It’s the language of choice in many countries, including ours. It replaced French as the preeminent language of the business world around 70-80 years ago. So, while the rest of the world is learning the language this country was founded on, the U.S. is becoming less and less of the English-speaking world.
The Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) came out with a report based on newly released Census Bureau numbers that shows that nearly 67 million people living in the U.S., regardless of immigration status, speak a language other than English in the home.
Here are some interesting factoids from the report:
- The actual number of people speaking a language other than English at home has “more than doubled since 1990, and almost tripled since 1980.
- The percentage of of U.S. residents speak another language has risen to an astronomical 21.8 percent, “roughly double the 11 percent in 1980.
- “…nearly half (48.2 percent) of residents in America’s five largest cities now speak a language other than English at home.”
- “…nearly one in four public school students now speaks a language other than English at home.”
- “The largest numerical increases from 2010 to 2017 were among speakers of Spanish (up four million); Chinese (up 653,000); Arabic (up 363,000); Hindi (up 254,000); Telugu (up 192,000); Tagalog (up 173,000); Haitian Creole (up 140,000); Bengali (up 128,000); Urdu (up 118,000); and Vietnamese (up 117,000).”
- “Of those who speak a foreign language at home, 25.9 million (39 percent) told the Census Bureau that they speak English less than very well.”
It’s bad enough that a lot of people whose first language is English can’t speak it properly, and that PC-culture has bastardized the language as well, but when almost half of the country’s five largest cities speak a language other than that of the country they currently inhabit, communication among the masses suffers.
It also doesn’t help that the rest of the world is getting stronger in terms of understanding the English language while the U.S. is lacking in that department. In 2012, Forbes reported that two billion people will be studying English by 2020. We only have around 325 million people in the U.S. That means that a third of the rest of the world will gain in terms of their English acumen while the U.S. falls back.
Couple all of that with the fact that the U.S. ranks 24th in reading among 71 other countries, according to the 2015 Program for International Student Assessment (PISA) report.
It’s really sad that the English language has been so discounted in favor of so-called “tolerance.” If used correctly, English can be one of the most beautiful languages in the world. Those who use it as their primary language have just become so used to it that they don’t give it the value it deserves.
H/T: Daily Mail