According to the Engco Forecasting Model explained above, the 5 most spoken languages in 2050 will be Mandarin, Spanish, English, Hindi and Arabic. The key drivers behind the continued rise in popularity of these languages include population growth, economic predictions and national language policy.
Of course, the world is constantly changing, and a new study has proclaimed that there will soon be a new global language on the world scene. Dr. Jeffrey Gill, a Flinders University academic, believes Chinese is set to rise shortly as a prominent global language spoken frequently outside of China and Asia.
By 2115 there may only be 600 active languages. Many linguists predict that two major changes will occur over time: There will be fewer languages.
Types of Language Change
Language is always changing. We've seen that language changes across space and across social group. Language also varies across time. Generation by generation, pronunciations evolve, new words are borrowed or invented, the meaning of old words drifts, and morphology develops or decays.
It's unlikely that we'll see a world that speaks one language any time soon. Protecting each individual countries' cultures is a huge barrier, but an important one to ensure our world is as beautifully diverse as it's always been.
1. Java. Java is currently the leading enterprise programming language and is expected to remain in high demand through 2025 and 2030. As a general-purpose language, Java is used for web pages, applications, and more.
As David Graddol notes in “The Future of English?”, there is no reason to believe that another language will become the global lingua franca within the next 50 years. English probably won't replace other languages, but its usefulness as the common language in trade, diplomacy, and pop culture will continue.
Indonesian. Called Bahasa Indonesia locally, Indonesian has also been one of the fastest growing languages in the world over the past 50 years.
A language becomes dormant or extinct when no one can speak it anymore. It becomes doomed when the latest generation of children no longer speak the language. From that point, the last fluent speakers of the language, in their late teens or early twenties, give the language about 75 more years of life.
Across multiple sources, Mandarin Chinese is the number one language listed as the most challenging to learn. The Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center puts Mandarin in Category IV, which is the list of the most difficult languages to learn for English speakers.
Python is a simple, object-oriented, and versatile programming language. Python, like JavaScript, has a plethora of libraries that make it future-proof. Most programmers who also want to work on Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence use it as their first choice.
So dive right in and practice your Dutch with confidence. For the same reasons Dutch is the closest language to English, German is also a close language, and another one that many English speakers may find easier to learn. Dutch is commonly mentioned as the language nestled between English and German.
The number of Chinese speakers online is estimated at 888.4 million, which has risen an astounding 2600% over the same time period. The Chinese language is catching up quickly and is set to overtake English in the near future.
Language is a vital part of everyday life. It's the medium we use to communicate with others, think through our emotions, make decisions, and so much more. Once you've embraced a language so fully and consistently, is it possible to ever completely forget it? The short answer is yes, it is possible.
English will most likely not become the dominant world language as more people speak more than one language, a language expert reports. The world faces a future of people speaking more than one language, with English no longer seen as likely to become dominant, a British language expert says in a new analysis.
Matthew Youlden speaks nine languages fluently and understands more than a dozen more. He's what is known as a polyglot, a member of the multilingual elite who speaks six or more languages fluently. He's also a sociolinguist who studies the revitalization of minority languages.
Currently, there are 573 known extinct languages. These are languages that are no longer spoken or studied. Many were local dialects with no records of their alphabet or wording, and so are forever lost. Others were major languages of their time, but society and changing cultures left them behind.
Officially recognized languages are often mistaken for official languages. According to the online reference Wikipedia, half the countries of the world have official languages. Some have only one official language, such as Albania, France, Germany and Lithuania.
Every 40 days a language dies. This “catastrophic” loss is being amplified by the climate crisis, according to linguists. If nothing is done, conservative estimates suggest that half of all the 7,000 languages currently spoken will be extinct by the end of the century.
It is crucial to understand that languages represent cultures. This reiterates the need to protect endangered languages. Without its language, a culture can die out quickly and become lost to time. Above all, preserving languages is as critical as preserving diverse wildlife to maintain a balanced ecosystem.