首页
外语
计算机
考研
公务员
职业资格
财经
工程
司法
医学
专升本
自考
实用职业技能
登录
考研
The status of English as an international language appears unassailable. It is simultaneously preeminent in science, politics, b
The status of English as an international language appears unassailable. It is simultaneously preeminent in science, politics, b
admin
2015-09-30
78
问题
The status of English as an international language appears unassailable. It is simultaneously preeminent in science, politics, business and entertainment. And unlike any of its lingua franca predecessors, it has all this on a truly worldwide scale. There is no challenger comparable to it: Chinese has more native speakers, but every schoolchild in China now studies English. And India, set to overtake China in population by 2050. is avidly trading on its English expertise.
But English is not thereby immune to the principles of language survival. Above all, it is notable that beyond the 330 million or so native speakers, perhaps twice as many more use it as a second language. And this community of over 600 million second-language speakers, who make English preeminent as a world language, also make it vulnerable in the long term.
In 5,000 years of recorded language history, a few dozen languages have achieved the status of lingua franca, a language of wider communication among people whose mother tongues may be quite different. But this status does not come about by some utilitarian reckoning, or democratic selection. There is always a reason, be it conquest, trade, religious mission or social aspiration, which has selected a language to have this wider role, and that reason is hard to forget—and ultimately often hard to forgive.
This is seldom clear—at first to native speakers. They naturally see their mother tongue as a simple blessing for the wider world. But neither Latin nor French would have spread across Western Europe if their use had not once upon a time been imposed—by forces other than lucidity and charm.
There was status or wealth to be gained from knowing these languages, and in their heyday, no one believed they might one day go out of use. After all, they seemed not only useful, but also such exceptional languages.
But far from being disinterested aids to thought and communication, every lingua franca continues to bear the badge of its original spread; and this is often the cause of its ultimate undoing. This moral is as clear and well-established as the recorded history of the lingua franca phenomenon.
English will not decline as a first language: Indeed for the foreseeable future it will be among the five major mother tongues of the world. Spread out worldwide, it may even change and ultimately split into a family of languages. But it would go against the pattern of world history if alien peoples patronized English for very much longer than necessary.
In sum, the world in the next few generations is likely to see greater multilingualism and less English-backed bilingualism. We can learn the long view from language history, but it may be a hard lesson.
According to the text, every lingua franca
选项
A、remains pre eminent as a first language
B、will decline in spite of its pre-eminence
C、has a recorded history as clear as English
D、is going to split into a family of languages
答案
B
解析
根据第六段第一句“But far from…communication,every lingua franca…spread;and this isoften the cause of its ultimate undoing”,B应为答案。
转载请注明原文地址:https://kaotiyun.com/show/YHzZ777K
0
考研英语一
相关试题推荐
HereIwanttotrytogiveyouananswertothequestion;Whatpersonalqualitiesaredesirableinateacher?Probablynotw
Thefollowingparagraphsaregiveninawrongorder.ForQuestions41-45,youarerequiredtoreorganizetheseparagraphsintoa
TheauthorgivestheexampleofatollgateinthefirstparagraphtoindicatethatWhatisthe"mainquestionforthepoor"(Li
Smoking,whichmaybeapleasureforsomepeople,isaserioussourceofdiscomforttotheirfellows.(1)_____,medicalauthorit
Ithasbeennecessarytoreferrepeatedlytotheeffectsofthetwoworldwarsinpromotingallkindofinnovation.Itshouldbe
Ithasbeennecessarytoreferrepeatedlytotheeffectsofthetwoworldwarsinpromotingallkindofinnovation.Itshouldbe
Agoodwriteris______whocanexpressthecommonplaceinanuncommonway.
Everyonemusthavehadatleastonepersonalexperiencewithacomputererrorbythistime.Bankbalancesaresuddenlyreported
Halfoftheworld’spopulationwillbespeakingorlearningEnglishby2015,researcherssay.Twobillionpeopleareexpectedto
Shouldaleaderstrivetobelovedorfeared?Thisquestion,famouslyposedbyMachiavelli,liesattheheartofJosephNye’sne
随机试题
NocountryintheworldhasmoredailynewspaperthantheUSA.Therearealmost2,000ofthem,ascomparedwith180inJapan,16
Conversationbeginsalmostthemomentwecomeintocontactwithanotherandcontinuesthroughouttheday【C1】______theaidofcel
关于131I-OIH放射性肾图,错误的是
患者,女,15岁。不慎跌倒致左髁突骨折。CT示骨折线位于关节翼肌窝上方。髁突断端可能的移位方向是
下列化合物中哪一个是线粒体氧化磷酸化的解偶联剂
根据《建设工程施工劳务分包合同(示范文本)》,劳务报酬可按()方式结算。
所谓小康水平,是指在温饱的基础上,生活质量进一步提高,达到丰衣足食。()
解放军某部有600人,他们排成四路纵队,每相邻两排之间前后相距1米,队伍每分钟行75米,现在要通过一座长676米的桥,从排头上桥到排尾离桥共需( )分钟。
从所给的四个选项中,选择最合适的一个填入问号处,使之呈现一定的规律性。
学生時代にもっと経済を勉強していればよかった()、残念でならない。
最新回复
(
0
)