HISTORY OF MODERN LANGUAGES A modern language is any human language that is currently in use.

The term is used in language education to distinguish between languages which are used for day-to-day communication (such as French and German) and dead classical languages such as Latin, Attic Greek, Sanskrit, and Classical Chinese, which are studied for their cultural or linguistic value. Modern languages are taught extensively around the world. Each country has a different number of modern languages that they have common knowledge of. However, it is highly suggested that in the spirit of improvement, at least one additional language should be learned.

Examples of modern language: French Spanish Arabic Japanese Chinese German Italian Russian

Language with more than 100 million native speakers today Language Family Native Total Other estimates Rank

Mandarin

Sino-Tibetan, Chinese

One of the six official languages of 1025 the United Nations. 845 million (2000) million All varieties of Chinese language: 1,200 million (2000) 400 million native., 500 million total (2009).

Spanish (Castilian)

Indo-European, Romance

329 million (19862000)

390 million One of the six official languages of the United Nations. 450 million total, up to 1.8 billion

English

Indo-European,

328 million

Germanic

(20002006)

total (first, second and foreign language spoken One of the six official languages of the United Nations. 490 million total. Higher estimates of 405 native speakers, such as the 2000 4 million Indian census, may include other (1999) Hindi languages

Hindi-Urdu Indo-European, (Hindustani) Indic

240 million (19911997)

Arabic

Afro-Asiatic, Semitic

(206M is 'all Arabic varieties'; 221M is Arabic 280 million native. 452 'macrolanguage', million not counting (1999) One of the six official languages of Hassaniya; 232M the United Nations. is sum of counts for all dialects) 181 million (19972001) 250 million 220 million native, 240 million total.

Bengali

Indo-European, Indic Indo-European, Romance Indo-European, Slavic Japonic

67

Portuguese

193 178 million (1998) million

67

Russian

Ethnologue estimate misses ~12 million in Angola 250 One of the six official languages of 144 million (2002) million the United Nations.[8] 122 million (1985) 123 million

Japanese

Asia Most children learn an official version of their native language or learn a local major lingua franca (for example Mandarin) in Asia-Pacific countries, and all subjects are taught in that lingua franca language except for foreign language lessons. Singapore, in which English is taught as a first language, is an exception. In India, where English is used for official communication, children learn to speak their native language at home, but English is usually used as the medium of instruction and taught as a first language in school. English is the most-studied foreign language in the People's Republic of China, Japan, South Korea, and Taiwan. In China, English is a required language starting in third grade, although the quality of instruction varies greatly and most Chinese citizens do not speak it well.

Malaysia In Malaysia, Malay and English are taught as compulsory languages from the first year of primary school with the exception of publicly funded vernacular schools (known as national type schools). In the latter, either Mandarin or Tamil are taught as additional compulsory languages. In non-vernacular schools, all subjects with the exception of the sciences and mathematics are taught in Malay. In vernacular schools, all subjects with the exception of the sciences and mathematics are taught in the primary language that is used in the respective schools. The sciences and mathematics are taught in English, although some Mandarin vernacular schools have dispensation to teach those subjects concurrently in Mandarin.

Middle East and North Africa Language study in the Middle East and North Africa varies from one country to another, usually depending on the foreign nation that colonized or occupied the country. For instance, in Algeria, Morocco, and Tunisia, French is the most widely-studied language besides the native Arabic, while in Egypt and the Gulf countries (such as the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, and Oman), English is the main supplementary language. The teaching of languages other than Arabic is uncommon in some countries, such as Iraq, the Palestinian Authority, Saudi Arabia, Syria, and Yemen. In these countries, English and other foreign languages tend to be offered as subjects only in certain, wealthier schools.

European Union In all European Union school systems, it is mandatory to study at least one foreign language at some stage during the school career; there is a tendency for this to start earlier, even in the first year of primary school. Additional languages can be chosen as an optional subject. The most common foreign language chosen is increasingly English (the most popular first foreign

language in 23 of the 25 EU Member States which do not have English as the language of instruction), followed by French and German. Some 90% of pupils learn English as a foreign language, whether the choice of language is obligatory or parental. Teaching is largely provided by generalist teachers in primary school and by specialists in middle and secondary schools. An exception to this is Ireland, where Irish Gaelic and English are the only mandatory languages, although the majority of students also study a modern language as it may be compulsory to do so at second level.

