Paul, at 18:12 on May 12 1995, you wrote to Bill Grimsley...

PE> There are more people that know English than know Spanish.

BG> I just checked this myself, and you are right.  However...

PE> Checked how?

An (almost) impeccable source, the 1993 Guinness Book of Records.

BG> it could be said that more people speak Chinese than any other language.  

PE> You'll find that a hell of a lot of those Chinese (presumably you 
PE> are counting both Cantonese and Mandarin and twenty million other
PE> Chinese dialects as "Chinese", as stupid as that is to do) speak 
PE> English as well. 

BG>   "The language used by more people than any other is Mandarin, 
BG>    spoken by an estimated 68% of China's population (and hence, 
BG>    by about 770 million people) in 1990."

PE> That is native language you're talking about, which I don't 
PE> disagree with. 

Sure, but in the case of the Chinese, I'd hazard a guess that fewer than 5%
of them could speak or understand even ONE English word.  Not all Chinese
live in Hong Kong, Singapore, or Dixon Street just yet.

PE> Have you ever counted how many countries are actually native English 
PE> speakers?  Very, very few.  Like 6 of any significance.

What constitutes a "significant" country though?  If I could be
bothered going through the list of countries in my Atlas, I reckon I could
find scores (maybe 100 or more) where English is either the main or
alternative spoken language.

PE> BTW, all of India speaks English as well, just to talk to each 
PE> other from different provinces.

BG> Funny, I could have sworn that most Indians spoke Hindi,

PE> No, they don't all speak Hindi. 

Sure, there are the ususal regional dialects.  However, you'd accidentally
deleted the quote which stated that...

  "Commonest Language: Today's world total of languages and dialects
   still spoken is about 4-5000, some 845 of which come from India."

As a matter of interest only, an incredible 500-odd of those languages and
dialects are specifically restricted to Papua/New Guinea alone.

PE> They are more likely to speak English than Hindi (as part of the repertoire 
PE> I'm talking about, not native, none of them are native English speakers).

As you suggest, the majority would likely speak English, doubtless because
of the British occupation.  I asked my brother, who has twice travelled
through India and Nepal (by bicycle, would you believe!), and although most
people speak Hindi (or dialects) amongst themselves, there was no town or
village where he couldn't find at least one person who was able to speak
English.

BG>   "The next (third) most commonly spoken language, and the most
BG>    widespread, is English, with an estimated 330 million native
BG>    speakers, and nearly twice as many using it as a second or
BG>    third language."

BG> Even allowing for the "twice as many" using English as their 
BG> second language, it STILL comes nowhere near the number of people 
BG> who speak Mandarin alone, not to mention the 500 million Chinese 
BG> who speak Cantonese or other regional dialects, all of which 
BG> comprehensively fucks your theory about English being the most 
BG> commonly used language.  It is, however, the most widely spread.

PE> I don't believe that is being interpreted correctly.  E.g. my 
PE> wife, from mainland China, learnt English at school,

And I'll bet that there are some remote provinces where they don't even
have schools, let alone teach anything other than their own regional
dialects.  Where exactly in mainland China did Xiayi live anyway, Beijing?

PE> just like everyone else, and EVERYONE in Japan, and EVERYONE in Europe,

Dangerous stuff Paul, using such absolutes.  It's nothing like everyone,
actually, especially in Europe.  It's close to true of the Japs though.

PE> and probably 50% of India and probably 20% of China.  However, there is no 
PE> way on earth you would say that she USED English in China as a second 
PE> language.  The statistic you want is how many people KNOW English.

That's rubbish.  I know Chinese, Japanese, French, German, Greek, Italian,
Spanish, Tagalog, Pidgin, and even some Gaelic, but there's no fucking way
in the world that I could even begin to conduct a conversation (or read a
book) in anything other than English (maybe French, but why bother with
those arrogant bastards anyway).

Regards, Bill
@EOT:

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