Is it possible that Chinese would take the palce of English?

[Fanny12]

Do you think that is it possible Chinese would thake the place of English in the future?

If it would be possible, how long would it take?

Is the language Chinese important than Japanese, German or French?

thanks

[BobK]

It depends what you mean by 'take the place of'. If you mean it in a strict geographical sense, probably not - unless there's a pretty radical change in geo-political realities; Chinese is unlikely to become the lingua franca of, say, Londoners.

But if you mean 'take the place of [in some measure of 'usedness']', almost certainly 'Yes'. I read somewhere that quite soon (my source was more definite - it said 'within X years', where X was either 5 or 10 or 20 [I've forgotten which]) Chinese will be used in more web pages than English.

Chinese also has demographics on its side, I think. I expect the number of Chinese mother-tongue speakers will ultimately become greater than the number of English mother-tongue speakers.

I don't think Chinese has much of a future as a second language though.

b

[Soup]

I don't think Chinese has much of a future as a second language though.

Oh, I'm not so sure about that...

As China’s economic power grows, Chinese is becoming the new language of the ... do business in China, so there’s a need for Americans to learn the language ... http://ambafrance-cn.org/spip.php?article3167&lang=fr

With China becoming economic superpower, Md. hits the books
The educated elite spoke Greek and Latin throughout much of history. In the 20th century, English became the universal language of business.

Now the world is changing again, and if America wants a strong voice in this new world, then its business people must learn the culture - and the language - of China.

With China becoming economic superpower, Md. hits the books Daily Record, The (Baltimore) - Find Articles

Next hot language to study: Chinese

Chicago schools are leading the way as they try to prepare students for an increasingly globalized world.

Proponents see knowledge of the Chinese language and culture as a leg up in a global economy where China is growing in importance. "This is beginning to bubble up as, 'This is an interesting way to begin to engage with the world's next superpower,' " says Michael Levine, director of education at the Asia Society, which has started five new public high schools that offer Chinese. "Globalization has already changed the arrangements in terms of how children today are going to need to think about their careers.... The question is when, not whether, the schools are going to adjust."

The number of students learning Chinese is tiny compared with how many study Spanish or French. But one report shows that precollegiate enrollment nearly quadrupled between 1992 and 2002, from 6,000 to 24,000.

Next hot language to study: Chinese | csmonitor.com

______________________
See Is Chinese the Future of Business?

[CHOMAT]

Bob ,
Chinese that includes the official Pu Tong Hua and the other Han tongues seems to reach one billion of mother-tongue speakers, English the half of it.( according to the Quid)
Linguasphere reckons an equality between Chinese and English.
Summer Institute of Linguistics give an edge to Chinese with 885 million speakers vs 332 for English.
What about a Cokney Mandarin? Give me my tit ( for tat)... I fancy a toll ( a roll?)

[BobK]

Oh, I'm not so sure about that...

As China’s economic power grows, Chinese is becoming the new language of the ... do business in China, so there’s a need for Americans to learn the language ... http://ambafrance-cn.org/spip.php?article3167&lang=fr

[etc]. ...

Thanks for all those links, Soup. Mandarin is at the top of my list of languages to be learnt; I'd better get my skates on!

b

[Tdol]

Chinese will increase in importance considerably, but I honestly don't think it will supplant English as an international language. Japan has had the world's second largest economy for ages, but that has had relatively little impact. Also, the size of the population isn't that important- there could be ten thousand workers in a factory, but I only need to speak to a very few to trade. More and more people will learn it, but I don't see it becoming the world's lingua franca.

[Ouisch]

Back in the 1980s I remember reading all the dire warnings of how Japan was poised to be the world's number one economic superpower, and that all savvy business people were learning to speak Japanese. Some high schools even started offering it as a foreign language course (usually in the US our choices for foreign language classes are French or Spanish).

The Japanese furor eventually subsided, and next we were warned that we'd best start studying Arabic, because that would soon be the international language for business. Now it's recommended that school children start learning Chinese if they plan to compete in the global economy when they're older...

I don't doubt that it would be beneficial to learn Mandarin as a second language, but since the native speakers are concentrated in such a specific geographic region, versus English speakers spread all around the globe, I don't know that it will ever become the world's de facto second language.

[CHOMAT]

I totally share this viewpoint. There are no economical , political or historical-to be reasons to believe Mandarin will spread all over the blue orange .

[BobK]

I totally share this viewpoint. There are no economical , political or historical-to be reasons to believe Mandarin will spread all over the blue orange .

b

PS Incidentally, Alain, is l'orange a metaphor - a bit like l'hexagone? If so, it doesn't translate too well - possibly just because having the two colours 'blue' and ''orange' juxtaposed is confusing (for us anyway! - ils sont fous ces bretons).

[CHOMAT]

Bob , you are as smart as ever and noticed the figure. The blue orange is a metaphor created by one of our greatest writer and Poet Paul Eluard who one said that the earth is blue as an orange.
I also remarked you are a fan of Asterix . I'm impressed!!. By the way, if you fancy going to Britanny some day ( again), you'll be welcome to our modest penn-ti near la Pointe du raz.
Anyway, I should apologize for this obscure metaphor which wasn't relevant at all.