United Kingdom All children of the United Kingdom learn English at school. In Wales, all children at English language medium state schools learn Welsh as a second language until the age of 16, which is mainly taught through the medium of English. Welsh language schools teach entirely though the medium of Welsh.In addition, Modern Foreign Languages is a compulsory component in the state education system. At least one language is studied until the end of Key Stage 3. Particular schools may require younger students to study additional languages, and they may be given the option to continue these. Schools are required to teach a program of languages according to local and national guidelines. From 2010, all primary school pupils in Key Stage 2 (aged 7 11) will be entitled to some teaching of a modern foreign language. English is taught to immigrant adults and youths as necessary.

United States All children learn English at school in the United States. In public school districts containing large numbers of immigrant children, bilingual education, in which instruction is initially largely taught in the student's native language, may be offered, though this practice is controversial.American students are increasingly advised (and at times required) to study a foreign-language course in high school, and often also at the university level. In addition, a growing number of school districts are offering foreign-language courses at the elementary and middle school levels, usually on an optional basis.

HISTORY OF LANGUAGE

Mandarin The present Chinese language varieties developed out of the different ways in which dialects of Old Chinese and Middle Chinese evolved. Traditionally seven major groups of dialects have been recognized. Aside from Mandarin, the other six are Wu Chinese, Hakka Chinese, Min Chinese, Xiang Chinese, Yue Chinese and Gan Chinese. More recently, other, more specific groups have been recognized. After the fall of the Northern Song dynasty, northern China was under the control of the Jin (Jurchen) and Yuan (Mongol) dynasties. During this period a new common speech developed, based on the dialects of the North China Plain around the capital, a language referred to as Old Mandarin. New genres of vernacular literature were based on this language, including verse, drama and story forms. The rhyming conventions of the new verse were codified in a rhyme dictionary called the Zhongyuan Yinyun (1324). A radical departure from the rhyme table tradition that had evolved over the previous centuries, this dictionary contains a wealth of information on the phonology of Old Mandarin. Further sources are the 'Phags-pa script based on the Tibetan alphabet, which was used to write several of the languages of the Mongol empire including Chinese, and the Menggu Ziyun, a rhyme dictionary based on 'Phags-pa. The rhyme books differ in some details, but overall show many of the features characteristic of modern Mandarin dialects, such as the reduction and disappearance of final stop consonants and the reorganization of the Middle Chinese tones. In Middle Chinese, initial stops and affricates showed a three-way contrast between voiceless unaspirated, voiceless aspirated and voiced consonants. There were four tones, with the fourth, or "entering tone", comprising syllables ending in stops (-p, -t or -k). Syllables with voiced initials tended to be pronounced with a lower pitch, and by the late Tang Dynasty each of the tones had split into two registers conditioned by the initials. When voicing was lost in all dialects except the Wu group, this distinction became phonemic, and the system of initials and tones was re-arranged differently in each of the major groups

French

French is a Romance language (meaning that it is descended primarily from Vulgar Latin) that evolved out of the Gallo-Romance dialects spoken in northern France. The Romance languages are a group of closely related vernaculars descended from the LATIN LANGUAGE, a member of the Italic branch of INDO-EUROPEAN LANGUAGES. The designation Romance is derived from the Latin phrase romanica loqui, "to speak in Roman fashion," which attests to the popular, rather than literary, origins of the languages. The Romance languages that have acquired national standing as the official tongues of their countries are French, with approximately 98 million speakers living principally in France, Belgium, Switzerland, Canada, and parts of Africa; Italian, with 65 million speakers in Italy, Switzerland, and parts of Africa; Portuguese, with 137 million speakers in Portugal, Brazil, and parts of Africa and Asia; Spanish, with 231 million speakers in Spain, Latin America, and parts of the Caribbean; and Romanian, with 25 million speakers in Romania and other parts of the Balkans. Several distinct Romance languages function as non-national, regional vernaculars. Among these are Rheto-Romance, or Rhaetian, which consists of a group of related languages spoken in Switzerland, where they are called Romansch, and in northern Italy, where they are called Ladin or Friulian. In southern France, Provenal, or Occitan, is spoken by about 12 million people. Formerly more unified as a literary language, Provenal now consists of a series of local dialects. Romance creoles, whose origins are found in PIDGINS or simplified trade languages, have also sprung up around the world. Haitian and Louisiana French are such languages, as are the varieties of Portuguese found in Macao and Goa. From the evidence of Latin grammarians, popular playwrights, and inscriptions, it is apparent that in Republican Rome the spoken language of the lower classes was undergoing modifications in pronunciation and grammar that ultimately were to differentiate it from the written language and the language of the privileged. During the period of empire and Roman expansion, it was this Latin of the people, so-called Vulgar Latin, that was carried to the far-flung provinces by soldiers, merchants, and colonists.

