English is Great Transcript Part 2

http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/britain-great/english-great-part-2

 © The British Council, 2012 Page 1 of 2 

The United Kingdom’s international organisation for educational opportunities and cultural relations. We are registered in England as a charity.

I’ve come here to the British Council whowork hard to build cultural relations betweenBritain and the rest of the world, and theEnglish language is a big part of that. Let’sfind out more.

The British Council provides resources forpeople learning English, and also teachersof English. Martin Peacock is the Director ofGlobal English Product Development.

Richard: Martin, tell me about English as aglobal language.

Martin: OK, well many people talk aboutEnglish as being a global language. And thereasons for that are the widespread use ofEnglish. It’s used in education, it’s used inscience and technology and, importantly,English is also used in business.

Richard: Are there many global languages?

Martin: Well, no, not really. I mean there’s‘the’ global language which is English in thesense that English is used in these manydifferent contexts; there’s only one. Thereare other languages which are used verywidely and spoken by many people in manydifferent places: Cantonese, for example, avariant of Chinese, is spoken in manydifferent places so it’s global in ageographic sense and it can be global in thenumbers, but in terms of the use in differentareas of education, science, research,English is the only global language.

Richard: Are there different types ofEnglish?

Martin: Well, yes, there are lots of differenttypes. There's different accents of English. Icome from the North of England, where Ihave a particular accent. So within Englanditself, within the UK, there are manyvariations in English pronunciation and thatextends globally, so you see English inAmerica and used in Australia, which is

different in accent and also in usage aswell.

Richard: And what about the impact oftechnology on a language?

Martin: In the past, new words were coinedby people - it might have been in a speechor a newspaper article or in a book - theywere written down and then other peopleadapted them and used them and that couldbe quite a slow process and new wordsmight come into a language over a longperiod: 10, 20 years. So technology allowslanguages to evolve much more quickly.

Richard: So technology can change thelanguage, but in what way does it helppeople to learn the language?

Martin: Well, it helps in many ways. In thepast, students in locations in other countriesdidn’t have access to much genuineEnglish; they may have a book or an oddnewspaper, but what the internet allowsthem is to read and often to read andtranslate languages like English on amassive scale.

People learn English for different reasonsand knowledge of the language is oftenimportant in fields like medicine, businessand computing. English is becoming moreand more important in order tocommunicate in the international world.

English opens doors to employment,education and mobility. And it helpsteachers and learners engage across theglobe. One of the best ways to learn Englishis to study in Britain. But what is it actuallylike to learn English here?

Clare: My name is Clare, I am 26 and Icome from Italy. My course at the North

 

 English is Great Transcript Part 2

http://learnenglish.britishcouncil.org/en/britain-great/english-great-part-2

 © The British Council, 2012 Page 2 of 2 

The United Kingdom’s international organisation for educational opportunities and cultural relations. We are registered in England as a charity.

West Academy was very good. I studiedgrammar, conversation and also wordslinked with my work placement. The teacherwas very good. She has always beenavailable for problems during the lessonsand outside the lessons.

Over 600,000 learners a year come toBritain to help achieve their ambition, toexperience modern UK life.

Maximiliano: My name is Maximiliano. I’m23 years old and I’m from Venezuela.Everyone here is very friendly. When youtell them that you’re a foreigner, everyone isvery welcoming, like everyone tries to speakwith you, everyone, like, tries to just stayclose to you and ask you about yourexperience, how your life is in your owncountry. And that actually helps you a lot,like, when you’re not a native speaker.

Alexander: My name is Alexander. Mysurname Igurov. I’m 24 years old. I’m cometo the UK from Russia, from Moscow. I’mstudying here business English. Sometimeswe have general lessons about socialEnglish. I’m engineer in the buildingcompany. I will use English in my job. I thinkit will help me to improve my career.

Anthony: My name’s Anthony, and I justturned 24 last February and I’m fromMalaysia. The people here are very nice.The place is amazing and learning here is areally different experience, so just comeover and check it out.

Well, they seem to be enjoying learningEnglish. And what I’ve learned is, is that theEnglish language is more exciting than I’dfirst realized. And maybe, just maybe, in thefuture, I won’t have to worry quite as muchabout my grammar and spelling.