I have two reasons for the last point:
1. Unlike English, which is the language of two superpowers and numerous other former colonies of them scattered around the world, Chinese is the language of only one (major) country and China has not done any (at least large-scale) colonization beyond its neighbors. In other words, Chinese has a large depth (upwards of a billion people) but small breadth (present in major numbers only near the home country in Asia). (By contrast, for example, French has less depth with fewer speakers than languages like English and Spanish - but more breadth with areas on five continents where it's used and an official language of several international organizations.)
2. As long as the traditional writing system (with its many thousands of characters) remains in place I think Chinese is highly unlikely to become the new lingua franca since many Westerners find it much harder than the familiar alphabet with a more finite number of symbols.
ETA: Basically I'm putting Mandarin on par with the languages of other rising economies like Arabic and Russian - more exotic and more difficult languages to learn (for those with English as their native language) with a high business potential, but not the only direction you should consider heading with your foreign language studies.
There's a promising future for anyone who is bilingual English-Mandarin today. It will only get better as China's economy improves.
Chinese as a language is not well suited for tech or medicine -- they only have so many words. And it isn't nearly as easy to create new words, such as "Google it." English is the world's language because it is so adaptable (and because America, Canada and the UK speak it and everyone wants our business and culture). People put up with our bizarre grammar and spelling because of English's adaptability.
Automobile, for instance, simply was not a word until the turn of the 20th century. Many brand names, like aspirin, become words as well. No other language does that as well as English.
China is THE market. With the exception of the past 170 years, China was the number-one economy on the planet. (And India was number-two). The UK, and later US pole-vaulted over them thanks to the Industrial Revolution. And now India and China are catching up. And they're catching up FAST.
The US will no longer have the largest economy on the planet, and that is only a matter of years away.
But America doesn't have to worry much about it's continued place at the table of "world's greatest nations." We're the most-creative country the world has ever seen. Our culture dominates the planet, which cannot get enough of our books and movies and music. We INVENT styles of music every few generations -- blues, jazz, rock, rap, hip-hop. All American originals. We invent our own sports and then get the world interested -- baseball, basketball, volleyball, football (American football, not soccer). All American inventions. And speaking of American inventions, we invent fully half the great things that people really love. That's not bad for a nation that contains less than six percent of the world's population.
Mandarin is going to be very, very important. We already want to sell our products to China. For instance, they are absolutely ga-ga about Buicks there. Buick is a status symbol in China like a Mercedes is in America. When I asked if I could bring something from the States, the number-one answer was an iPhone -- even though they're MADE in China. The Chinese think we can get them cheaper, for some reason.
If we treat China like a partner (the way we treat the UK and Canada), everyone is going to do well. If we treat China the way we treat Russia, we are eventually going to be very, very sorry.
A more intimate understanding of the Chinese and their language is very important in today's world. John Huntsman comes to mind, and I would have voted for him, that basis being so important IMO.
However, like the Yuan their language is mostly isolated within their own borders. The Chinese want to, and are coming out into the world, more so than letting the world in. And in that manner the Chinese are teaching their children English. I know few people who speak Chinese/Mandarin. I know few people who are seeking to learn, or moving to China for any reason. But I know quite a few Chinese now here having learned and learning English. Many came for their education and/or research.
I suspect that over time, more of the world will understand Chinese, but see no reason why English will withdraw in our future world. Again much like the Yuan and USD.
One, that Mandarin Chinese has numbers but those numbers are highly concentrated in one country. Languages like English and Spanish and Arabic spread across vast distances due to imperialism. That age is past, and languages can no longer be spread out in such a fashion.
Two, the logographic writing system of Chinese is a major impediment to its spread in this digital age.
I'll add some more issues. One is that Chinese missed its window, so to speak. English happened to be the dominant language on the planet when science was really hitting its stride. This has helped solidify English as the language of education. It was also the dominant language when broad global network were being established. Air traffic control is but one example of many - per ICAO regulations, pilots on international flights must be able to converse in English if requested. So any pilot flying between Russia and Bulgaria, or Thailand and India, or Argentina and South Africa, must be able to speak English. And it didn't hurt that two consecutive globally-dominant powers - the United Kingdom and the United States - both spoke English.
Also, English not only has economic power behind it, it also has unparalleled cultural power behind it - television, films, music, commercial products, and so forth. These things reach out to youth around the world at early ages.
Finally, the Chinese economic miracle is coming to an end. The looming retirement of the Chinese generation that first saw the one-child rule implemented is going to see the country facing a disproportionately large older generation supported by an artificially small successor generation. This is going to be a serious economic hardship. The influence of Chinese is not going to continue increasing at its current rate.
Quote:
Originally Posted by ScoopLV
There's a promising future for anyone who is bilingual English-Mandarin today. It will only get better as China's economy improves.
Chinese as a language is not well suited for tech or medicine -- they only have so many words. And it isn't nearly as easy to create new words, such as "Google it." English is the world's language because it is so adaptable (and because America, Canada and the UK speak it and everyone wants our business and culture). People put up with our bizarre grammar and spelling because of English's adaptability.
Automobile, for instance, simply was not a word until the turn of the 20th century. Many brand names, like aspirin, become words as well. No other language does that as well as English.
"We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and rifle their pockets for new vocabulary."
--James Nicoll
Finally, the Chinese economic miracle is coming to an end. The looming retirement of the Chinese generation that first saw the one-child rule implemented is going to see the country facing a disproportionately large older generation supported by an artificially small successor generation. This is going to be a serious economic hardship. The influence of Chinese is not going to continue increasing at its current rate.
While I think your point is interesting and well-thought, I do not agree with it. The Chinese people now have such high expectations that they will continue to bootstrap their country. Old people who cannot afford to retire.... won't.
I don't think there is a more industrious people on the planet than the Chinese. I have a feeling that they are going to vector past the United States in the near future.
It will be interesting to see which scenario happens. (Probably something else entirely. That's usually how it works.)
No current Chinese language will ever be the world's language, because there isn't one language. While Mandarin in the most popular, not everyone in China speaks it. There's about five or six different languages in China. Where as other languages like Spanish, despite having different dialects, lends itself better to overtaking English. I feel like Chinese enjoy this/want it that way. If wanted one of their languages to the universal language, I'm pretty sure the Chinese government would work on having all of their people speaking the same language.
I can't see Chinese becoming a global language either and for the same reasons mentioned. The Middle Kingdom has never been interested in the rest of the world except for matters of commerce.
England once ruled 25% of the world. English legal, commercial, and administrative systems were so powerful that no alternatives could compete with them. That's why English is the global language. I don't see these circumstances ever begin repeated.
The language that will dominate in the future will be the country that wins the space race. Space is the future. If the Chinese dominate future generations may need to learn it, most likely Mandarin, even though as others have pointed out, Chineseis not exactly a flexible language. This highly speculative of course.
When looking at China, it is a very, very bad idea to look at past trend lines to predict future growth. Anybody remember the lesson of Japan?
First, China has been cooking their economic books for decades. Lester Turow, the Nobel economist, noted that China's stated GDP growth is roughly twice their growth in electrical production for years. This is an economic impossibility, for you need a corresponding rise in electrical production to power new machinery, equipment, housing, etc.
Second, at this moment in history, China has the highest working-age population that it ever will again. If the UN's demographic statistics are indeed correct, the number of working-age Chinese falls off a cliff. The best guess is that China will lose 250,000,000 from their working age population by the year 2050, while the United States will gain 50,000,000. That's a staggering number. What's more, the working population that exists will have to support an enormous elderly population.
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