ESL Blogs

     "It may not be the most beautiful of tongues, but in this day and age, it’s indispensable", - says Jean-Paul Nerriere. Nerriere is a retired French businessman, a retired vice-president of IBM in the United States, who made an interesting discovery.

     Throughout his career, he conducted a lot of international business and realised he had an easier time talking to non-native English speakers than he did with actual business colleagues from England. And that’s why Nerriere invented "Globish". His two books, Don’t Speak English, Parlez Globish and Découvrez le Globish, became bestsellers in France and were also published in Spain, Italy, South Korea and Canada. They are also being translated into Japanese.

English

There are 615000 words in the Oxford English Dictionary. This is a collection of all the words that have been used in the English language. Very few native English speakers know more than 80000 of these words (on their best day). And though they may remember 80000 words, very few native English speakers will use more than 7500 English words in their communication.

Globish

The English Language can be extremely complicated if an English speaker or writer wants to show off all of its possibilities in words and structure to other English speakers. However, the form of English called Globish gives us a simpler, more universal tool to communicate with more than 5 times as many people.

      Globish is essentially a very basic version of English. It only has 1,500 words and its users must avoid humour, metaphor, abbreviation and anything else that can cause cross-cultural confusion. It has been invented for the practical purpose of communicating between cultures in a primitive, yet clear way.

     "It’s not a language, it’s a tool",  -  he says.  "A language is the vehicle of a culture. Globish doesn't want to be that at all. It’s only a means of communication."

     The simple goal of Globish is to reach only a level -- a common ground -- where everyone understands everyone else, everywhere in the world In the business world, there are more and more non-native English speakers that must communicate in English but just don’t have the level. For them, it’s much easier to learn Globish than it is to learn English. 

What do you think is it a good idea and will Globish become more important in the future or not?

If all the non-native speakers learn Globish, how is that going to affect native English speakers?

Do you think Globish will eventually give native Englishspeakers a disadvantage in the business world?

I am looking forward to your thoughts, ideas, opinions.

-Valentine-