Communication at every level, cultural, linguistic, personal, regional and international has never been so important on our ever shrinking planet, where all we do and decide affects everyone – near and far.
Communication is speeding up. It is adjusting. It is both more inclusive now than ever, and demanding.
No one language can dominate. Those of us who can operate in English are relieved that we can continue to converse for commerce and personal pursuits – because most of the world plugs into English still as a common language. We must now also respect a new world order.
In the 40th year of the Internet’s impact on our lives, we are faced with the reality that much of the world now CAN communicate and search in their own regional language and preference. And they can reasonably expect communication in the style, if not the actual words of their language, culture and ways of doing business.
I was reminded of my need to learn more, and faster about the world around me while listening to a song recently. To respect the growing strength and expectations of the ‘non-English’ speaking world. It was not enough that I felt somewhat comfortable in French, German or dabbled in Polish and even some ancient holy scripts. I realized that I would have to be prepared to embrace a good deal more and to be familiar with many more means of effective communication if I was to understand and be understood as a global citizen.
I was reminded recently of my hope to do so in our ONE world in a song sung by Bette Midler and the words written by Julie Gold.
The song …From a Distance.
Do these images inspire you?
From a distance the world looks blue and green,
and the snow-capped mountains white.
From a distance the ocean meets the stream,
and the eagle takes to flight.
From a distance, there is harmony,
and it echoes through the land.
It’s the voice of hope, it’s the voice of peace,
it’s the voice of every man.
From a distance we all have enough,
and no one is in need.
And there are no guns, no bombs, and no disease,
no hungry mouths to feed.
From a distance we are instruments
marching in a common band.
Playing songs of hope, playing songs of peace.
They’re the songs of every man.
God is watching us. God is watching us.
God is watching us from a distance.
From a distance you look like my friend,
even though we are at war.
From a distance I just cannot comprehend
what all this fighting is for.
From a distance there is harmony,
and it echoes through the land.
And it’s the hope of hopes, it’s the love of loves,
it’s the heart of every man.
It’s the hope of hopes, it’s the love of loves.
This is the song of every man.
And God is watching us, God is watching us,
God is watching us from a distance.
Oh, God is watching us, God is watching.
God is watching us from a distance.
Wasn’t That a Party?!
Thursday, July 9th, 2009(Reprinted in part from other postings by Helena K. in other social media venues)
For the past month and one week, Express Lane has been reveling in the events of summer. Aside from live theatre, seminars, lectures and other literary local diversions to celebrate the word, e word locally, there have been some international dates of note.
June 11, Web 2.0 entered the tomes as English language’s millionth word as we debated the merits of the runners up, Jai ho and nOOb. On June 21 people all over the earth stood still - in their various time zones – to honour the arrival of the longest day of the year.
Month’s end brought the memory of kids streaming out of schools into the summer sun, shouting ” no more pencils, no more book, no more teachers’ dirty looks”.
All these events are linked by ‘the word’. It appears in the anticipation of an event and in its summary at the conclusion. In the case of the millionth word, English sort of graduated, don’t you think, into the first official truly global language. We buy, sell, sing, rap, tell and taunt in English, all over the world.
1/5th of the world has chosen English as its first language and/or its primary language commerce. And, in China alone it is likely that more numbers of people are just learning English there are current native speakers, world wide. So we should not be surprised by all the local flavours that will naturally blend into this mondial mix. Yes! Here comes more Chinglish, Hebrish, Hinglish, Yinglish, Franglais, Spanglish and more movie and marketing magic words too, just because. Because we have always accepted and adapted and now it is, well, politically correct, to accept all enthusiastic new additions, isn’t it?
By definition, web 2.0 is “the next generation of web products and services, coming soon to a browser near you”. In contrast with an opinion in my local English speaking community, I offer this contrast from an Indian colleague at http://world-howiseeit.blogspot.com/
“It’s very good that the language is inclusive and adapts to changing times but there is a thin line between flexibility and weakness.” He goes on to post:
“I don’t think Web 2.0, Jai Ho or nOOb deserves a place in the official dictionary. At this rate English must recognize all the commands and mnemonics used by the software community like MOV, MVI (move immediate), printf, malloc etc. For God’s sake why ‘jai-ho’? It’s a good term in Hindi not English.”
Well, my learned friend in a giant country that has so many languages and has also embraced English; I feel that every blog, byte, tweet and Facebook Entry brings us ever closer to turning our Ancient Greek foundation into a fast forward geek future.
At least, we are all writing more and words are flowing, kind of, in a sorta way, omg, I’ll bbiab with a nu blog, k?
Tags: English Usage, Ganesh Ram, India blog comment, New words, Starting a Blog
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