Spanish

Spanish is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia during the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the later Medieval period. Modern Spanish developed with the readjustment of consonants (reajuste de las sibilantes) that began in 15th century. The language continues to adopt foreign words from a variety of other languages as well as developing new words. Spanish was taken most notably to the Americas as well as to Africa and Asia Pacific with the expansion of the Spanish Empire between the 15th and 19th centuries, where it became the most important language for government and trade. Castilian emerged from its ancestral Vulgar Latin (common Latin) dialects in the 9th century. Latin had been brought to Iberia by the Romans during the Second Punic War around 210 BC, absorbing influences from the native Iberian languages such as Celtiberian, Basque and other paleohispanic languages. Later, it gained other external influences, most notably from the Arabic of the later Al-Andalus period. Local versions of Vulgar Latin evolved into Castilian in the central-north of Iberia, in an area defined by the then remote crossroad strips of Alava, Cantabria, Burgos, Soria and La Rioja, within the Kingdom of Castile. In this formative stage, Castilian developed a strongly differing variant from its close cousin, Leonese, and was distinguished by a heavy Basque influence.This distinctive dialect progressively spread south with the advance of the Reconquista, and so gathered a sizable lexical influence from Al-Andalus Arabic, especially in the later Medieval period. In the fifteenth century, in a process similar to that affecting other Romance languages, Castilian underwent a dramatic change with the Readjustment of the Consonants (Reajuste de las sibilantes). Typical features of Spanish diachronic phonology include lenition (Latin vita, Spanish vida), palatalisation (Latin annum, Spanish ao, and Latin anellum, Spanish anillo) and diphthongisation (stem-changing) of stressed short e and o from Vulgar Latin (Latin terra, Spanish tierra; Latin novus, Spanish nuevo). From the 16th century onwards, the language was taken to the Americas and the Spanish East Indies via Spanish colonization. Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra is a so well-known reference in the world that Spanish is often called la lengua de Cervantes ("the language of Cervantes").[16] In the 20th century, Spanish was introduced to Equatorial Guinea and the Western Sahara, and to areas of the United States that had not been part of the Spanish Empire, such as Spanish Harlem in New York City.

Italian

Linguistically speaking, the Italian language is a member of the Romance group of the Italic subfamily of the Indo-European family of languages. It is spoken principally in the Italian peninsula, southern Switzerland, San Marino, Sicily, Corsica, northern Sardinia, and on the northeastern shore of the Adriatic Sea, as well as in North and South America. Considered a single language with numerous dialects, Italian, like the other Romance languages, is the direct offspring of the Latin spoken by the Romans and imposed by them on the peoples under their dominion. Of all the major Romance languages, Italian retains the closest resemblance to Latin. The struggle between the written but dead language and the various forms of the living speech, most of which were derived from Vulgar Latin, was nowhere so intense or so protracted as in Italy. During the long period of the evolution of Italian, many dialects sprang up. The multiplicity of these dialects and their individual claims upon their native speakers as pure Italian speech presented a peculiar difficulty in the evolution of an accepted form of Italian that would reflect the cultural unity of the entire peninsula. Even the earliest popular Italian documents, produced in the 10th century, are dialectal in language, and during the following three centuries Italian writers wrote in their native dialects, producing a number of competing regional schools of literature. During the 14th century the Tuscan dialect began to predominate, because of the central position of Tuscany in Italy, and because of the aggressive commerce of its most important city, Florence. Moreover, of all the Italian dialects, Tuscan departs least in morphology and phonology from classical Latin, and it therefore harmonizes best with the Italian traditions of Latin culture. Finally, Florentine culture produced the three literary artists who best summarized Italian thought and feeling of the late Middle Ages and early Renaissance: Dante, Petrarca, and Boccaccio

