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French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

independent.co.uk

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Re: French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

#191

Post by dragonwriter »

gumby wrote: post #35
throw737858 wrote: post #16

Why not arabic? French is kind of obsolete.

Mandarin would open the EU to the largest number of speakers. Spanish would be a good second, if English is politically untenable, but of course it's already an official EU language so choosing it might annoy the other states. Romansh is an European language not used in the EU; choosing it would level the playing field (and would not be so politically complex as another such like Basque).

> Mandarin would open the EU to the largest number of speakers.

No, making Mandarin the working language of the EU bureaucracy wouldn't open the EU up to any additional people, and the vast majority of Mandarin speakers are subject to one government or another that has no interest in the EU (and particularly, for instance, being accountable to the European Convention on Human Rights.)

> Romansh is an European language not used in the EU; choosing it would level the playing field

No, it wouldn’t. In terms of making communication within the levels of the bureaucracy to which it applies all but impossible, sure.

Not sure why that would be the goal, though.

Re: French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

#192

Post by mannerheim »

BitwiseFool wrote: post #149
gdsdfe wrote: post #102

Somehow this made wonder if Esperanto or at least the idea behind it that we can come up with one common language to use worldwide. If that was actually successful we might have less of this nonsense but then again good luck having everyone agreeing on something ... Hmm oh well

Esperanto is the Linux of languages.

That's way too generous. Linux at least dominates in servers and smartphones.

Re: French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

#193

Post by throwaway-571 »

fumblebee wrote: post #171
throwaway-571 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think embracing english as the main language of the EU is the worst idea since Brexit. It’s anything but neutral. It’s a concession made to the brits and a trojan for the Americans. They left, they can f right off and take their piss poor excuse of a language with them. It works for programming, insults and not much else. If they hadn’t joined the EU to sabotage it, maybe english wouldn’t be as popular in the EU. L…

What a depressingly resentful and scornful take against op’s well reasoned comment. Taking a position is fine, shouting through your keyboard is discouraged.

I have nothing against op’s well written and documented comment but it is describing the status quo.

it’s like saying cobol is the most used programming language, why use java or python?

Re: French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

#195

Post by throwaway-571 »

fumblebee wrote: post #171
throwaway-571 wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think embracing english as the main language of the EU is the worst idea since Brexit. It’s anything but neutral. It’s a concession made to the brits and a trojan for the Americans. They left, they can f right off and take their piss poor excuse of a language with them. It works for programming, insults and not much else. If they hadn’t joined the EU to sabotage it, maybe english wouldn’t be as popular in the EU. L…

What a depressingly resentful and scornful take against op’s well reasoned comment. Taking a position is fine, shouting through your keyboard is discouraged.

OP is describing the logical reason for english, i’m presenting the emotional reasons against it.

Re: French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

#196

Post by pier25 »

heinrichhartman wrote: post #19

The sane thing to do after the Brexit, was to embrace English as main language, since it has not become neutral ground! According to Wikipedia we have: * Germany: 56% English speakers, 14.5% French speakers * Italy: 34% English vs. 19.43% French * Spain: 22% English vs. 11.73% French * Sweden: 89% English vs. 8% French I can't get over how bad this decision is. How can you ignore these kinds of discrepancies? [1] htt…

I'm from Spain (but also a native French speaker) and I totally agree.

I haven't done the math, but I'd bet in the EU there are probably more English speakers than any other native language.

Re: French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

#197

Post by tagrun »

WalterBright wrote: post #92
heinrichhartman wrote: post #19

The sane thing to do after the Brexit, was to embrace English as main language, since it has not become neutral ground! According to Wikipedia we have: * Germany: 56% English speakers, 14.5% French speakers * Italy: 34% English vs. 19.43% French * Spain: 22% English vs. 11.73% French * Sweden: 89% English vs. 8% French I can't get over how bad this decision is. How can you ignore these kinds of discrepancies? [1] htt…

Isn't it ironic that English is the Lingua Franca?

No, because "lingua franca" derives from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediterranean_Lingua_Franca which has nothing to do with French, apart from people who didn't understand it mistook it for "French".

Re: French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

#198

Post by throwaway-571 »

CoastalCoder wrote: post #180
forty wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm French and honestly I don't really care that much about that but for some reason if I had to choose, I'd rather have EU things done in German for example than English, that would make much more sense to me (even though I speak some English and really no German).

Can you elaborate on your reasons?

i would guess “anything but english”, and German is more spoken in the EU than french.

Re: French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

#199

Post by beebeepka »

smcl wrote: post #142
pavlov wrote: post #116

Nobody should take any reporting about EU in the UK press at face value.

Ok so Politico then? https://www.politico.eu/article/in-2022-make-french-language...

This site is hilarious. It says .eu but supposed European news are just UK news. Need I sa more?

Re: French set to replace English as EU’s ‘working language’

#200

Post by jgwil2 »

heinrichhartman wrote: post #19

The sane thing to do after the Brexit, was to embrace English as main language, since it has not become neutral ground! According to Wikipedia we have: * Germany: 56% English speakers, 14.5% French speakers * Italy: 34% English vs. 19.43% French * Spain: 22% English vs. 11.73% French * Sweden: 89% English vs. 8% French I can't get over how bad this decision is. How can you ignore these kinds of discrepancies? [1] htt…

Let's not forget about Ireland.
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