sierra pe4first
TRANSCRIPT
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In his essay “Who Owns Global English?” Dennis Baron uses his language in a critic and
explanatory way in order to convey the importance of the English Language in a global context.
Dennis Baron analyzes how English has been transformed and how it’s transforming with time and
how people react to this.
The concept of Global English he refers to in his whole essay states the fact that time and other
countries have influenced English to a point where native anglo-speakers tend to fail to recognize
their own idiom in the English others use; to the point where it’s referred to as “Spanglish”(438),
“Engrish” or ”Bad English” (436).
To empower his points he uses words and sentences said by well-known and respected people in the
media like Barack Obama “Yes we can” or even the Queen of England. In addition to these two
characters of the actual international social life he mentions the Roman Empire to increase his
credibility even more. This strategy combined with intelligent use of language demonstrated in the
use of terms like “new English’’ or the distinction between American and British English to note that
this feeling is not only shared with countries that employ English as their second language plays a big
role in the ease of the understanding of the essay. (435)
Despite English being so ‘’Global” as defined by Baron, native speakers tend to overprotect it when
they get the feeling of the language being threatened by other idioms as the author expresses in his
essay. He uses verbs like threaten or protect to make it noticeable that this is a big issue for some and
it deserved to be paid attention to. This obsession is also reflected in the fact that they wish to remove
“borrowed” words from other language in order to keep English as pure as it can be.
Despite this attempt of protection, according to Dennis Baron, the English language has suffered the
same process the Romans had with Latin, being turned into many different Romance Languages. To
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express the feeling that Global English isn’t just his ideas but a real fact he presents the examples of
Slovakia where Andy Hillard was fined for using English on TV or how china is prohibiting USA’s
abbreviations . He once again uses real facts to empower the truthfulness of his paper along with an
anecdote on how Chinese reject American influence but are so familiar with Japanese or Pali. This
anecdotes put to rest the tension the author generates during the whole discussion.
Finally on a side note and as an update, possibly to bring the reader to concern and realize it’s
happening at the time he is reading it, he decides to emphasize on that bilingual phrase that the metro
in Madrid was using: ‘’Yes we want estudiar el proximo curso…” This is done to show us, the reader
the wide number or branches of variation that English has and also the importance it has adquired (to
be written on an official document, for example).
Through the repetition of the word English throughout the essay with different adjectives and
different connotations, the author maintains the main idea of the essay and keeps it in a remarkable
and easy-to-notice first layer. This constantly grabs the reader’s attention to what the thesis is and
how it relates to allthe different examples he gives out in addition to keeping the reader focused and
entertained on the reading.
The use of language not only allows for this essay to be produced but also permits the essay to reflect
the importance of the topic of discussion and develop the author’s thesis from that point.
Language is the vehicle we use; we get to choose the road we want to follow.