Arabic

Modern Standard Arabic belongs to the Semitic language family. Semitic languages have a recorded history going back thousands of years, one of the most extensive continuous archives of documents belonging to any human language group. While the origins of the Semitic language family are currently in dispute among scholars, there is agreement that they flourished in the Mediterranean Basin area, especially in the Tigris-Euphrates river basin and in the coastal areas of the Levant. The Semitic language family is a descendant of proto-Semitic, an ancient language that was exclusively spoken and has no written record. This relationship places Arabic firmly in the AfroAsiatic group of world languages. Specifically, Arabic is part of the Semitic subgroup of AfroAsiatic languages. Going further into the relationship between Arabic and the other Semitic languages, Modern Arabic is considered to be part of the Arab-Canaanite sub-branch the central group of the Western Semitic languages. Thus, to review, while Arabic is not the oldest of the Semitic languages, its roots are clearly founded in a Semitic predecessor. Aside from Arabic, the Semitic language family includes Hebrew, Aramaic, Maltese, Amharic, Tigrinya, Tigre, Gurage, Geez, Syrica, Akkadian, Phonoecian, Punic, Ugaritic, Nabatean, Amorite and Moabite. While a majority of these are now considered "dead" languages, either entirely obsolete or used only in religious practice, Arabic has flourished. The reason for this is inextricably linked with the rise of Islam and, more specifically, Islams holy book, the Quran. There are three distinct forms of Arabic. Classical or Quranical Arabic, Formal or Modern Standard Arabic and Spoken or Colloquial Arabic. Classical Arabic is the form of Arabic literally found in the Quran. It is used neither in conversation, nor in non-religious writing. As such, Classical Arabic is primarily learned for reading and reciting Islamic religious texts. While the first documented record of written Arabic dates from the early 4th century AD, its use in the early 7th century as the language of the Quran led Arabic to become the major world language that it is today. As Islam spread throughout the world, its chosen language did as well. Coupled with the rise of Islam, Arabic became the language of government as well as religion. Within 100 years after the introduction of the Quran, Arabic became the official language of a world empire whose boundaries stretched from the Oxus River in Central Asia to the Atlantic Ocean, and even northward into the Iberian Peninsula of Europe. As Islam continued to spread through the world, Arabic inherently followed.

English Language

The history of the English language really started with the arrival of three Germanic tribes who invaded Britain during the 5th century AD. These tribes, the Angles, the Saxons and the Jutes, crossed the North Sea from what today is Denmark and northern Germany. At that time the inhabitants of Britain spoke a Celtic language. But most of the Celtic speakers were pushed west and north by the invaders - mainly into what is now Wales, Scotland and Ireland. The Angles came from Englaland and their language was called Englisc - from which the words England and English are derived. Old English (450-1100 AD) The invading Germanic tribes spoke similar languages, which in Britain developed into what we now call Old English. Old English did not sound or look like English today. Native English speakers now would have great difficulty understanding Old English. Nevertheless, about half of the most commonly used words in Modern English have Old English roots. The words be, strong and water, for example, derive from Old English. Old English was spoken until around 1100. Middle English (1100-1500) In 1066 William the Conqueror, the Duke of Normandy (part of modern France), invaded and conquered England. The new conquerors (called the Normans) brought with them a kind of French, which became the language of the Royal Court, and the ruling and business classes. For a period there was a kind of linguistic class division, where the lower classes spoke English and the upper classes spoke French. In the 14th century English became dominant in Britain again, but with many French words added. This language is called Middle English. It was the language of the great poet Chaucer (c1340-1400), but it would still be difficult for native English speakers to understand today. Early Modern English (1500-1800) Towards the end of Middle English, a sudden and distinct change in pronunciation (the Great Vowel Shift) started, with vowels being pronounced shorter and shorter. From the 16th century the British had contact with many peoples from around the world. This, and the Renaissance of Classical learning, meant that many new words and phrases entered the language. The invention of printing also meant that there was now a common language in print. In 1604 the first English dictionary was published. Late Modern English (1800-Present) The main difference between Early Modern English and Late Modern English is vocabulary. Late Modern English has many more words, arising from two principal factors: firstly, the Industrial Revolution and technology created a need for new words; secondly, the British Empire at its height covered one quarter of the earth's surface, and the English language adopted foreign words from many countries.